Podcast listeners of Los Angeles! You're invited to a special event featuring the creators and hosts of shows from the Potluck Podcast Collective, including Kollabcast, Saturday School, Drunk Monk, Asian Americana, They Call Us Bruce and the Korean Drama Podcast. The evening will include a panel discussion with the Potluck hosts and a live recording of They Call Us Bruce with a special guest.
It's happening Thursday, July 6 at OPodz in Little Tokyo. Here are some more details:
Yingying Zhang, who disappeared from the University of Illinois on June 9, is believed to be dead.
A suspect has been arrested in the kidnapping of visiting Chinese scholar Yingying Zhang, who has been missing from the University of Illinois since June 9. She is believed by authorities to be dead.
27-year-old Brendt Christensen was arrested late Friday as a suspect in Zhang's kidnapping.
According to the FBI press release, "while Christensen was under law enforcement surveillance, agents overheard him explaining that he kidnapped Zhang. Based on this, and other facts uncovered during the investigation of this matter, law enforcement agents believe that Ms. Zhang is no longer alive."
Things got real racist real fast on the streets of Sunnyvale.
Protip: If you get the feeling something racist is about to happen, it doesn't hurt to pull out your camera and start recording. This one comes to us from Sunnyvale, California, where a woman recorded a racist encounter with an asshole motorist who called her a "bitch" and a "fucking Cambodian n**ger."
Paula Nuguid says she riding her bike with her 9-year-old daughter, attempting to make a legal left turn, when a man in a Nissan Altima started honking at her and calling her a "bitch." She confronted the man, rolling up to his window and demanding, "How fucking dare you, you entitled white prick?"
"Oh, shut the fuck up," he cleverly retorted.
When Nuguid told him, "I can tell you're not from California," the man responded, "You fucking Cambodian n**ger, get out of here." Aaaaaaand there it is. Smile, asshole. You're about to become internet famous.
Nuguid posted video of the encounter on Facebook, saying "I hope his friends, family, and employer see this."
"I'm a storyteller at heart and connector of ideas and people."
Hey, everybody! Here's what's up. It is time, once again, to meet the Angry Reader of the Week, spotlighting you, the very special readers of this website. Over the years, I've been able to connect with a lot of cool folks, and this is a way of showing some appreciation and attention to the people who help make this blog what it is. This week's Angry Reader is Thien Ho.
20-year-old Tommy Le was killed by a King County Sheriff's deputy on June 14.
In Washington state, a 20-year-old student was shot and killed by police responding to reports of a man wielding a knife. He turned out to be carrying a pen. Now his family and community members want answers.
Tommy Le, who had just graduated from an alternative high school completion program at South Seattle College, was fatally shot by a King's County Sheriff's deputy on June 14.
Sheriff's deputies were reportedly summoned to a Burien neighborhood by several 911 calls about a man threatening residents with a knife or "sharp object." Deputies say they found that a homeowner had fired a "warning shot" in an attempt to scare off a man -- later identified to be Le -- who had been chasing his friend.
When Le continued to approach, the homeowner fled back inside his house. Le, who was barefoot, then pounded on the door and stabbed it, screaming he was "The Creator." Deputies say Le refused to comply with orders to drop "what they thought was a knife," and that firing tasers "had no effect." When Le moved toward officers, Deputy Cesar Molina shot him three times. He died of his injuries at the hospital.
A week after the shooting, the sheriff's office revealed that the "sharp object" in Le's hand was a pen.
Visiting scholar Yingying Zhang has been missing from the University of Illinois since June 9.
In Illinois, the FBI announced Tuesday that it had found the car that a visiting Chinese student was last seen getting into before she went missing from the University of Illinois nearly three weeks ago.
26-year-old Yingying Zhang, a visiting student in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences, was last seen June 9 near the north end of campus in Urbana-Champaign. She had just gotten off a bus and was apparently on her way to an apartment complex to sign a lease.
Security camera footage shows her getting into the passenger seat of a black Saturn Astra. The FBI says the vehicle appeared to be driven by a white male who circled the area before making contact with Zhang. The car is seen pulling up next to Zhang on the sidewalk just after 2:00 pm. She talks for several moments to the unidentified driver before getting into the vehicle. The car then drives away.
A K-Drama re-watch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
Are you a fan of Korean dramas? Then this podcast is probably not for you. The Korean Drama Podcast is the K-Drama rewatch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
In season one, host Will Choi (founder of Asian AF) and I -- both self-professed Korean drama beginners -- with help and hand-holding by our resident K-Drama expert Joanna Lee, attempt to watch and discuss the 2009 megahit drama Boys Over Flowers in its entirety, episode by episode.
