The Ma family members pose with their former boss David Rathgeber, the former owner of Tisdale Bowling Lanes. (Facebook/Tisdale Bowling Lanes).

By Aaron Schulze

Bowling Owners' Milestone

China to Tisdale: Family celebrates first year in Saskatchewan and the bowling industry

Jul 30, 2020 | 6:12 PM

One year ago, Danni Ma’s parents moved more than halfway across the planet.

Prior to that, Danni was already studying in Saskatchewan. Her parents moved to Tisdale to be closer to their daughter. They worked for Tisdale Bowling Lanes under the previous owner David Rathgeber. Danni said her parents felt bowling was a fun business for the community, which eventually led to them purchasing the bowling alley from Rathgeber on Aug. 1, 2019.

One year later, and there have been plenty of great moments and learning curves. With help from his daughter’s translation skills, Michael Ma told northeastNOW he’s happy his family is in Tisdale.

“They’re not very fluent,” Danni said. “They had received lots of help from David. All the people in Tisdale were very supportive and bared with them. We would like to thank Dave and everybody in town for their consistent support and help.”

Aside from adjusting to a smaller, quieter community than what they were used to, the Ma’s now had a business to focus on. The original Tisdale Bowling Lanes building was built in 1962 and was due for some upgrades. Danni said her family put in new synthetic lanes, scoring systems, and general maintenance such as painting during their first year as owners.

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Perhaps the largest hurdle to overcome in the Ma’s first year of ownership was adjusting to life amidst the coronavirus pandemic. Tisdale Bowling Lanes could reopen on July 6 as part of phase four of Re-Open Saskatchewan. After four months of inaction, the family feels they’re getting back on track.

“We started having people coming in and they said they were very glad the bowling alley was opening again,” Danni said. “We have eight lanes in total, but now due to social distancing guidelines, we only open four. There are bigger workloads, because we have to sanitize the balls, chairs, and tables every time after use. My mom was saying even though it’s very hard and there’s lots of work to do, she wants the people in the community to have a place available to them.”

Looking back at year one of bowling alley ownership, some of the Ma’s memorable moments include getting involved with community initiatives such as Telemiracle and the Better Together program.

For year two, Danni said her father intends to join Youth Bowling Canada in order to give Tisdale bowlers more competitive opportunities, and the family hopes to host more fun-themed events.

To celebrate their anniversary of ownership, the Ma’s and Tisdale Bowling Lanes will host two free hours of bowling on Saturday, Aug. 1 between 1 and 3 p.m.

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aaron.schulze@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @SchulzePANow