Podcasts about asians

Welcome to Season 5, Episode 29! Today we're joined by a true icon in the world of academia—Professor Gordon H. Chang. A celebrated historian, Professor Chang is both the Olive H. Palmer Professor in Humanities and a Professor of History at Stanford University. He's also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. We're honored to speak with him about his latest book War, Race, and Culture, published by Stanford University Press in May 2025. This anthology compiles some of his most powerful essays written over decades of impactful scholarship. The topics range from foreign relations and U.S. imperialism to race, Asian American identity, and the cultural contributions of Asian Americans. Our conversation covers everything from the role of propaganda in shaping views of Asians, the long history of harmful stereotypes, and the cultural erasure seen during Japanese internment—including how artists like Dr. Seuss and creators of Superman contributed to racist narratives. Professor Chang also reflects on the political engagement of Asian Americans and why “nurture vs. nature” plays a crucial role in debunking the myth of political apathy in the community. We also touch on a more personal subject: his interest in art history, including how his father's legacy inspired him to explore and uplift overlooked Asian American artists like Dong Kingman, whose brilliance was too often overshadowed by the racist caricatures found in mainstream media. This episode offers not only a look into Professor Chang's new book, but a deeper understanding of how history, race, and culture intersect in America—and why writing history is always personal. Links and Resources: Learn more about War, Race, and Culture from Stanford University Press Read more from Gordon H. Chang, including Ghosts of Gold Mountain, Fateful Ties, and Asian American Art: A History, 1850-1970 If you like what we do, please share, follow, and like us in your podcast directory of choice or on Instagram @AAHistory101. For previous episodes and resources, please visit our site at https://asianamericanhistory101.libsyn.com or our links at http://castpie.com/AAHistory101. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, email us at info@aahistory101.com.  

I'm no complete Christian, but the bizarre act of hacking and spewing and gasping by whoever was next door while I was reading the Bible was telling of its claims. “that girl really fucked you over.” I wasn't sure what exactly the voice was besides the voice of God itself, or maybe even the same voice who had warned me who'd win the election and was right, and so eternally and internally always kind of a voice I trusted, and besides that, I was sure it see right. The evil girl next door had really fucked me over— not just in one way, but several, and finally culminating in no longer even having an apartment. She had fucked me out of an apartment! The more I complained about her door slamming, incessant obsessive stalking, and the way she played mind games whenever she could find me about in the small space between our two doors, it was nothing short of her method of targeted warfare— to have given me a plant was for her to be able to say she was trying to be my friend, but everything else she did around that was evil, and the more I complained about the door slamming, the stalking my door and setting up loud conversations just outside of it in order to irk me, slamming the door each time I took a bath or a shower, or used the toilet for several months, she had indeed fucked me over, and run me over, and I was lost— I didn't understand that people could just be like that and I didn't want to just attribute it to race, but she was a white girl, and all the red flags and flares indicated that the game she was playing was race war— her goal to return me to the streets or the shelter where she could presume her dominance in the structure of social culture because it made her so uncomfortable that we had the same thing. She had never been inside of my apartment, but she was aching the entire time to get in, and the entire overall factor was, that I just never felt safe around her, despite her broad gestures and gifs and supposed openness— her words and her presence spoke an entire hidden language, telltale signs of betrayal, and maliciousness, and as much as I wanted them all in my head, they were not. Now the new property manager seemed to be taking her side, and her actions seemed more egregious— knowing I had come here from the shelter meant that there were entire parties of people enraged that the city was helping people to come out of homelessness and to bridge the gap between homelessness and inequality, but it was easy to see over the course of the gentrification process that white people were mad at this equality, and acting out, and even acting very outrageous, and the problem with me personally was that I wasn't even from New York, or out of the system in a certain way, but the people who were treating me with such degradation and disrespect couldn't see that. They could only see “black” and “formerly homeless”. What's worse, is they couldn't see the many books I'd written or art I'd made, and this contributed to their overall devaluation in my kind— or worse, they could, like the girl next door, who had read an excerpt of my writing under the guise that she was a helpful person, and had become enraged with dissolution and jealousy; it was as if she couldn't understand that not only might I be equal to her, but even intellectually superior in a certain way, or at the very least artistically superior, and began to act in such a destructive way that paired with the noise form the morortcycles and incessant harassment from outside the apartment which bled into all spaces of the apartment throughout the day, combined with her incessant door slamming and disruption to anything I did while I was at “home”, which never felt like home because of these things exactly, it made me seem crazy and ungrateful any time I complained to the property management, and that seemed to be the game. I even surmised that she was connected to the noise from outside and the particular strangeness that someone seemed to be listening to me inside the apartment as well, as she had somehow seemed to know things I was talking about on my unpublished podcast episodes— things she could not have possibly heard from next door, which meant there was some sort of audio recording on the premises she had access too. It became a cat and mouse game, because she knew where I was in my apartment and began to attack my psyche anytime I was in the apartment, and especially when I attempted to create. Now, facing almost certain death and removal from the only stability I'd ever known, it was partially due to this incessant and rampant behavior that I was almost always at a loss. I had once again been bullied out of something I desperately needed by a white girl who felt justified and untouchable— only this time, it was more serious. I wasn't just in trouble at school, or some kind of job— she had manipulated things in such a way that this time I was out of a place to live— under the guise that she was a good person, giving gifts and acting strangely friendly, she had planted seeds and initiated acts of warfare, and in the recovery process of having left abusive situation after abusive situation, it was hard to wrap my mind around the fact that this was yet again another one. I kept telling myself it was only in my mind, despite the evidence of otherwise. That she was not evil but simply ignorant, or misguided, and aloof because of her privelege— but now, understanding that once again I may have no where in my own country to go, I understood the earth shattering truths of equality and integration, and gentrification. Not only did they want to bring in wealthy whites and Asians, they wanted (and needed) to push poor blacks and Latinos out, because of the value the white people placed in themselves. Too many of us made them feel weak and vulnarable, and insecure— and I was certaint that reading over my writing the girl had felt she'd met her match— that even my presence at all was a threat, not just because I was black, but because I was smart. So the way she contributed to the forces of white power was the simple way the race war continues to be fought— by working on the mind, forcing it to weaken and crumble by slamming things during times of vulnerability— baths, showers, toilet use— and that way, for months at a time, I no longer felt safe at all, and of course, it was ungrateful to complain— I should just be happy to have a place to sleep that was my own. But to have peace and quiet and sanity, recovery and health? How could I ever deserve that? In fact, I didn't deserve it, and they made it clear— and there surely was a dorrelation between the noise outside and the noise inside: somebody was trying to make a very violent point— and they were using me to do it. They had effectively dismantled my ability to focus, and the. Intercepted my strength— I had a Peloton for cardio, and a small treadmill— but lifting and strength training was out of the question; this was trademarked by the sudden appearance of a man paid to follow me into the small gym in the buildings— a man who looked enough like the man who had beat me in front of my two children, stolen my son and intercepted my every attempt to care for him, or even be in his life. This man, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, would throw the 30 pound dumbbells from a over his head, sending them crashing to the floor across the room— absolutely unnecessary and unacceptable behavior, which I had at one point even captured on video, however, my visits to the gym ended when I decided to leave my phone in the apartment and I had been followed there by the same man, who threw the weights from above his head and acted like an animal. I simply picked up the weights and placed them on the treadmill as he lifted at the tension machine, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, then silently walked away. I never returned to the gym again— this had gone too far, but overall since it was an obvious plan to diminish my ability to fight what was happening with the noise by staying strong, this strategy had worked. Now all I could realistically do was cardio, which took too much time and effort in order to reach what I had been doing in the gym beforehand— now that my psyche was being dismantled, it remained important to kee me awake during the day with the noise, so that I could not attend the gym at night, because I didn't have the energy to function anymore. I was a trapped animal, and these sick mind games were nothing short of warfare. It had to be a government institution or privatized force, because their resources were immense— nothing like this could happen without a militarized approach; weaponizing people as effective weapons and dismantling my livelihood by any way possible was indeed an act of torture and psycholical warfare. I was isolated, without family or friends, and disconnected from any stable income— job after job application not simply denied, but ignored, as if my efforts were going into a black hole of nothingness. Then, it did seem as if all of my technological communications had been altered-1 my phone calls monitored and my internet history avalible to someone unseen, but not unfelt. It just so happened that the neighbor might be one of them, and that because I had no way of continuing my training regimen without being followed by strange men, who would then act in abrasive ways to further psychologically destruct what should have been strength training and recovery, I was weakened, not by one thing, but an entire organization of many. Just then, writing and luckily somehow also recording, standing between the door and the bathroom after raising out of the bathtub, the merciless noise continued— a loud crash against the wall as I stood naked in the walkway of the apartment with a towel draped over my shoulders sent my heart shrieking and pounding into the cavern of my stomach— not just my entire heart racing but my gut wrenching with the beating of my heart…. “File that.” I was standing over the doorway in the bathroom, still gripping the pslams of the first testament in my hand, but I didn't understand anymore what things to ignore and what to not. I assumed that it was just more mind games and frequency manipulation and that God itself had nearly been lost. In my time in the apartment, I became more connected from disconnected from the source in the way I knew it and had learned how to internalize God. I could no longer pray freely out loud— someone was listening to me in my apartment, and when I did speak, the noise was arranged to rile up until it shattered me, and I was quiet again. —Tales of a Superstar DJ. When was he ever a long hair, but here? I went to bed two hours ago, But perhaps when I sleep I dream of you Suppose that waking life's a nightmare And when I look in the mirror I see your eyes there I need you to go to my apartment; I'll be dead by the time you get there; Don't worry, you won't find my body I went over the edge elsewhere I left you a note and some postcards; The letters I put in the post beforehand I need you to publish my books, my friend Or no one will ever know of them I left you a pen name Who are you Where you from What'd you do for ten years I dont know Congrats from your accolades From the academy Down the hatch The overwhelming message of the thing was, that because this girl was white, she could do whatever she wanted to me. To act however she pleased, or be as horrible as the wanted without recourse ir reprimand, and I could only assume that because I was now being pressured and rushed to hurriedly do things that I couldn't have done under the stress of the noise and harassment, that it was someone acting in favor of the regime of white dominance and structured power— that equality was not only ineffective, but impossible, because it was not what they wanted. The illusion of equality was better because in that way, they maintained control over our minds and our bodies in the same way slavery had structured—and though they could no longer truly own us in one way, they still could in another, and this is how they maintained their humiliation and disrespect, the dehumanization of war— by creating the illusion that it was peace. Copyright The Collective Complex © [The Festival Project, Inc. ™] All Rights Reserved -Ū.

