Paul Fong, “Godfather” of Silicon Valley’s Asian American’s political community and current California State Assembly member, last week introduced resolution ACR 42 calling on the state of California to offer the first formal apology to Chinese Americans for unjust laws and discrimination dating from the Gold Rush Era to the 1940’s:
“Unjust laws include foreign miner’s tax on all gold found, prohibition to marry the person of your choice, Chinese Exclusion Act, prohibition to buy a home and work for a state, county or city entity. ACR 42 also recognizes the work Chinese in California performed on the Transcontinental Railroad and their contributions to the success of California’s fishing and agricultural industries. In addition, Chinese in California helped build the Delta levees.”
I previously mentioned the famous 1869 photo capturing the joining of the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad at Promontory Point where not one Chinese laborer was included in the photo, even though up to 12,000 Chinese worked for Central Pacific, making up to 90% of the workforce. But photos can lie, with history is often written by the victors. And sometimes, history needs to be corrected.
Not many Americans were taught the very racist and exclusionary practices of America’s past when regarding Chinese Americans in the 18th and 19th century, let alone the internment of over 120,000 Japanese Americans during World War II (which the United States formally apologized for paid reparations, albeit in 1988.)
I’m sure many Californians will complain about any such efforts regarding addressing past injustices of discrimination, especially with the state of California falling apart and dealing with a massive budget deficit. But these resolutions don’t actually take up all the of the legislature’s time — it’s not like everyone in the state senate and assembly can’t be working on other matters when there is time in between negotiating budget compromises and votes. I’m glad that at least someone is trying to redress such past discriminatory acts; the longer these acts are left behind and forgotten, the harder they are to go back to to redress. In an interview, Fong expresses part of his family’s experience and his personal motivation for introducing the resolution:
“Growing up in his family’s flower business, Fong heard many stories about the hard life of Chinese immigrants, building railroads, mines and irrigation systems. They weren’t allowed in public schools, couldn’t vote and couldn’t marry a white person. Fong’s grandfather was detained for two months on Angel Island in 1939 and had to wait for several years to be reunited with his wife and daughter, Fong’s mother.”
Ultimately, a formal apology for past injustices would serve more to educate, inform and redress past official policies of the state of California — and hopefully in the future, the United States federal government.
As the old saying goes, “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” Let’s not repeat history when history has proven past actions wrong. For this reason, I personally want to wish Assembly Member Fong all the best in trying to get ACR 42 passed, and hopefully get a federal apology of past unjust laws and discrimination.
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Crazy weight loss gimmicks are certainly not unique to Japan, but I’m trying to figure out why anyone would use this “Boneless Belt” underneath their clothes. An anonymous commenter says that “the name supposedly comes from the term “boneless ham,” which is basically the japanese version of calling somebody a ‘muffin top.’ Imagine a big fat ham with that net around it, and the meat pushing out through the net.”
Yuck. So why would you do this on purpose? Supposedly, the belt actually helps you lose weight!
From Inventor Spot:
In effect, the structure of the rubber belt is a large mesh grid that splits the dieter’s belly, side and back fat into easily manageable blobs. This allows for increased metabolic consumption of calories and raises the propensity for increased blood flow values. More blood flow = more heat = more burning of fat. Got it? Good… What’s NOT good is that a multitude of fat blobs are squeezed out in a manner that disturbingly resembles mini-boobs.
If you really want to buy one, check out the Japanese Yahoo store which offers them.
Or, you can save yourself 4,000 yen and the trauma of seeing yourself as a blobular mess by just hopping on a treadmill, instead.
Shopping With GASP!
Okay, so by now we know that suicide is the second-leading cause for death for Asian American women ages 15-24, the highest rate of all ethnicities. We’ve blogged about the pressure from parents to achieve academically, and even the study on how organized religion may drive Asian American teenagers to depression.
And now for an article that pretty much contradicts everything we’ve previously blogged about: a recent study featured in a LA Times Health article asserts that family involvement and obligation doesn’t drive Asian American youth to suicide, but may actually lessen depressive symptoms. From the authors of study: “Programs geared toward immigrant youth from cultures where family obligation is central could emphasize youth’s collective identity to strengthen ties to their family and culture and, in the process, remind youth of their family obligation.” But cultural pressures and family obligation aren’t necessarily binary, as Tim points out in a recent internal e-mail thread:
I agree with both sides of the coin. The push to succeed does increase the suicide rate, but I also believe the family ties help prevent the person from going through with it. In Asian (specifically Chinese) culture there’s such strong family ties, that even if you hate your dad (for example) or feel such strong pressure to succeed, you probably still feel strongly attached to a sibling or the other parent, who you’d want to protect, and you’d feel guilty for leaving them if you killed yourself. So I’m sure there’s some degree of truth to both.