In this week's episode, we are faced with even more K-Drama tropes including personal space issues, awkward tardy dates (in the snow) and JEALOUSY! New rival Oh Minji adds drama to the drama and our hosts are powerless to resist. Also, Korean drama bullying is no joke (don't bully).
Trailer for upcoming action thriller promises a darker, revenge-ier Jackie Chan.
Jackie Chan is not messing around anymore. While the 63-year-old international action star is known for his comedic physicality and upbeat everyman hero roles, the new trailer for the upcoming thriller The Foreigner promises Chan in full-on Revenge Dad mode, Ã la Taken. And that means a lot of people are gonna die.
Chan plays a humble London businessman Quan, whose long-buried past (cue vintage photo of young shirtless Jackie) erupts in a revenge-fueled vendetta when his teenage daughter is killed in a terrorist blast. In his search for the identity of the bombers, Quan is forced into a cat-and-mouse conflict with a British government official, played by Pierce Brosnan, whose own past may hold clues to the identities of the killers.
Note the look on Jackie Chan's face. That's a look that says I am going to kill all the terrorists.
These snaps should give you a sense of what it's like for anyone who appears to be Muslim to travel by plane.
The thing about commercial air travel is that you never know what kind of weird or awful or questionable people you're going to be forced to fly with. For instance, this recent flight where a Sikh man boarded the plane. No, I'm not calling the Sikh passenger weird or awful or questionable. I'm talking about the asshole who freaked out over the sight of a guy with a turban and beard and broadcast his racist assumptions on social media.
Because a guy who looks like that could definitely be a terrorist, right? This jerk recently documented his ridiculous prejudice and paranoia on Snapchat, posting photos of the Sikh passenger seated nearby, taken surreptitiously over the course of the flight, chronicling his activities with fearful commentary like, "Please god just let the man sleep" and "Ok he just walk to the back of the Plane then to the front then to his seat."
Screen grabs of the Snapchat posts were shared on social media by educator and activist Simran Jeet Singh, who is also Sikh and is all too familiar with the "uncomfortable stares" of fellow passengers in an era of heightened Islamophobia. And yet Singh tries to show compassion even when faced with such ignorance.
"This series of snaps should give you a sense of what it's like for anyone who appears to be Muslim to travel by plane," Singh wrote in a series of tweets. "As a Sikh who flies frequently, I'm no stranger to the uncomfortable stares and misguided fears people have of me."
Min Kim pleaded guilty to fatally shooting Jakeel Mason in the back.
Photo Credit: KOMO
Last week in Washington state, a Korean American convenience store owner was sentenced to serve eight years in prison for shooting and killing a fleeing shoplifting suspect last year.
31-year-old Min Kim pleaded guilty earlier this year to fatally shooting Jakeel Mason after he caught Mason shoplifting at his convenience store, Pacific Quick Shop in Spanaway. Mason was trying to flee from the store when Kim shot him in the back. Kim initially claimed he shot in self-defense.
However, prosecutors say surveillance video showed that Mason, who was unarmed, put his hands up and backed away when Kim pulled a gun on him. When Kim started fighting with him, Mason broke free and ran toward the door. Kim shot him twice in the back, killing him.
The Slants on the Power of Repurposing a Slur: "The battles about hate speech shouldn’t be waged at the Trademark Office, decided by those who have no connections to our communities. Those skirmishes lead to arbitrary, inconsistent results and slowly chip away at the dignity and agency of oppressed people to decide appropriateness on our terms."
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The Slants show full meaning of free speech: Can freedom of expression and protection of the oppressed coexist? According to the Portland band whose dispute over their name lasted over eight years before finally going to the Supreme Court -- yes, it can.
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Asian 'Boat People,' Once Opposed More Than Syrian Refugees Today, Speak Out: One Lao and two Vietnamese refugees speak frankly about how their experiences relate to the need to support refugees today. "There are a lot of innocent people who are refugees, and given the opportunity, [they] would give back 100 times more than what was given to them."
The Inner World of Ali Wong: How the San Francisco native grew up, cracked filthy jokes, got pregnant, filmed a Netflix special, and became the next big thing in comedy.
Why Are Brown Men So Infatuated With White Women Onscreen? While projects like The Big Sick, Master of None, and Homecoming King offer welcome depiction of brown Muslim men in love, the characters pursue white women at the expense of women of color.