I'm no complete Christian, but the bizarre act of hacking and spewing and gasping by whoever was next door while I was reading the Bible was telling of its claims. “that girl really fucked you over.” I wasn't sure what exactly the voice was besides the voice of God itself, or maybe even the same voice who had warned me who'd win the election and was right, and so eternally and internally always kind of a voice I trusted, and besides that, I was sure it see right. The evil girl next door had really fucked me over— not just in one way, but several, and finally culminating in no longer even having an apartment. She had fucked me out of an apartment! The more I complained about her door slamming, incessant obsessive stalking, and the way she played mind games whenever she could find me about in the small space between our two doors, it was nothing short of her method of targeted warfare— to have given me a plant was for her to be able to say she was trying to be my friend, but everything else she did around that was evil, and the more I complained about the door slamming, the stalking my door and setting up loud conversations just outside of it in order to irk me, slamming the door each time I took a bath or a shower, or used the toilet for several months, she had indeed fucked me over, and run me over, and I was lost— I didn't understand that people could just be like that and I didn't want to just attribute it to race, but she was a white girl, and all the red flags and flares indicated that the game she was playing was race war— her goal to return me to the streets or the shelter where she could presume her dominance in the structure of social culture because it made her so uncomfortable that we had the same thing. She had never been inside of my apartment, but she was aching the entire time to get in, and the entire overall factor was, that I just never felt safe around her, despite her broad gestures and gifs and supposed openness— her words and her presence spoke an entire hidden language, telltale signs of betrayal, and maliciousness, and as much as I wanted them all in my head, they were not. Now the new property manager seemed to be taking her side, and her actions seemed more egregious— knowing I had come here from the shelter meant that there were entire parties of people enraged that the city was helping people to come out of homelessness and to bridge the gap between homelessness and inequality, but it was easy to see over the course of the gentrification process that white people were mad at this equality, and acting out, and even acting very outrageous, and the problem with me personally was that I wasn't even from New York, or out of the system in a certain way, but the people who were treating me with such degradation and disrespect couldn't see that. They could only see “black” and “formerly homeless”. What's worse, is they couldn't see the many books I'd written or art I'd made, and this contributed to their overall devaluation in my kind— or worse, they could, like the girl next door, who had read an excerpt of my writing under the guise that she was a helpful person, and had become enraged with dissolution and jealousy; it was as if she couldn't understand that not only might I be equal to her, but even intellectually superior in a certain way, or at the very least artistically superior, and began to act in such a destructive way that paired with the noise form the morortcycles and incessant harassment from outside the apartment which bled into all spaces of the apartment throughout the day, combined with her incessant door slamming and disruption to anything I did while I was at “home”, which never felt like home because of these things exactly, it made me seem crazy and ungrateful any time I complained to the property management, and that seemed to be the game. I even surmised that she was connected to the noise from outside and the particular strangeness that someone seemed to be listening to me inside the apartment as well, as she had somehow seemed to know things I was talking about on my unpublished podcast episodes— things she could not have possibly heard from next door, which meant there was some sort of audio recording on the premises she had access too. It became a cat and mouse game, because she knew where I was in my apartment and began to attack my psyche anytime I was in the apartment, and especially when I attempted to create. Now, facing almost certain death and removal from the only stability I'd ever known, it was partially due to this incessant and rampant behavior that I was almost always at a loss. I had once again been bullied out of something I desperately needed by a white girl who felt justified and untouchable— only this time, it was more serious. I wasn't just in trouble at school, or some kind of job— she had manipulated things in such a way that this time I was out of a place to live— under the guise that she was a good person, giving gifts and acting strangely friendly, she had planted seeds and initiated acts of warfare, and in the recovery process of having left abusive situation after abusive situation, it was hard to wrap my mind around the fact that this was yet again another one. I kept telling myself it was only in my mind, despite the evidence of otherwise. That she was not evil but simply ignorant, or misguided, and aloof because of her privelege— but now, understanding that once again I may have no where in my own country to go, I understood the earth shattering truths of equality and integration, and gentrification. Not only did they want to bring in wealthy whites and Asians, they wanted (and needed) to push poor blacks and Latinos out, because of the value the white people placed in themselves. Too many of us made them feel weak and vulnarable, and insecure— and I was certaint that reading over my writing the girl had felt she'd met her match— that even my presence at all was a threat, not just because I was black, but because I was smart. So the way she contributed to the forces of white power was the simple way the race war continues to be fought— by working on the mind, forcing it to weaken and crumble by slamming things during times of vulnerability— baths, showers, toilet use— and that way, for months at a time, I no longer felt safe at all, and of course, it was ungrateful to complain— I should just be happy to have a place to sleep that was my own. But to have peace and quiet and sanity, recovery and health? How could I ever deserve that? In fact, I didn't deserve it, and they made it clear— and there surely was a dorrelation between the noise outside and the noise inside: somebody was trying to make a very violent point— and they were using me to do it. They had effectively dismantled my ability to focus, and the. Intercepted my strength— I had a Peloton for cardio, and a small treadmill— but lifting and strength training was out of the question; this was trademarked by the sudden appearance of a man paid to follow me into the small gym in the buildings— a man who looked enough like the man who had beat me in front of my two children, stolen my son and intercepted my every attempt to care for him, or even be in his life. This man, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, would throw the 30 pound dumbbells from a over his head, sending them crashing to the floor across the room— absolutely unnecessary and unacceptable behavior, which I had at one point even captured on video, however, my visits to the gym ended when I decided to leave my phone in the apartment and I had been followed there by the same man, who threw the weights from above his head and acted like an animal. I simply picked up the weights and placed them on the treadmill as he lifted at the tension machine, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, then silently walked away. I never returned to the gym again— this had gone too far, but overall since it was an obvious plan to diminish my ability to fight what was happening with the noise by staying strong, this strategy had worked. Now all I could realistically do was cardio, which took too much time and effort in order to reach what I had been doing in the gym beforehand— now that my psyche was being dismantled, it remained important to kee me awake during the day with the noise, so that I could not attend the gym at night, because I didn't have the energy to function anymore. I was a trapped animal, and these sick mind games were nothing short of warfare. It had to be a government institution or privatized force, because their resources were immense— nothing like this could happen without a militarized approach; weaponizing people as effective weapons and dismantling my livelihood by any way possible was indeed an act of torture and psycholical warfare. I was isolated, without family or friends, and disconnected from any stable income— job after job application not simply denied, but ignored, as if my efforts were going into a black hole of nothingness. Then, it did seem as if all of my technological communications had been altered-1 my phone calls monitored and my internet history avalible to someone unseen, but not unfelt. It just so happened that the neighbor might be one of them, and that because I had no way of continuing my training regimen without being followed by strange men, who would then act in abrasive ways to further psychologically destruct what should have been strength training and recovery, I was weakened, not by one thing, but an entire organization of many. Just then, writing and luckily somehow also recording, standing between the door and the bathroom after raising out of the bathtub, the merciless noise continued— a loud crash against the wall as I stood naked in the walkway of the apartment with a towel draped over my shoulders sent my heart shrieking and pounding into the cavern of my stomach— not just my entire heart racing but my gut wrenching with the beating of my heart…. “File that.” I was standing over the doorway in the bathroom, still gripping the pslams of the first testament in my hand, but I didn't understand anymore what things to ignore and what to not. I assumed that it was just more mind games and frequency manipulation and that God itself had nearly been lost. In my time in the apartment, I became more connected from disconnected from the source in the way I knew it and had learned how to internalize God. I could no longer pray freely out loud— someone was listening to me in my apartment, and when I did speak, the noise was arranged to rile up until it shattered me, and I was quiet again. —Tales of a Superstar DJ. When was he ever a long hair, but here? I went to bed two hours ago, But perhaps when I sleep I dream of you Suppose that waking life's a nightmare And when I look in the mirror I see your eyes there I need you to go to my apartment; I'll be dead by the time you get there; Don't worry, you won't find my body I went over the edge elsewhere I left you a note and some postcards; The letters I put in the post beforehand I need you to publish my books, my friend Or no one will ever know of them I left you a pen name Who are you Where you from What'd you do for ten years I dont know Congrats from your accolades From the academy Down the hatch The overwhelming message of the thing was, that because this girl was white, she could do whatever she wanted to me. To act however she pleased, or be as horrible as the wanted without recourse ir reprimand, and I could only assume that because I was now being pressured and rushed to hurriedly do things that I couldn't have done under the stress of the noise and harassment, that it was someone acting in favor of the regime of white dominance and structured power— that equality was not only ineffective, but impossible, because it was not what they wanted. The illusion of equality was better because in that way, they maintained control over our minds and our bodies in the same way slavery had structured—and though they could no longer truly own us in one way, they still could in another, and this is how they maintained their humiliation and disrespect, the dehumanization of war— by creating the illusion that it was peace. Copyright The Collective Complex © [The Festival Project, Inc. ™] All Rights Reserved -Ū.