Former Best Group Weblog competitor Jezebel posted a photograph from Bangkok featuring a mother cleaning her daughter’s ear with a Q-tip, although I have no idea what this has to do with the recession hitting the Thai economy.
My first thought upon seeing the photo was along the lines of “I wish my mom was here to clean my ears for me again. Good times!” but a look at the comments made me realize how different this pastime was for non-Asians.
Apparently we’re the one of the few populations who likes to clean our ears with a scooped pick because — aside from the fact that it FEELS SO GOOD — we’ve got a unique type of ear wax: it’s dry, yellow, flaky and scoopable; just as my childhood doctor used to say, like potato chips!
Non-Asians have a goopy ear wax, which is just weird. I mean, wouldn’t you rather have potato chips congregating in your ear canal than ooze?
I’m kidding; it’s not weird. But I’m sad that much of America is missing out on what I consider the most comforting and satisfying feeling in the world: laying your head down on your mother’s lap while she gently scratches the inside of your ear. Mmm.
I found myself wanting to know more about the person behind that awesome video DEADLINE, so I reached out to the creator, Bang-yao Liu (劉邦耀), who was kind enough to answer 8 Questions (the first in a new series) for 8Asians.
It turns out that he’s actually a graduate student getting his MFA in Taiwan, but was in the US taking undergrad classes as a part of his scholarship. He shares more with us, including some exclusive behind-the-scene photos, too… thanks, Bang-yao!
8Qs for Bang-yao Liu
1 ) What part of Taiwan are you from?
I was born in Hsinchu city and study in Taipei.2 ) Do you plan to return to Taiwan after you are done with school or to stay in the United States?
Actually, I am a graduate student in Taipei National University of the Arts (TNUA). I am a transfer and visiting student to SCAD for one year because of a scholarship from Taiwan Ministry of Education (MOE); this program only lets me to take undergrad classes at SCAD, but that is still good though.When I finish this scholar(ship) program, I will have to go back to Taiwan. I can not stay here over one year. However, I would like to work in United States or other country if I have the opportunities, but I have to finish my MFA degree in TNUA and one year military service first. It sounds complicated, doesn’t it?
3 ) What are your career aspirations?
I wish I can be a filmmaker someday, it is a long road to go, I think. I will just keep learning, create more, and have fun with doing animation.4 ) What color of Post-Its did you use most of?
Pink and blue.5 ) Did you run into any unanticipated problems while producing DEADLINE?
A lot. The biggest problem is “time”. Actually, the original animatic is longer than the final film. Why did not finished it is because where I shoot is a classroom; I only can use it on weekends. So it took us two weekends, almost four days unsleep, to finish it. After that is the final of the quarter.6 ) Did you have a lot of leftover Post-Its and what did you do with them?
Part of them I gave to my friends, and other were throw away. It depends on the post-it is still sticky to use or not.7 ) Can you share any other “behind the scenes trivia” about your production?
I want to share some photos of my friend. We have fun with that. [See below]8 ) Do you have any future projects planned or anything else you’d like to share?
I already have a new concept in my mind, it is quite different. I will start to plan it later.
Bang-yao was nice enough to share exclusive photos of Chun-yao Huang, Jay Tseng, and Kelly Wang — some of the many people who worked on DEADLINE! 謝謝, Bang-yao!
The internet has been pretty good to Goh Nakamura. After becoming a YouTube celebrity for his video Embarcadero Blues, he returned the favor to his Internet fans by making MP3′s from his newest album, Ulysses, available for free.
But an artist can’t pay water bills and buy groceries off of downloading MP3 or clicking a shiny silver arrow on YouTube, which means if you want to truly support the artist you’ll need to invariably throw down some money for an physical album — or, even better, buy merchandise from a live show. But if you’re not geographically close to the San Francisco Bay Area, you can still watch Goh Nakamura work his magic — he’ll be streaming a live performance via his website tomorrow, 8:00pm PST. There’ll be a chat room, and if you’re lucky he’ll be taking requests.
And if you are in the San Francisco Area, what luck — you’ll be able to catch Goh perform with the previously-blogged Jane Lui in an all-ages show at Cafe Du Nord on June 30th; you can watch a recently recorded duet between the two of them on our Tumblr.