Jeff Yang and Phil Yu present an unfiltered conversation about what's happening in Asian America.
What's up, podcast listeners? We've got another episode of our podcast They Call Us Bruce. Each week, my good friend, writer/columnist Jeff Yang and I host an unfiltered conversation about what's happening in Asian America, with a strong focus on media, entertainment and popular culture.
This week, we welcome Simon Tam, front man for the embattled Asian American rock band The Slants. He talks about the eight-year fight to trademark their band name, the landmark Supreme Court ruling in their favor, and the important right for Asian Americans and other marginalized communities to call ourselves whatever we want.
"I'm still learning how to stay authentic, and not to veil my true self."
What's up, good people of the internet? It's time to meet the Angry Reader of the Week, spotlighting you, the very special readers of this website. Over the years, I've been able to connect with a lot of cool folks, and this is a way of showing some appreciation and attention to the people who help make this blog what it is. This week's Angry Reader is Alfa.
Thirty-five years ago today in Detroit, four nights after being severely beaten in the head with a baseball bat, Vincent Chin died. The case would become a seminal rallying point for the Asian American community. And tonight, concerned community members plan to gather for a vigil outside the home of Chin's killer.
For those unfamiliar with the case: Chin was out at a strip club celebrating his bachelor party when he got into a fight with a couple of disgruntled auto industry workers, Ronald Evens and his stepson Michael Nitz. Witnesses say they heard Ebens yell "It's because of you little motherfuckers that we're out of work!" -- referring to U.S. auto jobs being lost to Japanese manufacturers. Vincent Chin was Chinese American.
The fight was broken up, but Ebens and Nitz weren't finished. They searched for Chin outside the club, tracked him down to a McDonald's and attacked him. Nitz held Chin in a bear hug while Evens repeatedly bludgeoned him with a baseball bat until his head cracked open. Vincent fell into a coma and died on June 23, 1982.
NPR's Morning Edition aired a Story Corps interview Vincent Chin's best friend, Gary Koivu, who talks about his lifelong friendship with Vincent and hauntingly recounts the night he witnessed his murder.
Dash cam video of Minnesota traffic stop shows police officer violently assaulting motorist.
The ACLU of Minnesota is calling for an investigation into the police officers who pulled over a motorist and violently assaulted him. Dash cam footage shows one officer viciously beating the young man who is still buckled in his car seat, while another officer purposely turns off the camera's audio.
Anthony Promvongsa was driving in Worthington, Minnesota on July 28, 2016 when Agent Joe Joswiak of the Buffalo Ridge Drug Task Force pulled him over and proceeded to beat the shit out of him. Well, first Joswiak threw open Promvongsa's door and screamed "Get the fuck out of the car, motherfucker!" Then he beat the shit out of him. Promvongsa didn't even get a chance to unbuckle his seat belt before Joswiak started swinging.
In police dash cam footage obtained by the ACLU, Joswiak can be seen punching, kicking and elbowing Promvongsa several times in the back before yanking him out of the driver's seat of his Honda Pilot, throwing him to the ground. Then he presses his knee to the back of Promvongsa's neck, pinning him face down on the pavement while he and Sgt. Tim Gaul of the Worthington Police Department handcuffed him.
At some point, Gaul intentionally turns off the audio of the encounter. After he is placed inside the squad car, Promvongsa can be heard breathing heavily and sobbing.
A K-Drama re-watch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
Are you a fan of Korean dramas? Then this podcast is probably not for you. The Korean Drama Podcast is the K-Drama rewatch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
In season one, host Will Choi (founder of Asian AF) and I -- both self-professed Korean drama beginners -- with help and hand-holding by our resident K-Drama expert Joanna Lee, attempt to watch and discuss the 2009 megahit drama Boys Over Flowers in its entirety, episode by episode.
In this week's episode, we dive back into the story of Perm Boy, Violin Guy, Pottery Boy, and Ringo in Episode 3 of Boys Over Flowers. As we try to piece together the not-quite-love triangle (or a line with 3 points) forming among the characters, we continue to wonder: where are all the adults?
Behold! The debut collaboration between "Beat Box Man and Poem Woman," aka poet Christy NaMee Eriksen and her 8-year-old son Diego. Christy shares a poem entitled "How a Mother Remembers" while Diego backs her up with some sweet, sweet vocal rhythm. It's a little rough around the edges -- Diego introduces the video with the disclaimer that it's "just a test" -- but it's absolutely lovely and charming. Enjoy:
"Can I see a doctor please that's white, that doesn't have brown teeth, that speaks English?"