I'm no complete Christian, but the bizarre act of hacking and spewing and gasping by whoever was next door while I was reading the Bible was telling of its claims. “that girl really fucked you over.” I wasn't sure what exactly the voice was besides the voice of God itself, or maybe even the same voice who had warned me who'd win the election and was right, and so eternally and internally always kind of a voice I trusted, and besides that, I was sure it see right. The evil girl next door had really fucked me over— not just in one way, but several, and finally culminating in no longer even having an apartment. She had fucked me out of an apartment! The more I complained about her door slamming, incessant obsessive stalking, and the way she played mind games whenever she could find me about in the small space between our two doors, it was nothing short of her method of targeted warfare— to have given me a plant was for her to be able to say she was trying to be my friend, but everything else she did around that was evil, and the more I complained about the door slamming, the stalking my door and setting up loud conversations just outside of it in order to irk me, slamming the door each time I took a bath or a shower, or used the toilet for several months, she had indeed fucked me over, and run me over, and I was lost— I didn't understand that people could just be like that and I didn't want to just attribute it to race, but she was a white girl, and all the red flags and flares indicated that the game she was playing was race war— her goal to return me to the streets or the shelter where she could presume her dominance in the structure of social culture because it made her so uncomfortable that we had the same thing. She had never been inside of my apartment, but she was aching the entire time to get in, and the entire overall factor was, that I just never felt safe around her, despite her broad gestures and gifs and supposed openness— her words and her presence spoke an entire hidden language, telltale signs of betrayal, and maliciousness, and as much as I wanted them all in my head, they were not. Now the new property manager seemed to be taking her side, and her actions seemed more egregious— knowing I had come here from the shelter meant that there were entire parties of people enraged that the city was helping people to come out of homelessness and to bridge the gap between homelessness and inequality, but it was easy to see over the course of the gentrification process that white people were mad at this equality, and acting out, and even acting very outrageous, and the problem with me personally was that I wasn't even from New York, or out of the system in a certain way, but the people who were treating me with such degradation and disrespect couldn't see that. They could only see “black” and “formerly homeless”. What's worse, is they couldn't see the many books I'd written or art I'd made, and this contributed to their overall devaluation in my kind— or worse, they could, like the girl next door, who had read an excerpt of my writing under the guise that she was a helpful person, and had become enraged with dissolution and jealousy; it was as if she couldn't understand that not only might I be equal to her, but even intellectually superior in a certain way, or at the very least artistically superior, and began to act in such a destructive way that paired with the noise form the morortcycles and incessant harassment from outside the apartment which bled into all spaces of the apartment throughout the day, combined with her incessant door slamming and disruption to anything I did while I was at “home”, which never felt like home because of these things exactly, it made me seem crazy and ungrateful any time I complained to the property management, and that seemed to be the game. I even surmised that she was connected to the noise from outside and the particular strangeness that someone seemed to be listening to me inside the apartment as well, as she had somehow seemed to know things I was talking about on my unpublished podcast episodes— things she could not have possibly heard from next door, which meant there was some sort of audio recording on the premises she had access too. It became a cat and mouse game, because she knew where I was in my apartment and began to attack my psyche anytime I was in the apartment, and especially when I attempted to create. Now, facing almost certain death and removal from the only stability I'd ever known, it was partially due to this incessant and rampant behavior that I was almost always at a loss. I had once again been bullied out of something I desperately needed by a white girl who felt justified and untouchable— only this time, it was more serious. I wasn't just in trouble at school, or some kind of job— she had manipulated things in such a way that this time I was out of a place to live— under the guise that she was a good person, giving gifts and acting strangely friendly, she had planted seeds and initiated acts of warfare, and in the recovery process of having left abusive situation after abusive situation, it was hard to wrap my mind around the fact that this was yet again another one. I kept telling myself it was only in my mind, despite the evidence of otherwise. That she was not evil but simply ignorant, or misguided, and aloof because of her privelege— but now, understanding that once again I may have no where in my own country to go, I understood the earth shattering truths of equality and integration, and gentrification. Not only did they want to bring in wealthy whites and Asians, they wanted (and needed) to push poor blacks and Latinos out, because of the value the white people placed in themselves. Too many of us made them feel weak and vulnarable, and insecure— and I was certaint that reading over my writing the girl had felt she'd met her match— that even my presence at all was a threat, not just because I was black, but because I was smart. So the way she contributed to the forces of white power was the simple way the race war continues to be fought— by working on the mind, forcing it to weaken and crumble by slamming things during times of vulnerability— baths, showers, toilet use— and that way, for months at a time, I no longer felt safe at all, and of course, it was ungrateful to complain— I should just be happy to have a place to sleep that was my own. But to have peace and quiet and sanity, recovery and health? How could I ever deserve that? In fact, I didn't deserve it, and they made it clear— and there surely was a dorrelation between the noise outside and the noise inside: somebody was trying to make a very violent point— and they were using me to do it. They had effectively dismantled my ability to focus, and the. Intercepted my strength— I had a Peloton for cardio, and a small treadmill— but lifting and strength training was out of the question; this was trademarked by the sudden appearance of a man paid to follow me into the small gym in the buildings— a man who looked enough like the man who had beat me in front of my two children, stolen my son and intercepted my every attempt to care for him, or even be in his life. This man, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, would throw the 30 pound dumbbells from a over his head, sending them crashing to the floor across the room— absolutely unnecessary and unacceptable behavior, which I had at one point even captured on video, however, my visits to the gym ended when I decided to leave my phone in the apartment and I had been followed there by the same man, who threw the weights from above his head and acted like an animal. I simply picked up the weights and placed them on the treadmill as he lifted at the tension machine, grunting and mumbling rap lyrics, then silently walked away. I never returned to the gym again— this had gone too far, but overall since it was an obvious plan to diminish my ability to fight what was happening with the noise by staying strong, this strategy had worked. Now all I could realistically do was cardio, which took too much time and effort in order to reach what I had been doing in the gym beforehand— now that my psyche was being dismantled, it remained important to kee me awake during the day with the noise, so that I could not attend the gym at night, because I didn't have the energy to function anymore. I was a trapped animal, and these sick mind games were nothing short of warfare. It had to be a government institution or privatized force, because their resources were immense— nothing like this could happen without a militarized approach; weaponizing people as effective weapons and dismantling my livelihood by any way possible was indeed an act of torture and psycholical warfare. I was isolated, without family or friends, and disconnected from any stable income— job after job application not simply denied, but ignored, as if my efforts were going into a black hole of nothingness. Then, it did seem as if all of my technological communications had been altered-1 my phone calls monitored and my internet history avalible to someone unseen, but not unfelt. It just so happened that the neighbor might be one of them, and that because I had no way of continuing my training regimen without being followed by strange men, who would then act in abrasive ways to further psychologically destruct what should have been strength training and recovery, I was weakened, not by one thing, but an entire organization of many. Just then, writing and luckily somehow also recording, standing between the door and the bathroom after raising out of the bathtub, the merciless noise continued— a loud crash against the wall as I stood naked in the walkway of the apartment with a towel draped over my shoulders sent my heart shrieking and pounding into the cavern of my stomach— not just my entire heart racing but my gut wrenching with the beating of my heart…. “File that.” I was standing over the doorway in the bathroom, still gripping the pslams of the first testament in my hand, but I didn't understand anymore what things to ignore and what to not. I assumed that it was just more mind games and frequency manipulation and that God itself had nearly been lost. In my time in the apartment, I became more connected from disconnected from the source in the way I knew it and had learned how to internalize God. I could no longer pray freely out loud— someone was listening to me in my apartment, and when I did speak, the noise was arranged to rile up until it shattered me, and I was quiet again. —Tales of a Superstar DJ. When was he ever a long hair, but here? I went to bed two hours ago, But perhaps when I sleep I dream of you Suppose that waking life's a nightmare And when I look in the mirror I see your eyes there I need you to go to my apartment; I'll be dead by the time you get there; Don't worry, you won't find my body I went over the edge elsewhere I left you a note and some postcards; The letters I put in the post beforehand I need you to publish my books, my friend Or no one will ever know of them I left you a pen name Who are you Where you from What'd you do for ten years I dont know Congrats from your accolades From the academy Down the hatch The overwhelming message of the thing was, that because this girl was white, she could do whatever she wanted to me. To act however she pleased, or be as horrible as the wanted without recourse ir reprimand, and I could only assume that because I was now being pressured and rushed to hurriedly do things that I couldn't have done under the stress of the noise and harassment, that it was someone acting in favor of the regime of white dominance and structured power— that equality was not only ineffective, but impossible, because it was not what they wanted. The illusion of equality was better because in that way, they maintained control over our minds and our bodies in the same way slavery had structured—and though they could no longer truly own us in one way, they still could in another, and this is how they maintained their humiliation and disrespect, the dehumanization of war— by creating the illusion that it was peace. Copyright The Collective Complex © [The Festival Project, Inc. ™] All Rights Reserved -Ū.

