Posts by akrypti
small town roots. enthusiast of many trades. oh, and yeah, high-maintenance like you wouldn't believe.
To The White Guy Who Tried To Give Me Pointers On How To Snag A White Guy
To the white guy who tried to give me pointers on how to snag a white guy: My professional obligation in the context at hand was to convince you to sign a contract that would fork over half a million dollars to my company and so I couldn’t say then any of what I am about to say now.
A Response Piece to This American Life’s Monologue on Chinese Factory Life
Listening to “Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory” on NPR’s This American Life left my thoughts in a maelstrom. I was excited because I knew what he was talking about and I agreed. I was flustered because I wanted to say he had no idea what he was talking about and I disagreed. Daisey’s monologue initially inspired me to launch into one of my signature 8A tirades, but then I decided not to. Instead of ranting, which would [...] Continue »
Chinese-Taiwanese Familial Relations
It has not been easy for my Taiwanese family and my Chinese in-laws to understand each other. That is a gross understatement and for now we’ll leave it at that and table the wildly contentious, high-tension stories for another time. While I was aware of the cultural, political, and social differences that left a gap between the two families, I in part hoped it was particular to our personal predicament. Yet I’ve encountered many echoes of [...] Continue »
China Will Never Become a World Power Until It Learns to Respect Intellectual Property
A Chinese businessman tells me offhandedly that he’s under federal investigation. He doesn’t know enough to explain that he’s being investigated for massive amounts of trademark infringement. Those words aren’t in his vocabulary. IP isn’t part of his knowledge set. Instead he says, “You ever heard of Chanel? My factory in China makes Chanel bags. I ship them here and sell in America, in Chinatown. Oh, but my bags are much cheaper than what Chanel sells [...] Continue »
The Perfect Villain: Straight Asian Men
Women get together and complain about men. It happens. Yet no other group of women display such visceral antagonism toward men of their own race as Asian women do. We Asian women never say generally “men are horrible.” We say “Asian men are horrible.” We ourselves buy into the rumor that somehow Asian men are more misogynist than other men. The complaints ring universally: Asian men are more abusive; Asian men are more chauvinistic; Asian [...] Continue »
My Chinese Monster-in-Law
Screw that Confucian nonsense. Let’s not even get into the quagmire of East and West cliches; that exercise has never proven productive. Let’s just state this for what it is: my Chinese mother-in-law is a monster. She objectifies me. I am the wife of her son, a wife that thankfully has credentials she can brag about to her friends. But that’s the extent of it. Actually, my credentials bug her, because it means I don’t have the time [...] Continue »
8Questions with Eugene Liu: Where Are The Asian Conservatives?
Lately I’ve been surrounded by liberals. My friends, most family members, co-workers, and colleagues at the non-profits and institutions I serve lean decidedly left. So imagine my elation when I stumbled across Eugene Liu, founder of AsianConservatives.com. Liu is a Christian conservative of Asian descent. Liberals will assume that someone fitting that description must be stuffy, stoic, and closed-minded. In contrast, Liu is full of humor and wit, and expresses empathy for liberal points of [...] Continue »
SUNY Binghamton Campus Newspaper Pipe Dream Publishes Racist Cartoon
I received word that late last week Pipe Dream, the campus newspaper at my alma mater published the above cartoon. My response can be summarized in two words: Not funny. I don’t mean “Asians-are-the-butt-of-this-joke-(again)-and-therefore-this-is-not-funny-to-me” not funny. No, I mean it’s not funny. Period. It doesn’t even make any sense. Sure, Asians like money, but to get money, we’re not going to doctor your fortune cookie fortune for a bigger tip. That’s just not how we roll. Instead, we’ll [...] Continue »
A Nativist View on Immigration Reform
I’ve always been anti-immigration. When my car glides past the borders of Chinatown and I see the throngs of people, signs completely in a foreign language, people shouting with abandon, pushing and shoving, litter on the streets, flies swarming above crates of fruit, I shudder. “Go back to China,” I want to say to them. “If you love living in Chinatown so much, isn’t China even better?” When I read about immigration reform, I say [...] Continue »
Who’s Afraid Of Being “So Asian”?
As it turns out, one’s intensity of Asianness is measurable. You can be “not Asian enough” or “so Asian” and such quantifications will have nothing to do with the ethnic identification of your parents. What’s more, there are even assigned values to Asianness, because apparently no one wants to be seen as “so Asian.” The other night I was at a dinner function of white folks and two lone Asians–another female and me. [Tangent: And why is [...] Continue »
Myth of the Made In USA Label
I have had about enough of the “Made in USA” propaganda. Be a patriot. Create jobs for Americans. Keep money in America. Manufacture in the U. S. of A. Here’s a burst to your bubble: “Made in USA” may not benefit the Joe Shmoe American as much as folks would like to think. A fashion designer I know, a white woman with a popular ready-to-wear label, is quick and proud to declare that her entire line [...] Continue »
DUDE WTF ASIA: Social Darwinist Chinese Dad
Yay. More WTF news from China gone viral. This time, it’s: “Tiger dad” cheers for kids’ brutal fight. A little girl beats the crap out of a little boy and not only does the girl’s father record the whole fight and post it online, but he cheers his daughter on. Messed up, right? No worries, the little boy’s parents will certainly take care of this. Actually, the boy’s parents are in full support of what the girl’s [...] Continue »
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