In the past two weeks, I noticed the New York Times reporting on college entrance exam preparation in South Korea and in China. The U.S. media often covers how stressful and college entrance exams are in Asia, but rarely do I come across how other region’s higher educational systems admit their students, let alone the academic pressures faced by those students.
Unlike in the United States, “applying” to college in South Korea, China — or for that matter, a lot of other Asian countries like Japan and India — is fairly simple and straight forward: you take one exam, and how well you did on that one exam, will determine which college you can attend (and sometimes which major you can major in):
“In this country, where people’s status and income at 60 are largely determined by which college they entered at 18, South Korean parents’ all-consuming task is to ensure that their children enter an elite university. And that requires a high score on the college entrance exam.”
…
“The Chinese test is in some ways like the American SAT, except that it lasts more than twice as long. The nine-hour test is offered just once a year and is the sole determinant for admission to virtually all Chinese colleges and universities. About three in five students make the cut.”
There are no other factors; no high school grades, no teacher recommendations, no athletic abilities or extracurricular activities which determine whether or not you get into college. And in those countries, which college or university you attend can have a HUGE influence on the rest of your life, setting a path for someone to be a future president or prime minister or future business leader in that country.
In many ways, I admire the simplicity of these examination systems, and in other ways despise them; whether or not these college entrance exams are accurate ways to measure the ability of a high school to succeed in college (or in life, for that matter) may be questionable, I’ve always thought that there was something very orderly, transparent and meritocratic about the process.
Growing up, it has always bothered me that factors such as whether or not a student was the child of an alumnus (the worst unspoken affirmative action program in the United States, if you ask me) or if someone excelled at a sport nothing to do with whether or not they were deserving of attending an academic institution they would have had no chance of getting into. If Asian American immigrant parents realized how important some of these non-academic factors — especially athletics — can play in college admissions, many Asian parents wouldn’t be so singularly focused on academics and draw concern.
However, I do think it is ridiculous to put so much pressure and expectations on a high school student in Asia on one exam that will essentially determine the future of that student into late adulthood. Add to that the fact that Asian educational systems depend on rote memorization, whereas the American system fosters the sense in students to pursue their interests, passions, and an important differentiator, creativity. Memorizing and studying, just for the sake of an entrance exam, to get into the right college seems like a complete waste of time and effort for any society. Singapore has come to realize its educational system’s failures, most notably in the area of creative thinking, which it considers absolutely necessary to compete in the future.
The great irony of the Asian systems is that even as graduate studies improve in Asian countries, the predominate preferred choice for Asians are to still to pursue graduate studies in the United States.
Of course, the American educational system is far from perfect, but it seems that the American media seems to exotify the Asian test taking process a bit too much; I’d much rather read a more balanced approach as to what are the strengths and weaknesses of the educational systems in the United States versus Asia, as well as other parts of the world.
(Image Source: The New York Times)
So You Think You Can Dance seems to have some really good ballet dancers that end up on the show, Danny Tidwell being the most memorable in a recent season. I used to see Danny Tidwell dance with the American Ballet Theater, but sadly for us ballet fans, he left the company, and I was glad to have more chances to see him dance on TV during season three of the TV show.
So when I heard Alex Wong was in the audition footage of this season’s So You Think You Can Dance, I remember being confused. Similarly with Danny Tidwell, I had the privilege of seeing Alex dance with the American Ballet Theater, and then he moved on to Miami City Ballet, one of the U.S. premiere dance companies. About a month ago, he was also promoted to soloist, a huge achievement for Alex, and well deserved. But unlike Danny, Alex is still currently working with a professional company, so I wondered how he even came to audition for the TV show. It was oh-so-dramatic when Alex was eliminated due to his professional obligations, but what great exposure for Alex and the Miami City Ballet; I hope that viewers will realize that there are many, many, really talented dancers in professional ballet companies all around the U.S. who do amazing things artistically and athletically, just like Alex.
Either way, I’m so glad to see Alex getting recognition and giving some credibility to ballet dancers who are extremely gifted and versatile.
Attached is one of my favorite videos of Alex: dressed as a Sancho Panza, a character in the ballet Don Quixote, you won’t have to guess how he spends his downtime backstage. (Seen here with principal soloist Jeremy Cox from Miami City Ballet.)
The Fiancé and I have talked about how many kids we want, and what names we’ll call them. We have more girl names than boy names, mainly because in my opinion, girl names are a lot more fun to think up than boy names. But according to a recent NY Times article, Asian couples living in America — particularly Chinese, Indian and Korean — may face a different scenario. In those communities, there are a disproportionately high number of male children in families with two or more children.