The AfterNoonas discuss the viral Kpop Demon Hunters, why it resonated with us, how it inspires us, and what we think about a sequel.Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Why do Asians eat dogs, but others find that awful? What causes a culture to revere some animals and eat others? ► Script Sources and Notes: https://shorturl.at/dvdo3FOLLOW KEN

Celebrate, The Savior is Here!Jesus Christ is Alive!Get to know Jesus Christ, He will change your life!!!Go to GOD for discernment and wisdom.Know the Truth as the Truth will make you free! (John 8:32)___The Pledge of AllegianceNEO420 = Real News + Real Information for WE THE PEOPLEWE THE PEOPLE are at war with the deepstate criminal cabal!!!Turn off your tv, radio, and stop listening to paid professional liars spreading propaganda.***SUPPORT Independent Free Speech Reporting***Thank you for the SUPPORT & SHARING the TRUTH!!!___Podcast  link is here http://neo420.com/talks-podcast/The video channel link is here. https://odysee.com/@NEO420TALKS:4The Viral Delusionhttp://www.theviraldelusion.com/HAARPDARPA BlackjackAshli Babbit false flag Jan 6 video evidence___NEVER FORGET 9 11!!!Rumsfeld admitted $2.3 Trillion missing from Pentagon Sept 10 2001.  https://odysee.com/@NEO420TALKS:4/rumsfeld-2.1Trillionunaccountedforb-ccriminalsstoleit:7Planes did NOT bring down the two towers.AE911Truth.orgGeorge Bush Sr was CIA director before being Vice President then President.Towers that fell:-Building 1-Building 2-Building 7 (seldom reported even though BBC reporter reported building down before it happened) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J0VFMqi--Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.Support the show

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. The post APEX Express – July 10, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

Amy and Megan chat about the 2024 movie Love in the Big City while eating Korean snacks. We discuss why Kim Go Eun remains a top actress and why this movie was a surprising delight for us.Korean Snack BoxReady to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Karen left the country! And came back! We talk Karen's travels to London (with a brief layover in NYC) and the FIVE shows she saw. Why do Asians love Phantom of the Opera? Does Jamie Lloyd only know screens and black underwear? Get in touch! @downstageleftpc downstageleftpc@gmail.com downstageleftpodcast.com

It's that time of the year again...the All-Star Game is near and things are starting to get weird! First, is BTS Suga a part-owner of the As??? The Dodgers lean into Japanese culture with One Piece Night and Hololive Night, and we have 6 Asians on the All-Star roster!In position player news, Field Reporter Naomi Ko is on the scene for Kim Ha Seong's return (though short lived), Anthony Volpe beans Aaron Judge in the eye, Kyle Higashioka's Rangers-leading 5RBI game includes a deposit into the Higgy Bank, and Seiya Suzuki isn't worried his All-Star snub since his "plans are full." Pitchers are feeling things! Exhaustion (Yamamoto and Sugano), finding their stride (Joey Cantillo and Kumar Rocker), and firmly in the groove (Bryan Woo, Yusei Kikuchi, and Shota Imanaga). Also, we welcome the big league debut of Shinnosuke Ogasawara and the season debut of Yu Darvish!Lastly, Ohtani is officially Two Way Player status again...but how long until he makes a full start?

In this bite-sized tutorial, Pramita Mukherjee—named one of Animation Magazine's 2025 Rising Stars—walks us through the animation production pipeline step-by-step. From modeling and rigging to CFX and lighting, she breaks down the essential roles that bring animated characters and worlds to life.This clip is part of a full interview where we explore Pramita's creative journey from Kolkata to Los Angeles, her advice for rising artists, and her advocacy through Women in Animation and Asians in Animation. Watch the full conversation to hear more about her path, influences, and insights: https://youtu.be/iOyLJSdyoSo

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists.     The post APEX Express – 7.3.25 – Haibayo appeared first on KPFA.