This one comes from our neighbors to the north... A woman at a Toronto-area clinic was caught on video demanding for a "white doctor" who "doesn't have brown teeth" and "speaks English" to treat her son.
The video was filmed on Sunday at the Rapid Access to Medical Specialists walk-in clinic in Mississauga, Ontario, where the woman was awaiting treatment for her son, who was apparently experiencing chest pains.
Except she made clear that she wanted a very specific kind of care.
"So you're telling me that my kid has chest pains, he's going to have to sit here until 4 o'clock?" she asks a clinic employee. "Can I see a doctor please that's white, that doesn't have brown teeth, that speaks English?"
Award-winning poet opens up about his latest collection 'Thousand Star Hotel.' By tk lê.
Photo Credit: Anna Min
Bao Phi is a performance poet and writer based in Minneapolis. His second poetry collection, Thousand Star Hotel skillfully weaves a range of topics -- police brutality, Asian American representation, masculinity, fatherhood, and his immigrant experience growing up in Minnesota, to name just a few. In this interview, Bao talks in-depth about what the process of writing this book has been for him and elaborates on some of the heavier subject matter. Also, kittens.
Over the weekend in Washington, a 92-year-old Japanese American woman received her high school diploma -- with honors -- alongside the graduating class of Vashon High School -- 74 years after her education at the school was interrupted when her family was forced into an internment camp during World War II.
Mary Matsuda Gruenewald was 17, in the middle of her junior year in 1942, when her family was forcibly removed from Vashon Island and incarcerated in a dusty California concentration camp, like thousands of other innocent Japanese Americans on the west coast. She was a good student, a member of the honor society and served on the student council. But she missed the opportunity to graduate with her classmates.
On Saturday, she finally graduated from Vashon High School. Receiving a standing ovation, she was presented with her diploma, along with a copy of the 1943 yearbook and the 2017 yearbook signed by students and staff. The ceremony was streamed live on YouTube (Gruenewald is first acknowledged in the principal's remarks at the 51:46 mark, and receives her diploma at 1:48:02):
Asian American rock band wins the right to trademark their "disparaging" band name.
'The Slants have won the right to trademark their band name. The Supreme Court ruled Monday that even trademarks considered to be derogatory deserve First Amendment protection, in a ruling that could have significant impact on how speech protection is applied in other trademark cases.
The Slants' frontman, Simon Tam, filed a lawsuit after the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office denied the band from registering its name, and rejected repeat appeals, citing a section of the 1946 Lanham Act, a federal law that prohibits registration of trademarks that "disparage" or "bring into contempt or disrepute" persons, institutions, beliefs or national symbols. Tam contended that the 70-year-old law violates free speech rights.
In an 8-0 ruling, the court agreed with The Slants, determining the law's disparagement clause violates the free speech clause of the First Amendment.
"The commercial market is well stocked with merchandise that disparages prominent figures and groups, and the line between commercial and non-commercial speech is not always clear, as this case illustrates," Justice Samuel Alito wrote in his opinion for the court. "If affixing the commercial label permits the suppression of any speech that may lead to political or social 'volatility,' free speech would be endangered."
Darwin Torres is accused of killing 17-year-old Nabra Hassanen with a baseball bat.
In Virginia, a Muslim teenage girl who was reportedly assaulted and disappeared has been found dead, and a 22-year-old man has been charged in her murder in connection with the case.
Police believe a body found Sunday afternoon in a pond in Sterling is 17-year-old Nabra Hassanen, who was reported missing after she and some friends got into an altercation with a motorist near their mosque.
According to police, a group of girls was walking back from breakfast at IHOP early Sunday when they got into a dispute with a motorist -- witnesses say he appeared to be drunk and was brandishing a baseball bat -- who got out of his car and assaulted one of them. The rest of the teens ran back to their mosque, the All Dulles Area Muslim Society (ADAMS), where the group reported that Hassanen had been left behind.
"Immediately thereafter, the ADAMS' personnel notified both Loudon County and Fairfax County authorities who immediately began an extensive search to locate the missing girl," the mosque said in a statement.
Police searched the surrounding wooded area for several hours, and found the body in the pond, located about two to three miles away from where the original altercation happened.
Who Is Vincent Chin? The History and Relevance of a 1982 Killing: Although the death of Vincent Chin has become a staple of Asian-American studies courses taught across the country, there are still many -- Asian Americans and others -- who do not know about what happened the night Chin was beaten or understand its continued significance for the Asian American community.