Census survey data from the year 2000 points out that Chinese, Korean and Indian families who already have one daughter are more likely to have a second child who’s a boy; if the first two children are both girls, then the third child is even more likely to be a boy. If at first you don’t succeed in having a son, try, try again. And again. These same families also consider other options to ensure a male birth, like in vitro fertilization or sperm sorting. Or abortion.
Yes, we all know about China’s one-child policy — or, as the Chinese government calls it, the family planning policy — and how that has led to the increase in abortions and infanticides of female babies. And we all know that many Asian cultures prefer male children to female. But I had no idea the bias toward male children had extended to the United States.
Generally, there are slightly more male births in the U.S., by a ratio of 1.05 to 1. But in American families of Chinese, Korean and Indian descent, the likelihood of having a boy after the first child is a girl goes up to 1.17 to 1. If the first two kids are girls, the ratio of the third child being a boy goes up to 1.51 to 1. This doesn’t sound so bad, until you think about the mentality that goes into these numbers. That some families will abort if they find out they’re having a second or third girl.
Suddenly, having an unequal number of boy names and girl names thought up doesn’t seem so important after all.
(Flickr Photo credit: ernop)
Last week, I was looking at the my DVR’s electronic programming guide and wondering why the hell Time’s former Man-of-the-Year David Ho was going to be on the new Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien. Then I saw Steven Ho listed as one of the guests and realized that Dr. Ho’s first name was David, not Steven.
To be honest, before Steven Ho’s appearance on The Tonight Show, I had never heard of him. The stunt coordinator to the stars, he has trained actors including Brad Pitt, Leonardo DiCaprio, James Franco and Tobey McGuire and was once Jet Li’s stunt double. Conan and Steven go through a long sequence of coordinating a series of stunts for a prolonged fight scene, which turns out to be pretty funny; when you see Steven standing next to Conan, Steven looks short, until you realize that Conan is a freakishly tall 6’4″.
The U.S. switched to digital TV last Friday June 12, and it’s estimated there were around 60,000 unprepared households in the San Francisco Bay Area, including many Chinese and Asian elders, who have larger difficulties preparing for the transition than most. Self Help for the Elderly in San Francisco has a DTV assistance center, and has received more than 100 calls an hour since the transition began, mostly from Chinese-speaking callers.
If you have cable or satellite you didn’t have to worry about the digital transition, unless you had someone speaking an Asian language in your home. While cable in the SF Bay Area has been pretty good about carrying some Asian language stations, it doesn’t carry all, and if you had satellite, it’s likely you didn’t have any Asian programming, without ordering a special second package for Asian language TV.
When my parents moved in with my family, after my dad got ill from cancer in 2005, I was faced with the dilemma of finding ways to bring Chinese language TV into my home. Over the air signals were never particularly satisfactory, especially living in San Jose trying to receive dim signals from San Francisco. So we stuck with cable which provided at least one Chinese language station most hours of the day.
Both my parents have since passed away, and I didn’t really bother with the digital TV transition until this past week, when we decided to buy a new flat screen panel TV with an integrated digital tuner. It happens to be mounted in the one location in the house where I don’t have cable run yet, so I stuck some ordinary rabbit ears on the TV to see what kind of reception I could get from an over-the-air signal. While we can’t receive any of the main broadcast networks, it turned out we get really clear PBS, Spanish language, and Asian language stations. To my surprise, I counted at least 5 different channels of Chinese language programming. If only my parents were still around to enjoy them.
If you still need assistance with the digital TV transition or for more information, visit DTV or DTV2009.
Sejal Hathi is an excellent student, earning the highest academic honors at her high school, winning the Presidential Scholar Award and the Principal’s Leadership Award, and going to Yale in the fall. On top of that, she has become an international figure, founding Girls Helping Girls, an international organization in 15 countries that empowers girls by raising funds for scholarships, working with victims of the sex trade and sex trafficking, and providing microloans to enable women to become self-sufficient economically. Here is an interview she did with CNN:
The Daughter, who goes to the same high school from where Sejal just graduated, tells me that Sejal was always on the phone. That isn’t surprising as she must have been managing her foundation and making some high-level appointments, as she has talked to the World Bank, spoke on a panel with the Dalai Lama, and met with Beatriz Merino, the first female prime minister in Latin America, and arranged for her to give a talk at Sejal’s high school. While we have done posts on Asian American whiz kids who excel academically, it is refreshing to do one on a girl who breaks stereotypes of the academically talented yet passive Asian American by being an incredible activist.
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