Today we're tackling Emotional Intelligence (EQ or EI) in K-Dramas. What does that mean? Well, Amy and Megan weren't so sure until Lia led them into her mind castle, and then it all came together. Join us as we share assessments of our own emotional intelligence, as we dive into how K-dramas help us to expand our EQ, and as we explore characters who demonstrate emotional growth along with those who might still need a few lessons on how to achieve a better understanding of their own emotional intelligence.K Pop Rec: "Eye Candy" by From20Kpop Idol Learns About Cultural AppropriationReady to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Erik and Jon go through some memorable episodes in this episode filled with reminiscing. Jon brought some excerpts from the "First Asian in Sweden", "Viking Age" and "Potatis" episodes. Get ready for a hilarious stroll down memory lane. Enjoy!Support this podcast at www.patreon.com/teachmesweden Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This week's topics: • Jim Jones Vs Nas • Gaslighting • Women asking questions Vs Men. • Taking to your wife about things they don't care about. • Mr Wolf being a giver. • Asians love of feeding people • Doing good deeds so others do the same. • Being careful of your good gestures. • Wedding etiquette between male friends. • Trump dropping the F bomb on the news. • Israel Vs Iran • Fighting in Northern Nigeria • AITA for not paying "Black Tax" and not sending money back home. Connect with us at & send your questions & comments to: #ESNpod so we can find your comments www.esnpodcast.com www.facebook.com/ESNpodcasts www.twitter.com/ESNpodcast www.instagram.com/ESNpodcast @esnpodcast on all other social media esnpodcast@gmail.com It's important to subscribe, rate and review us on your apple products. You can do that here... www.bit.ly/esnitunes

Ness Sandoval, Professor of Sociology and Demography at Saint Louis University, joins Megan Lynch with a look at the new data. He says international migration has offset domestic migration in the region. The region is getting older, not younger says Sandoval while other regions are building housing for families.

Commentary by Dr. Jian'an Wang.

Welcome to Season 5, Episode 26! With the fall of Saigon happening about 50 years ago, it's important to recognize related additional moments in the history of Asians and Asian Americans. We're talking about the Secret War in Laos which was closely tied to the Vietnam War. This will be Part 1 of 2 on the topic. Laos is in Southeast Asia, a key region that the U.S. worried about during the Cold War. The Secret War in Laos was led by the CIA and fought predominantly by the Hmong, an ethnic minority in the country, and it's a major reason so many Hmong and Laotian people became refugees after the Fall of Saigon and retreat of U.S. forces. So in this episode, we dig into the geopolitical situation that was present in Southeast Asia, the U.S. role in battling the spread of communism there, the key local soldiers recruited by the CIA, and the amount of damage the U.S. did to the area.  We begin the episode by catching up on current events, including celebrating newly elected mayor of San Antonio Gina Ortiz Jones as well as all the Tony winners of Asian Pacific descent. We also give our thoughts on the push for Asian American History in Arizona. We end the episode with the recurring segment What are We Watching? In this installment, we talk about the streaming show Deli Boys and the feature film Sinners.  If you like what we do, please share, follow, and like us in your podcast directory of choice or on Instagram @AAHistory101. For previous episodes and resources, please visit our site at https://asianamericanhistory101.libsyn.com or our links at http://castpie.com/AAHistory101. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, email us at info@aahistory101.com. Segments 00:25 Introduction and Current Events 04:59 The History of the Secret War in Laos 14:40 What are We Watching? Deli Boys and Sinners

Could it be? Good news in 2025? We're thrilled about Zohran Mamdani's win in the New York City Democractic mayoral primary, and we talk about the exciting and disheartening parts of this outcome, the data, and the ranked choice of it all. Then we get into a topic we've been thinking but not talking more about in our middle age: Death. We dig into the big questions - how we feel about it these days, if we're afraid of it, what we think happens next - and also alllllll the logistical questions that come with it: Have you done any estate planning? What do you want to happen with your body? Who would you want to speak at your funeral? Finally, we take a hard pivot into an evergreen topic: Most embarrassing Asians. There are embarrassing people everywhere and Asians are no exception, and these are the folks who make us cringe the hardest. This episode has a little bit of everything, and we're glad we get to talk about the most serious and most silly things with each other and with you!facebook.com/topfivepodInstagram: @topfivepodArt by Colin Turnbull (colinpturnbull.com)Music by Origami PigeonThe opinions shared here do not necessarily reflect those of our employers!