How Asian Americans Remade Suburbia: Asian immigrants, once the "ultimate outsiders," have profoundly reshaped the suburbs of the San Francisco Bay Area. A new book, Trespassers? Asian Americans and the Battle for Suburbia, explores that tension in the context of Fremont, California, the largest Asian American-majority suburb in the Silicon Valley.
In Little Saigon, scraping out a living, one home-cooked meal at a time: Com thang is a popular practice of home cooking made in mass quantities to sell as quick meals for families too busy to make their own meals. Such small business practices are familiar to many immigrant families.
"Stories with real people going through real shit captivate me."
Hello, internet friends. You know what time it is. It's time to meet the Angry Reader of the Week, spotlighting you, the very special readers of this website. Over the years, I've been able to connect with a lot of cool folks, and this is a way of showing some appreciation and attention to the people who help make this blog what it is. This week's Angry Reader is Tiffanie Hsu.
Jeff Yang and Phil Yu present an unfiltered conversation about what's happening in Asian America.
What's up, podcast listeners? We've got another episode of our podcast They Call Us Bruce. Each week, my good friend, writer/columnist Jeff Yang and I host an unfiltered conversation about what's happening in Asian America, with a strong focus on media, entertainment and popular culture.
Philadelphia restaurateur Han Chieng suffers broken ankle in sidewalk fight with drunken racists.
A Philadelphia restaurateur suffered a broken ankle after getting into a sidewalk fight with several drunk individuals -- a fight that he says started when one of them shouted "ching chong wong" at him.
Han Chiang, owner of Han Dynasty in Old City, says he and several employees were outside on a cigarette break Thursday night when they encountered a group that had apparently just been kicked out of 2nd Story Brewing, the pub next door. Chiang and his colleagues were about to go back inside when one of the group yelled something to the effect of "ching chong wong" at them. Chiang called him on it.
"I turned around and said, 'Fuck you, you racist motherfucker,'" Chiang said in a phone interview with Billy Penn. "The guy denied saying it, then his friend Ian jumped in and hit me with a skateboard." Then it was on.
The fight escalated, with multiple people joining in, and Chiang getting his ankle broken in the fracas. At some point, the fight was broken up, and Chiang was hospitalized. But not before skateboard guy and the gang yelled "Fuck you, you Chinese faggots!" as they made their getaway.
Later, Ian Carroll, the guy who apparently hit Chiang with the skateboard, posted a note to Han Dynasty's Facebook page, preemptively recounting his version of the altercation, alleging that it was the Han Dynasty employees who started the fight when they tried to jump him and his friends.
In a surprise announcement on the 5th anniversary of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the Trump administration announced yesterday that it would reverse one of the president's campaign promises and would instead continue the popular federal program. Founded in 2012, DACA granted renewable permits to undocumented immigrants who had been brought into the United States as children, protecting them from deportation and allowing them to work.
However, yesterday also saw U.S. Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly sign a memorandum to roll back a program proposed by the Obama administration in 2014 called Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA). DAPA was intended to provide legal protections for the undocumented parents of American citizens or residents in an effort to not break up immigrant families. That program was never put into place due to legal challenges in federal court filed by 26 states led by Republican governors.
In January, Trump was quoted as saying about undocumented immigrants, "They are here illegally. They shouldn't be very worried. I do have a big heart. We're going to take care of everybody." However, it is clear by yesterday's dual announcements that the Trump administration is less interested in "taking care of everybody", and more interested in taking care of Trump's approval rating.
Asian American participants needed to take an online survey for clinical psychology dissertation.
Here's a research study that could use your help with online survey. Nicole Himuro-Fitzgerald, a doctoral student in clinical psychology at Alliant International University in San Francisco, is working on a dissertation about whether culture impacts the relationship between romantic attachment and infidelity, and reasons for why people engage in infidelity. She's specifically focusing on the Asian American population because they're significantly underrepresented in the current research. Can you help her out?
The survey will take about 25-30 minutes to complete. They're looking for individuals who are 1) between the ages of 21-65; 2) identify as Asian Americans; 3) experience a romantic relationship lasting at least six months. Those who complete the survey can be entered into a raffle to win a $200 Visa gift card.
'The Walking Dead' actor will appear alongside Tessa Thompson and Lakeith Stanfield.
We still cry for Glenn, but coming up, departed Walking Dead star Steven Yeun will star alongside Tessa Thompson and Lakeith Stanfield in the drama Sorry to Bother You from first-time director Boots Riley.
