8Asians.com | Archive | February, 2010

For The Love of Tiger Art Show Opening

By Moye | Wednesday, February 3, 2010

My favorite artist, Martin Hsu will be commemorating the 2010 Chinese New Year with a special art show, For the Love of the Tiger.

According to the Chinese horoscopes (and as my mom like to remind me every time she yells at me), those born in the year of the Tiger are passionate, independent, quick-tempered and competitive. For Martin, this Chinese New Year is also about bringing awareness to the endangered tigers of the world.

Traditionally, tigers are the guardians of children in Chinese folktales. Under the circumstances, I thought it’d be interesting to reverse the roles and have the children become protectors for such an important animal.

So kick off 2010 by supporting the arts with this special show at Munky King in Los Angeles. For the Love of the Tiger also features the talented works of Andrew Brandou and will run from February 11th to March 11th, 2010. See you there!

| Posted in The Arts | No Comments

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Reckless Tortuga on Asian Tattoos and Clothing

By Guest Writer | Wednesday, February 3, 2010

By Kristian

“If you’re not Asian, stay away from Asian characters! Shay Shay.”

You’ve seen them on the street and maybe you’re dating them. Non Asians wearing clothing or tattoos of Chinese & Japanese characters is nothing new. However, it is pretty hilarious finding out that a lot of these people don’t even know that a lot of these characters are not translated properly. This is currently a problem for people interested in getting Baybayin tattoos, the writing system that Filipinos used before they were colonized by Spain. This PSA parody from the popular comedic group Reckless Tortuga tries to address this issue but fails in their delivery. The comedic group has come out with a lot of hilarious sketches but like many comedians who have very little understanding of Asian culture they just appear ignorant and end up embarrassing themselves. I cringed near the end of this video with their mispronunciation of 谢谢 (xie xie), “thank you” in Mandarin.

About Kristian: Kristian is the creator and blogger of Fil-Am Ako.

| Posted in (featured), Lifestyles, Observations | 11 Comments

Shopping With GASP!

[Feb 5] NORTHERN CA: GO!STYLE: A Bay Area Locally Produced, Large Scale, APIA Variety Concert

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[Feb 5] NORTHERN CA: Lost and Found Art Exhibition

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Asian American Commercial Watch: Radio Shack

By John | Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Radio Shack just launched this inexplicable commercial titled “Sensei” promoting the fact that they carry cell phones from three different wireless carriers: AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint. All the elements of an annoying commercial for Asian Americans – a stereotypical screaming kung fu master. I’m trying to figure out which commercial is more annoying – this one or this Six Flags commercial… Actually, no, I think this KFC commercial annoys me the most. At least when Palm launched the Pre, Palm demonstrated that you could command an army of Asian dancers – that would make me buy a phone.

| Posted in (featured), Entertainment, Observations | 10 Comments

An Asian American Basketball Player to Watch: Nicole Hung

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Harvard-Westlake of North Hollywood’s Nicole Hung was selected as California State Athlete of the week by ESPN’s Calhisports.com. Not only is she a great basketball player, scoring 24 points and pulling down 12 rebounds in a recent 70-67 victory, but this 6-0 girl has a 4.2 GPA, plays piano like a concert pianist, and plays bassoon in the Harvard-Westlake High School orchestra. Her team is California’s #1 ranked Division 4 team (#5 overall), and she’s headed to Princeton. Does that remind anyone else of a certain Asian American Ivy league basketball player?

8Asians Talkabout: Bong Joon-ho’s “Mother”

By Guest Writer | Monday, February 1, 2010

Every so often, we get clips of movies: In this case, MOTHER 마더, Korea’s official entry to the 2010 Academy Awards Foreign Language Film and directorial follow-up to Bong Joon-ho’s 2006 horror movie, The Host. The link to the trailer was sent to the 8Asians mailing list, to which the following conversation ensues:

Jun: the movie has been available online for a while now if you do a little googling. [It] did well both critically and at the box office in Korea. I didn’t think was that amazing of a movie; I tend to think Korean directors overplay the retarded/mentally challenged character role, so I I’m always biased on the negative side on those types of movies. But the scene in the field of the mother dancing was epic.
Christine: I already saw this film and met the director; it was OK. I like his other one better — incapable characters annoy me. The best part is that I saw it as part of a VISA Screening room event and got a whole bunch of Ferrero Roche chocolates.
Jee: Okay, I might really hate you if you met Won Bin. I LOVE him. Okay, I don’t really love him. I just think he’s major eye-candy. A while back i saw photos of him holding kids in Africa and I about died. It made me want to have his children. Well, sorta. I’ve been wanting to see it, but anytime a movie depicts a person living with a disability mistreated, I cry all liquids out of my body, so I haven’t brought myself to do it yet.

But enough about us: for those that have seen it, what do you think?

| Posted in Movies, Reviews, TalkAbout | No Comments

San Jose Gets A Vietnamese-American Deputy Chief Of Police

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If you’re familiar with San Jose local news, then you’re already aware that the city’s Police Department isn’t in the best standing with the local Vietnamese population. This following the police shooting of mentally-ill Daniel Pham in the backyard of his home, and the violent, videotaped arrest of San Jose State University student Phuong Ho. Last week, San Jose Police Chief Rob Davis announced the appointment of Captain Phan S. Ngo, filling one of 4 deputy chief positions. As a child, Ngo was airlifted out of Saigon during the last days of the Vietnam War. He is the first Vietnamese American to serve as a deputy chief in San Jose, and also believed to be the highest-ranking Vietnamese-American officer on any major U.S. police department. Ngo also becomes the only nonwhite member of Davis’ top command staff, filling a job that has been open for months. Congratulations to Deputy Chief Ngo!

Extraordinary Measures: Another Case of Yellowface in Hollywood

By Linda | Monday, February 1, 2010

extraordinary measures Extraordinary Measures: Another Case of Yellowface in Hollywood When I first saw the movie poster for Extraordinary Measures, starring Brendan Fraser and Harrison Ford, I had no idea what it was about. I guessed Harrison Ford played some kind of heroic character, but beyond that, I had no idea. Nor did I really care — the movie poster looked “eh.”

Then I read this article on racebending.com and found out that Harrison Ford’s character, a doctor who finds a cure for Pompe disease, is actually based on an Asian doctor, Dr. Yuan-Tsong Chen. Here is a portion of Roger Ebert’s review of the movie:

Dr. Robert Stonehill doesn’t exist in real life. The Pompe cure was developed by and his colleagues while he was at Duke University. He is now director of the Institute of Biomedical Science in Taiwan. Harrison Ford, as this film’s executive producer, perhaps saw Stonehill as a plum role for himself; a rewrite was necessary because he couldn’t very well play Dr. Chen. The real Chen, a Taiwan University graduate, worked his way up at Duke from a residency to professor and chief of medical genetics at the Duke University Medical Center. He has been mentioned as a Nobel candidate.

I know this isn’t the first time a Caucasian actor was hired to play a role based on an Asian or Asian American — far from it. But that doesn’t make it any more bearable each time it happens. I’ve always had respect for Harrison Ford as an actor, but I wonder if the movie — which opened to just $7 million this weekend, for 7th place — would’ve been better had an unknown Asian actor been cast. I understand the studio probably wanted a famous actor to carry the role. Yet, if you look at previous unknowns like Gabourey Sidibe in Precious and Carey Mulligan in An Education, you know this is the year of the breakout star.

I don’t know about you, but I believe America is more than ready for Asian Americans starring in non-martial arts films. Even if Hollywood isn’t.

| Posted in (featured), Discrimination, Movies | 9 Comments