Now that the Iran crisis is passing, attention is returning to President Trump's sweeping domestic agenda. Stephen Miran of the Council of Economic Advisers makes the case for why the BBB must pass not only to secure the border and deliver on Trump's campaign promises, but also to unleash American economic growth. Plus, Harmeet Dhillon explains the agenda of the DOJ's Office of Civil Rights, which is in position to unshackle American police and roll back institutional discrimination against whites, Asians, and more. Watch ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com! Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Now that the Iran crisis is passing, attention is returning to President Trump's sweeping domestic agenda. Stephen Miran of the Council of Economic Advisers makes the case for why the BBB must pass not only to secure the border and deliver on Trump's campaign promises, but also to unleash American economic growth. Plus, Harmeet Dhillon explains the agenda of the DOJ's Office of Civil Rights, which is in position to unshackle American police and roll back institutional discrimination against whites, Asians, and more. Watch ad-free on members.charliekirk.com! Get new merch at charliekirkstore.com! Support the show: http://www.charliekirk.com/supportSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Tonight Producer Swati Rayasam showcases a community panel of how discriminatory exclusion policies during times of heightened fears of national security and safety have threatened our communities in the past, and how the activities of the current administration threaten our core constitutional rights, raising the specter of politicization and polarization of citizenship, immigration visas, naturalization rights, and the right to free speech.   Deport. Exclude. Revoke. Imprison – “Wong Kim Ark is for All of Us” SHOW TRANSCRIPT Swati Rayasam: You are tuned in to APEX Express on KPFA. My name is Swati Rayasam and I'm back as your special producer for this episode. Tonight we have an incredible community panel titled Deport. Exclude. Revoke. Imprison. This panel explores the history of how discriminatory exclusion policies during times of heightened fears of national security and [00:01:00] safety have threatened our communities in the past, and how the activities of the current administration threaten our core constitutional rights, raising the specter of politicization and polarization of citizenship, immigration visas, naturalization rights, and the right to free speech. I'll pass it on to UC Berkeley Ethnic Studies Professor Mike Chang to kick us off. Mike and Harvey: We're starting on Berkeley time, right on time at three 10, and I want to introduce Harvey Dong. Harvey Dong: Okay. The sponsors for today's event include, AADS- Asian American and Diaspora studies program, uc, Berkeley, Asian American Research Center, the Center for Race and Gender Department of Ethnic Studies- all part of uc, Berkeley. Off campus, we have the following community groups. Chinese for Affirmative Action, Asian Law Caucus, [00:02:00] Asian Prisoners Support Committee, and East Wind Books. Okay, so that's, quite a few in terms of coalition people coming together. My name is Harvey Dong and I'm also a lecturer in the AADS program and part of the ethnic studies department. I can say that I exist here as the result of birthright citizenship won by Ancestor Wong Kim Ark in 1898. Otherwise, I would not be here. We want to welcome everyone here today, for this important panel discussion titled: Deport, Exclude, Revoke, Imprison – Immigration and citizenship rights during crisis. Yes, we are in a deep crisis today. The Chinese characters for crisis is way G in Mandarin or way gay in [00:03:00] Cantonese, which means danger and opportunity. We are in a moment of danger and at the same time in a moment of opportunity. Our communities are under attack from undocumented, documented, and those with citizenship. We see urgency in coming together. In 1898, the US Supreme Court case, US versus Wong Kim Ark held that under the 14th Amendment birthright, citizenship applies to all people born in the United States. Regardless of their race or their parents' national origin or immigration status. On May 15th this year, the Supreme Court will hear a President Donald Trump's request to implement an executive order that will end birthright citizenship already before May 15th, [00:04:00] deportations of US citizen children are taking place. Recently, three US citizen children, one 2-year-old with cancer have been deported with their undocumented parents. The numbers of US citizen children are much higher being deported because it's less covered in the press. Unconstitutional. Yes, definitely. And it's taking place now. Also today, more than 2.7 million southeast Asian Americans live in the US but at least 16,000 community members have received final orders of deportation, placing their lives and families in limbo. This presents a mental health challenge and extreme economic hardship for individuals and families who do not know whether their next day in the US will be their last. Wong Kim Ark's [00:05:00] struggle and the lessons of Wong Kim Ark, continue today. His resistance provides us with a grounding for our resistance. So they say deport, exclude, revoke, imprison. We say cease and desist. You can say that every day it just seems like the system's gone amuk. There's constant attacks on people of color, on immigrants and so forth. And our only solution, or the most important solution is to resist, legally resist, but also to protest, to demand cease and desist. Today brings together campus and community people. We want you all to be informed because if you're uninformed , you can't do anything. Okay? You have to know where things are at. It's nothing new. What they're trying to do, in 1882, [00:06:00] during times of economic crisis, they scapegoated Asian Americans. Today there's economic, political crisis. And the scapegoating continues. They're not doing anything new. You know, it's old stuff, but we have to realize that, and we have to look at the past in terms of what was done to fight it and also build new solidarities today. Wong Kim Ark did not take his situation sitting down. He went through, lots of obstacles. He spent three months in Angel Island he was arrested after he won his case because he was constantly being harassed wherever he went. His kids when they came over were also, spotted as being Wong Kim Ark's, children, and they too had to spend months at Angel Island. So Wong Kim Ark did not take his situation sitting down. We need to learn from him today. Our [00:07:00] next, special guest is Mr. Norman Wong, a good friend of mine. He was active here in the third world Liberation Front strike that led to ethnic studies. He did a lots of work for the development of Asian American studies and we've been out in touch for about, what, 40 years? So I'm really happy that he's able to come back to Berkeley and to talk about yourself, if you wish, maybe during the Q and a, but to talk about , the significance of your great-grandfather's case. Okay, so Norman Wong, let's give him a hand. Norman Wong: Hello, my name's Norman Wong. I'm the great grandson, Wong Kim Ark. Wong Kim Ark was [00:08:00] born in the USA, like my great-grandfather. I, too was born American in the same city, San Francisco, more than 75 years after him. We are both Americans, but unlike him, my citizenship has never been challenged. His willingness to stand up and fight made the difference for his struggles, my humble thanks. Wong Kim Ark however, was challenged more than once. In late 1889 as an American, he traveled to China in July, 1890. He returned to his birth city. He had his papers and had no problems with reentry. In 1895, after a similar trip, he was stopped from disembarking and was placed into custody for five months aboard ship in port. [00:09:00] Citizenship denied, the reason the Chinese exclusion Act 1882. He had to win this case in district court, provide $250 bail and then win again in the United States Supreme Court, March 28th, 1898. Only from these efforts, he was able to claim his citizenship granted by birthright from the 14th Amendment and gain his freedom. That would not be the last challenge to his being American. My mother suffered similar treatment. She like my great-grandfather, was born in America. In 1942, she was forced with her family and thousands of other Japanese Americans to relocation camps an experience unspoken by her family. [00:10:00] I first learned about Japanese American internment from history books. Executive order 9066 was the command. No due process, citizenship's rights stripped. She was not American enough. Now we have executive order 14160. It is an attack on birthright citizenship. We cannot let this happen. We must stand together. We are a nation of immigrants. What kind of nation are we to be with stateless children? Born to no country. To this, I say no. We as Americans need to embrace each other and [00:11:00] cherish each new life. Born in the USA. Thank you. Harvey Dong: Thank you, Norman. And Annie Lee, will moderate, the following panel, involving campus and community representatives who will be sharing their knowledge and experience. Annie Lee, Esquire is an attorney. She's also the, managing director of policy for Chinese Affirmative Action, and she's also, heavily involved in the birthright citizenship issue. Annie Lee: Thank you so much Harvey for that very warm welcome and thank you again to Norman for your remarks. I think it's incredible that you're speaking up at this moment, to preserve your ancestors' legacy because it impacts not just you and him, but all of us [00:12:00] here. So thank you. As Harvey said, my name is Annie Lee and I have this honor of working with this amazing panel of esteemed guest we have today. So I will ask each of them to introduce themselves. And I will start, because I would love to hear your name, pronouns. Title and organization as well as your personal or professional relationship with the US Immigration System. So my name's Annie. I use she her pronouns. I'm the managing Director of policy at Chinese for Affirmative Action, which is a non-profit based in San Francisco Chinatown. We provide direct services to the monolingual working class Chinese community, and also advocate for policies to benefit all Asian Americans. My relationship with the immigration system is I am the child of two Chinese immigrants who did not speak English. And so I just remember lots of time spent on the phone when I was a kid with INS, and then it became U-S-C-I-S just trying to ask them what happened to [00:13:00] a family member's application for naturalization, for visas so I was the interpreter for them growing up and even today. I will pass it to Letty. Leti Volpp: Hi everybody. Thank you so much, Annie. Thank you Harvey. Thank you, Norman. That was profoundly moving to hear your remarks and I love the way that you framed our conversation, Harvey. I'm Leti Volpp. I am the Robert d and Leslie k Raven, professor of Law and Access to Justice at the Berkeley Law, school. I'm also the director of the campus wide , center for Race and Gender, which is a legacy of the Third World Liberation Front, and the 1999, student movement, that led to the creation of the center. I work on immigration law and citizenship theory, and I am the daughter, second of four, children of my mother who was an immigrant from China, and my father who was an immigrant [00:14:00] from Germany. So I'll pass it. Thank you. Ke Lam: Thank you. Thank you all for being here. Thank you, Norman. So my name's Key. I go by he, him pronouns or Nghiep “Ke” Lam, is my full name. I work for an organization called Asian Prison Support Committee. It's been around for like over two decades now, and it started behind three guys advocating for ethics study, Asian and Pacific Islander history. And then it was starting in San Quent State Prison. All three of them pushed for ethics study, hard and the result is they all was put into solitary confinement. And many years later, after all three got out, was Eddie Zang, Mike Romero and Mike no. And when they got out, Eddie came back and we pushed for ethics study again, and we actually got it started in 2013. And it's been going on to today. Then the programs is called Roots, restoring our Original True Self. So reconnecting with who we are. And one of Eddie's main, mottos that really stuck with me. He said, we need to all connect to our chi, right? And I'm like, okay, I understand what chi is, and he said no. He [00:15:00] said, you need to connect to your culture, your history, which result to equal your identity, who you are as a person. So, the more we study about our history and our culture, like, birthright citizen, it empower us to know, who we are today. Right? And also part of that is to how do we take down the veil of shame in our community, the veil of trauma that's impacting our community as well. We don't talk about issue that impact us like immigration. So I'm a 1.5 generation. So I was born in Vietnam from Chinese family that migrant from China to Vietnam started business after the fall of Vietnam War. We all got kicked out but more than that, I am directly impacted because I am a stranded deportee, somebody that got their, legal status taken away because of criminal conviction. And as of any moment now, I could actually be taken away. So I live in that, right at that threshold of like uncertainty right now. And the people I work with, which are hundreds of people, are fixing that same uncertainty.