Written by Riley, the film centers on "a black telemarketer with self-esteem issues" who "discovers a magical key to business success, propelling him to the upper echelons of the hierarchy just as his activist comrades are rising up against unjust labor practices. When he uncovers the macabre secret of his corporate overlords, he must decide whether to stand up or sell out."
Fruitvale Station's Nina Yang Bongiovi and Forest Whitaker of Significant Productions are producing along with 6 Years' Jonathan Duffy and Kelly Williams, Charles D. King (Fences), George Rush (Bully).
No details on what Yeun will be doing in the film -- I'm going to assume he's not playing the black telemarketer -- but the talent involved, both in front and behind the camera, already has me interested. According to Deadline, Sorry to Bother You will start shooting later this month in Oakland.
Next up, you can see Steven Yeun in Bong Joon-ho's Okja, which premieres on Netflix on June 28.
Gunman Jimmy Lam opened fire on his co-workers, then turned the gun on himself.
A United Parcel Service employee opened fire during a meeting with co-workers at one of the company's San Francisco packing facilities, killing three employees before fatally shooting himself.
According to witnesses, 38-year-old gunman Jimmy Lam appeared to specifically target three fellow employees. Durning a Wednesday morning meeting, Lam walked up to driver Benson Louie, 50, and shot him. As his co-workers fled the room, he shot Wayne Chan, 56, in the back, and then walked up to him and "finished him." Mike Lefiti, 46, was running from the building when Lam went out onto the street and shot him.
At least two other people were injured in the shooting, which prompted a massive police response to the UPS warehouse in Potrero Hill. When officers confronted Lam inside the building, he shot himself in the head.
"The suspect put the gun to his head and discharged the weapon," Assistant Police Chief Toney Chaplin told reporters, adding that police did not fire any shots. Two guns were recovered at the scene.
26-year-old Yingying Zhang was last seen on June 9.
At the University of Illinois, authorities are asking for the public's help in the search for a visiting scholar from China who has been missing from the Urbana-Champaign campus since Friday.
26-year-old Yingying Zhang, a visiting student in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Sciences, was last seen June 9 near the north end of campus. She had just gotten off a bus and was apparently on her way to an apartment complex in Urbana to sign a lease. Zhang's friends called police on Saturday when they couldn't get in touch with her and became concerned about her whereabouts.
University of Illinois Police released security camera footage showing a black Saturn Astra pulling up next to Zhang on the sidewalk just after 2:00 pm. She can be seen talking for several moments to the unidentified driver before getting into the vehicle. The car then drives way. She has not been seen or heard from since.
Diversity Speaks at the LA Film Festival, Saturday, June 17 at the Kirk Douglas Theatre
Los Angeles film fans! The LA Film Festival invites you to Diversity Speaks, two days of panel discussions focusing on expanding the definition of diversity and act as a call to action for the entertainment industry.
On Saturday, June 17, I'll be participating in a panel discussion entitled "Whitewashing: Asian and Asian-American Representation in Film/TV," along with Leonardo Nam, Kelly Hu, Kelvin Yu, Ally Maki, Bruce Thierry Cheung and Gloria Fan, and moderated by Jenny Yang. It's happening at 2:00pm at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City.
Here's some more info about the full Saturday lineup:
A K-Drama re-watch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
Are you a fan of Korean dramas? Then this podcast is probably not for you. The Korean Drama Podcast is the K-Drama rewatch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
In season one, host Will Choi (founder of Asian AF) and I -- both self-professed Korean drama beginners -- with help and hand-holding by our resident K-Drama expert Joanna Lee, attempt to watch and discuss the 2009 megahit drama Boys Over Flowers in its entirety, episode by episode.
In this week's episode, we return to take on episode 2 of Boys Over Flowers. Still getting used to all the K-Drama tropes, we are bewildered by "so many crimes," lavish school trips, and a bunch of semi-stalking. We give our preliminary ship. Also everyone loves the Pretty Unni/Cool Nuna.
Next week marks the 35th anniversary of Vincent Chin's brutal, racist murder at the hands of two white autoworkers in Detroit -- a case that set off a pan-Asian, nation-wide movement for justice. Thirty-five years later, what is the legacy of Vincent Chin? The New York Public Library will be hosting a panel discussion, Vincent Chin: Dead or Alive?, examining the case, what has and has not changed since Chin's murder, as well as the current state of civic participation and advocacy in API communities.