[00:16:00] Annie Lee: Thank you, Ke. I'm gonna pass it to our panelists who are joining us virtually, including Bun. Can you start and then we'll pass it to Chris after. Bun: Hey everybody, thank you for having me. My name is Bun. I'm the co-director of Asian Prison Support Committee. I'm also, 1.5 generation former incarcerated and under, direct impact of immigration. Christopher Lapinig: Hi everyone. My name is Christopher Lapinig, my pronouns are he, him and Sha. I am a senior staff attorney on the Democracy and National Initiatives Team at Asian Law Caucus, which you may know is the country's first and oldest legal aid in civil rights organization, dedicated to serving, low income immigrant and underserved AAPI communities. In terms of my connection to the immigration system, I am, I also am a beneficiary of a birthright citizenship, and my parents are both immigrants from the Philippines. I was born in New York City. My [00:17:00] extended family spans both in the US and the Philippines. After graduating law school and clerking, my fellowship project was focused on providing litigation and immigration services to, survivors of labor trafficking in the Filipino community. While working at Asian Americans Advancing Justice Los Angeles, I also was engaged in, class action litigation, challenging the first Trump administration's practices, detaining immigrants in the Vietnamese and Cambodian communities. Annie Lee: Thank you, Chris. Thank you Bun. Let's start off by talking about birthright citizenship since it's a big topic these days. On the very, very first day of Trump's administration, he issued a flurry of executive orders, including one that would alter birthright citizenship. But I wanna take us back to the beginning because why do we have this right? It is a very broad right? If you were born in the United States, you are an American citizen. Where does that come from? So I wanna pose the first question to Letty to talk about the [00:18:00] origins of birthright citizenship., Leti Volpp: Very happy to. So what's being fought about is a particular clause in the Constitution and the 14th Amendment, which says, all persons born are naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. Okay, so that's the text. There's been a very long understanding of what this text means, which says that regardless of the immigration status of one's parents, all children born here are entitled to birthright citizenship with three narrow exceptions, which I will explain. So the Trump administration executive order, wants to exclude from birthright citizenship, the children of undocumented immigrants, and the children of people who are here on lawful temporary visas. So for example, somebody here on an [00:19:00] F1 student visa, somebody on a H one B worker visa, somebody here is a tourist, right? And basically they're saying we've been getting this clause wrong for over a hundred years. And I will explain to you why I think they're making this very dubious argument. Essentially when you think about where the 14th amendment came from, in the United States, in the Antebellum era, about 20% of people were enslaved and there were lots of debates about citizenship. Who should be a citizen? Who could be a citizen? And in 1857, the Supreme Court issued a decision in a case called Dread Scott, where they said that no person who was black, whether free or enslaved, could ever be a citizen. The Civil War gets fought, they end slavery. And then the question arose, well, what does this mean for citizenship? Who's a citizen of the United States? And in 1866, Congress [00:20:00] enacts a law called the Civil Rights Act, which basically gave rights to people that were previously denied and said that everybody born in the United States is a birthright citizen. This gets repeated in the 14th Amendment with the very important interpretation of this clause in Norman's great-grandfather's case, the case of Wong Kim Ark. So this came before the Supreme Court in 1898. If you think about the timing of this, the federal government had basically abandoned the reconstruction project, which was the project of trying to newly enfranchised, African Americans in the United States. The Supreme Court had just issued the decision, Plessy versus Ferguson, which basically legitimated the idea that, we can have separate, but equal, as a doctrine of rights. So it was a nation that was newly hostile to the goals of the Reconstruction Congress, and so they had this case come before them, whereas we heard [00:21:00] from Norman, we have his great-grandfather born in San Francisco, Chinatown, traveling back and forth to China. His parents having actually left the United States. And this was basically presented as a test case to the Supreme Court. Where the government tried to argue, similar to what the Trump administration is arguing today, that birthright citizenship, that clause does not guarantee universal birthright citizenship saying that children of immigrants are not subject to the jurisdiction thereof, not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States because their parents are also not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. The Supreme Court took over a year to decide the case. They knew that it would be controversial, and the majority of the court said, this provision is clear. It uses universal language. It's intended to apply to children of all immigrants. One of the things that's interesting about [00:22:00] what the, well I'll let Chris actually talk about what the Trump administration, is trying to do, but let me just say that in the Wong Kim Ark decision, the Supreme Court makes very clear there only three narrow exceptions to who is covered by the 14th Amendment. They're children of diplomats. So for example, if the Ambassador of Germany is in the United States, and, she has a daughter, like her daughter should not become a birthright citizen, right? This is why there's diplomatic immunity. Why, for example, in New York City, there are millions of dollars apparently owed to the city, in parking tickets by ambassadors who don't bother to pay them because they're not actually subject to the jurisdiction in the United States. Okay? Second category, children of Native Americans who are seen as having a sovereign relationship of their own, where it's like a nation within a nation, kind of dynamic, a country within a country. And there were detailed conversations in the congressional debate about the [00:23:00] 14th Amendment, about both of these categories of people. The third category, were children born to a hostile invading army. Okay? So one argument you may have heard people talk about is oh, I think of undocumented immigrants as an invading army. Okay? If you look at the Wong Kim Ark decision, it is very clear that what was intended, by this category of people were a context where the hostile invading army is actually in control of that jurisdiction, right? So that the United States government is not actually governing that space so that the people living in it don't have to be obedient, to the United States. They're obedient to this foreign power. Okay? So the thread between all three of these exceptions is about are you having to be obedient to the laws of the United States? So for example, if you're an undocumented immigrant, you are subject to being criminally prosecuted if you commit a crime, right? Or [00:24:00] you are potentially subjected to deportation, right? You have to obey the law of the United States, right? You are still subject to the jurisdiction thereof. Okay? But the Trump administration, as we're about to hear, is making different arguments. Annie Lee: Thank you so much, Leti for that historical context, which I think is so important because, so many different communities of color have contributed to the rights that we have today. And so what Leti is saying here is that birthright citizenship is a direct result of black liberation and fighting for freedom in the Civil War and making sure that they were then recognized as full citizens. And then reinforced, expanded, by Wong Kim Ark. And now we are all beneficiaries and the vast majority of Americans get our citizenship through birth. Okay? That is true for white people, black people. If you're born here, you get your ci. You don't have to do anything. You don't have to go to court. You don't have to say anything. You are a US citizen. And now as Leti referenced, there's this fringe legal theory that, thankfully we've got lawyers like [00:25:00] Chris who are fighting this. So Chris, you're on the ALC team, one of many lawsuits against the Trump administration regarding this unlawful executive order. Can you tell us a little bit about the litigation and the arguments, but I actually really want you to focus on what are the harms of this executive order? Sometimes I think particularly if you are a citizen, and I am one, sometimes we take what we have for granted and you don't even realize what citizenship means or confers. So Chris, can you talk about the harms if this executive order were to go through? Christopher Lapinig: Yeah. As Professor Volpp sort of explained this executive order really is an assault on a fundamental constitutional right that has existed for more than a hundred years at this point, or, well, about 125 years. And if it is allowed to be implemented, the harms would really be devastating and far reach. So first, you know, children born in the us, the [00:26:00] parents without permanent status, as permissible said, would be rendered effectively stateless, in many cases. And these are of course, children, babies who have never known any other home, yet they would be denied the basic rights of citizen. And so the order targets a vast range of families, and not just undocument immigrants, but also those with work visas, student visas, humanitarian productions like TPS, asylum seekers, fleeing persecution, DACA recipients as well. And a lot of these communities have deep ties to Asian American community. To our history, and of course are, essential part, of our social fabric. In practical terms, children born without birthright citizenship would be denied access to healthcare through Medicaid, through denied access to snap nutritional assistance, even basic IDs like social security numbers, passports. And then as they grow older, they'd be barred from voting, serving on juries and even [00:27:00] working. And then later on in life, they might be, if they, are convicted of a crime and make them deportable, they could face deportation to countries that they never stepped, foot off basically. And so this basically is this executive order threatened at risk, creating exactly what the drafters of the 14th Amendment wanted to prevent the creation of a permanent underclass of people in the United States. It'll just get amplified over time. If you can imagine if there's one generation of people born without citizenship, there will be a second generation born and a third and fourth, and it'll just get amplified over time. And so it truly is just, hard to get your mind around exactly what the impact of this EO would be. Annie Lee: Thanks, Chris. And where are we in the litigation right now? Harvey referenced, a hearing at the Supreme Court on May 15th, but, tell us a little bit about the injunction and the arguments on the merits and when that can, when we can expect [00:28:00] that. Christopher Lapinig: Yeah, so there were a number of lawsuits filed immediately after, the administration issued its exec order on January 20th. Asian Law Caucus we filed with the ACLU Immigrant Rights Project. Literally we were the first lawsuit, literally hours after the executive order was issued. By early February, federal judges across the country had issued nationwide preliminary injunctions blocking implementation of the order. Our case is actually not a nationwide injunction. And so there're basically, I believe three cases that are going up to the Supreme Court. And, the Trump administration appealed to various circuit courts to try to undo these injunctions. But all circuit courts upheld the injunctive relief and and so now the Supreme Court is going to be hearing arguments on May 15th. And so it has not actually ruled on whether or not the executive order is constitutional, but it's going to. I mean, it remains to be seen exactly what they're going to decide but may [00:29:00] 15th is the next date is the big date on our calendar. Annie Lee: Yeah. So the Trump administration is arguing that these judges in a particular district, it's not fair if they get to say that the entire country, is barred from receiving this executive order. Is that procedurally correct. Judges, in order to consider whether to grants an injunction, they have a whole battery of factors that they look at, including one, which is like likelihood of winning on the merits. Because if something is unconstitutional, it's not really great to say, yeah, you can let this executive order go through. And then like later when the court cases finally worked their way, like a year later, pull back from that. And so that's, it's very frustrating to see this argument. And it's also unfair and would be very messy if the states that had republican Attorneys General who did not litigate, why would you allow the executive order to go forward in those red states and not in these blue state? It really, I would say federalism run terribly amuck. Swati Rayasam: [00:30:00] You are tuned in to APEX Express on 94.1 KPFA, 89.3 KPFB in Berkeley,. 