It's happening Monday, June 19 in the Community Room at Chatham Square Library. Some more details:
To attend this wedding, you had to be in shape. And I'm not talking about looking good in a dress or a tux. Last month, a Brooklyn couple ran a half marathon as part of their wedding day... along with 60 of their guests.
When Amanda Hughes and Joel Tse, who met while they were both training for the New York City Marathon in 2009, realized they had scheduled their wedding on the same day as the Brooklyn Half Marathon, they decided to incorporate the race into their nuptials. Not only would they run the half marathon, they invited their guests to run the distance with them to the finish line before they got officially tied the knot.
"We were going to organize a fun run, because without the running community, we never would have met," Hughes told Runner's World. "But the way it worked out was perfect because all of our running friends were going to be in town anyway."
They even sent out a training schedule with the wedding invitation -- with four months to train -- since many of the guests had never run a long distance race before.
21-year-old Maria Hsiao was fatally shot outside Q-Cafe in Palo Alto on June 10, 2001.
Maria Hsiao (far left) was enjoying an evening out with friends when she was fatally gunned down.
In Palo Alto, police are asking for the public's help and turning to social media for assistance solving a 16-year-old homicide case, in which a young woman was gunned down outside a downtown night club.
21-year-old Maria Hsiao was shot once in the head while standing outside the now-defunct Q-Cafe in Palo Alto, located at 529 Alma St., just after midnight on June 10, 2001. Hsiao, a student at the Academy of Art in San Francisco, was enjoying an evening out with her sister and some friends when she was gunned down.
Police never recovered the weapon nor developed a motive for the fatal shooting.
Over the weekend, on the anniversary of the shooting, the Palo Alto Police Department re-circulated a 10-minute video about the case, calling for anyone with information about the killing to come forward. The video, first released in 2015, includes interviews with police and Hsiao's loved ones.
A Parting Letter to My MFA Program: "What does it mean for me to learn how to make art in an environment that unquestioningly perpetuates and reinforces systems of dominance?" When Claire Zhuang withdrew from her MFA program, she read a letter outlining the failings of the program to the faculty.
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Mother Tongue: "Language is not only a means of communication or description. It’s a framework in which we process existence." For a bilingual new mother, parenting becomes an experiment in identity -- both her child's and her own.
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I Am An Immigrant: Survival to Sacrifice: Sevly Snguon's retells the sacrifices his mother made for him, from summoning the will to survive in one of the largest refugee camps in Cambodia to sacrificing her ambitions once she arrived in the United States.
My Hindu American Childhood: A Comic: Artist and comedian Soumya Dhulekar chronicles the ups and downs of her Hindu American childhood, ages 5-18, in illustrated form.
Why Hollywood Bet On "The Joy Luck Club": After 24 years, The Joy Luck Club remains the only Hollywood film to feature a majority Asian-American cast -- a feat most studios are still afraid to attempt today. Now, those behind the 1993 tearjerker tell BuzzFeed News how they pulled off the movie no one thought possible.
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Aziz Ansari is Still Searching: A hit Netflix show. A best-selling (and scholarly!) book. A powerful SNL monologue. Can you blame Aziz Ansari for wanting to hide?
What is up, my people? It is time, once again, to meet the Angry Reader of the Week, spotlighting you, the very special readers of this website. Over the years, I've been able to connect with a lot of cool folks, and this is a way of showing some appreciation and attention to the people who help make this blog what it is. This week's Angry Reader is Ronny Chieng.
"The Geek Shall Inherit the Earth" - Thursday, June 15 at The Lyric Hyperion Theatre
Hey, Los Angeles! It's story time! Disoriented Comedy invites you to the latest edition of Family Reunion, a monthly live storytelling show co-presented by Angry Asian Man Angry Asian Man, Tuesday Night Project, Mishthi Music and KAYA Press, featuring regular everyday folks talking story. No notes.
This month's Family Reunion theme is "The Geek Shall Inherit the Earth." The evening's featured lineup of storytellers includes Pallavi Gunalan, Naomi Hirahara, Nathan Ramos, Jenny Yang, Tanha Dil, Ify Nwadiwe, Vivian Martinez and Scott Okamoto, with the proceedings hosted by Naomi Ko.
It's happening Thursday, June 15 at The Lyric Hyperion Theatre in Silverlake. Here are some more details about the show:
San Francisco Business Times posts article with photo of the wrong Jane Kim.
Will the real Jane Kim please stand up? Well, first, somebody at the San Francisco Business Times needs some help telling their Jane Kims apart. They recently published an article about San Francisco Supervisor Jane Kim, but the individual in the accompanying photo was not Jane Kim.
Well, it was a person also named Jane Kim. This Jane Kim is Vice President of Revenue at CircleCI, and pretty much looks nothing like the Jane Kim who serves San Francisco's District 6 on the Board of Supervisors. A totally different Asian American woman named Jane Kim, which any competent photo editor should figure out.
Supervisor Jane Kim called out the gaffe on Twitter:
A K-Drama re-watch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
Are you a fan of Korean dramas? Then this podcast is probably not for you. The newly launched Korean Drama Podcast is the K-Drama rewatch podcast by (and for) people who don't watch Korean dramas.
In season one, host Will Choi (founder of Asian AF) and I -- both self-professed Korean drama beginners -- with help and hand-holding by our resident K-Drama expert Joanna Lee, attempt to watch and discuss the 2009 megahit drama Boys Over Flowers in its entirety, episode by episode.
Action drama set during the Tong Wars of San Francisco's Chinatown, from executive producer Justin Lin.
I am so here for this. Cinemax has given a 10-episode straight to series order to the period action drama Warrior, written by Jonathan Tropper, executive produced by Justin Lin and Danielle Woodrow, and inspired by an original idea from late martial artist Bruce Lee.
Set against the backdrop of the Tong Wars of San Francisco's Chinatown in the second half of the 19th century, Warrior tells the story of Ah Sahm, a gifted martial artist who immigrates from China to San Francisco and becomes a hatchet man for one of Chinatown's most powerful organized crime families.
Warrior appears to be a version of the long-rumored martial arts western that Bruce Lee had tried to develop as a star vehicle for himself, but was never able to materialize -- the idea that many believe eventually became Kung Fu... starring David Carradine, who was totally not Asian. In a now-famous 1971 interview on The Pierre Berton Show, Lee mentions he was in discussions to pitch a western called "The Warrior."
29-year-old Kelly Wong fell several stories during a training exercise.
Some tragic news out of Los Angeles... A firefighter died Monday morning, two days after he fell from a fire engine's aerial ladder during a training exercise in downtown Los Angeles.
29-year-old Kelly Wong was participating in an exercise Saturday morning when he fell several stories from an aerial ladder on to a fire truck, suffering numerous blunt force trauma injuries. He was transported to a local trauma center where he was listed in critical condition.
The Los Angeles Fire Department announced Wong's death on Twitter in a written statement.
Saturday, June 17. Hosted by API Forward Movement and Koreatown Youth and Community Center.
As of this writing, this class is already fully registered, but I had to make note of how awesome this sounds: How to Make Kimchi, hosted by API Forward Movement and Koreatown Youth and Community Center in Los Angeles. But wait, is this gonna be some legit Korean kimchi-making? Rest assured, just so you know that this is an authentic endeavor, the advertising makes clear that this class will be "TAUGHT BY KOREATOWN AUNTIES." Yes, real ajummas will be schooling you in the art, science and history of spicy fermentation.
It's happening Saturday, June 17 at Doulos Mission Church in Koreatown. Here are some more details:
Watch 'Misery Loves Company,' a comedic digital series by Emily C. Chang and Sara Amini.
The comedic digital series Misery Loves Company, recently released on YouTube, is a funny, female-driven exploration of racism, sexism, depression and other American pastimes in the post-Trump era, LA-style.
Written and created by Emily C. Chang and Sara Amini, the seven-episode webseries centers on a New Yorker who joins her friend in Los Angeles to live together amongst the man-buns, wannabes, and Kombucha-lovers of Hollywood. Along the way, they try to find happiness while taking on casual racists, YouTube "influencers," misogynists, cults, and general Millennial ennui.
Here's Episode 5, "Pu$$y," in which Sara and Emily deal with cat-callers on the street:
'Glee' star will play Charlie Wu in the adaptation of Kevin Kwan's best-selling novel.
The epic cast of Crazy Rich Asians continues to grow, with Harry Shum Jr. joining the likes of Constance Wu, Gemma Chan and Michelle Yeoh in Warner Bros.' adaptation of Kevin Kwan's best-selling novel.
Crazy Rich Asians follows Rachel, an American-born Chinese economics professor, who travels to Nick's hometown of Singapore for his best friend's wedding, only to discover that Nick is heir to a massive fortune, he's perhaps he most eligible bachelor in Asia, and every single woman in his ultra-rarefied social class is incredibly jealous of Rachel and wants to bring her down.