88.1. KFCF in Fresno and online@kpfa.org. Annie Lee: But anyway, let's see back off from the actual case because I think what we're really talking about and what Chris has alluded to is, these cases about birthright citizenship, all the immigration policy is essentially determining who belongs here. Who belongs here. That's what immigration policy is at its heart. And we see that the right wing is weaponizing that question, who belongs here? And they are going after very vulnerable populations, undocumented people, people who are formerly incarcerated. So Bun if you can talk about how, is the formerly incarcerated community, like targeted immigrants, targeted for deportation? What is going on with this community that I feel like most people might not know about? Thank [00:31:00] you. Bun: Yes. For our folks that are incarcerated and former incarcerated, we are the easiest target for deportation because we are in custody and in California, CDCR colludes with ICE and on the day that we are to be paroled they're at the door, cuffing us up and taking us to detention. I'm glad to hear Harvey say, this is a time of fear for us and also opportunity. Right now, our whole community, the Southeast Asian community, mainly are very effective with immigration. In the past 25 years, mostly it was the Cambodian community that was being targeted and deported. At this moment, they are targeting, all of the Southeast Asian community, which historically was never deported because of the politics and agreements, of the Vietnamese community. And now the Laos community thats more concerning, that are being targeted for deportation. Trump have opened a new opportunity for us as a community to join [00:32:00] together and understand each other's story, and understand each other's fear. Understand where we're going about immigration. From birthright to crimmagration. A lot of times folks that are under crimmigration are often not spoken about because of our cultural shame, within our own family and also some of our community member felt safe because the political agreements. Now that everybody's in danger, we could stand together and understand each other's issue and support each other because now we could see that history has repeated itself. Again, we are the scapegoat. We are here together fighting the same issue in different circumstances, but the same issue. Annie Lee: But let me follow up. What are these, historical agreements that you're talking about that used to feel like used to at least shield the community that now aren't in place anymore? Bun: Yeah. After the Clinton administration, uh, passed the IRA [immigration reform act] a lot of Southeast Asian nations were asked to [00:33:00] take their nationals back. Even though we as 1.5 generation, which are the one that's mostly impacted by this, had never even stepped into the country. Most of us were born in a refugee camp or we're too young to even remember where they came from. Countries like Cambodian folded right away because they needed the financial aid and whatever, was offering them and immediately a three with a MOU that they will take their citizens since the early two thousands. Vietnam had a stronger agreement, which, they would agree to only take folks that immigrated here after 1995 and anybody before 1995, they would not take, and Laos have just said no until just a few months ago. Laos has said no from when the, uh, the act was passed in 1995, the IRRIRA. Mm-hmm. So the big change we have now is Vietnam had signed a new MOU saying that they will take folks after 1995 [00:34:00] in the first administration and more recently, something that we never thought, happened so fast, was Laos agreeing to take their citizen back. And then the bigger issue about our Laos community is, it's not just Laos folks. It's the Hmong folks, the Myan folks, folks, folks that are still in danger of being returned back 'cause in the Vietnam War, they colluded and supported the Americans in the Vietnam War and were exiled out and kicked out, and were hunted down because of that. So, at this moment, our folks are very in fear, especially our loud folks, not knowing what's gonna happen to 'em. Ke Lam: So for folks that don't know what IRR means it means, illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act. It actually happened after the Oklahoma bombing, which was caused by a US citizen, a white US citizen. Yeah. But immigration law came out of it. That's what's crazy about it. Annie Lee: Can you tell us, how is APSC advocating to protect the community right now because you [00:35:00] are vulnerable? Ke Lam: So we had to censor a lot of our strategies. At first we used to use social media as a platform to show our work and then to support our community. But the government use that as a target to capture our people. So we stopped using social media. So we've been doing a lot of on the ground movement, such as trying to get local officials to do resolutions to push Governor Newsom to party more of our community members. The other thing is we hold pardon workshops, so try and get folks to get, either get a pardon or vacate their sentence. So commute their sentence to where it become misdemeanor is not deportable anymore. Support letters for our folks writing support letters to send to the governor and also to city official, to say, Hey, please help pardon our community. I think the other thing we are actually doing is solidarity work with other organizations, African American community as well as Latin communities because we've been siloed for so long and we've been banned against each other, where people kept saying like, they've taken all our job when I grew up. That's what they told us, right? [00:36:00] But we, reality that's not even true. It was just a wedge against our community. And then so it became the good versus bad narrative. So our advocacy is trying to change it it's called re-storying you know, so retelling our story from people that are impacted, not from people, not from the one percenters in our own community. Let's say like we're all good, do you, are there's parts of our community that like that's the bad people, right? But in reality, it affects us all. And so advocacy work is a lot of different, it comes in a lot of different shapes and forms, but definitely it comes from the community. Annie Lee: Thanks, Ke. You teed me up perfectly because there is such a good versus bad immigrant narrative that takes root and is really hard to fight against. And that's why this administration is targeting incarcerated and formerly incarcerated folks and another group that, are being targeted as people who are accused of crimes, including Venezuelan immigrants who are allegedly part of a gang. So, Leti how is the government deporting [00:37:00] people by simply accusing them of being a part of a gang? Like how is that even possible? Leti Volpp: Yeah, so one thing to think about is there is this thing called due process, right? It's guaranteed under the constitution to all persons. It's not just guaranteed to citizens. What does it mean? Procedural due process means there should be notice, there should be a hearing, there should be an impartial judge. You should have the opportunity to present evidence. You should have the opportunity to cross examinee. You should have the opportunity to provide witnesses. Right? And basically Trump and his advisors are in real time actively trying to completely eviscerate due process for everybody, right? So Trump recently said, I'm doing what I was elected to do, remove criminals from our country. But the courts don't seem to want me to do that. We cannot give everyone a trial because to do so would take without exaggeration, 200 years. And then Stephen Miller said the judicial process is for Americans. [00:38:00] Immediate deportation is for illegal aliens. Okay. Quote unquote. Right. So I think one thing to notice is, as we're hearing from all of our speakers are like the boxes, the categories into which people are put. And what's really disturbing is to witness how once somebody's put in the box of being quote unquote criminal gang banger terrorists, like the American public seems to be like, oh, okay you can do what you want to this person. There's a whole history of due process, which exists in the laws which was created. And all of these early cases actually involved Asian immigrants, right? And so first they were saying there's no due process. And then in a case called Yata versus Fisher, they said actually there is due process in deportation cases, there's regular immigration court proceedings, which accord with all of these measures of due process. There's also a procedure called expedited removal, [00:39:00] which Congress invented in the nineties where they wanted to come up with some kind of very quick way to summarily exclude people. It was motivated by a 60 Minutes episode where they showed people coming to Kennedy Airport, who didn't have any ID or visa or they had what seemed to be fake visas and they were let into the United States. And then they disappeared, right? According to the 60 Minutes episode. So basically Congress invented this procedure of, if you appear in the United States and you have no documents, or you have what an immigration inspector thinks are false documents, they can basically tell you, you can leave without this court hearing. And the only fail safe is what's called a credible fear screening. Where if you say, I want asylum, I fear persecution, I'm worried I might be tortured, then they're supposed to have the screening. And if you pass that screening, you get put in regular removal [00:40:00] proceedings. So before the Trump administration took office, these expedited removal proceedings were happening within a hundred miles of the border against people who could not show that they had been in the United States for more than two weeks. In one of his first executive orders. Trump extended this anywhere in the United States against people who cannot show they've been in the United States for more than two years. So people are recommending that people who potentially are in this situation to carry documentation, showing they've been physically in the United States for over two years. Trump is also using this Alien Enemies Act, which was basically a law Congress passed in 1798. It's only been used three times in US history it's a wartime law, right? So it was used in 1812, World War I, and World War II, and there's supposed to be a declared war between the United States and a foreign nation or government, or [00:41:00] there's an incursion threatened by a foreign nation or government, and the president makes public proclamation that all natives of this hostile nation, 14 and up shall be liable to be restrained and removed as alien enemies. Okay? So we're obviously not at war with the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua, right? They have not engaged in some kind of invasion or predatory incursion into the United States, but the Trump administration is claiming that they have and saying things like, oh, they're secretly a paramilitary wing of the Venezuelan government, even as the Venezuelan government is like cracking down on them. It's not a quasi sovereign, entity. There's no diplomatic relationships between Tren de Aragua and any other government. So these are legally and factually baseless arguments. Nonetheless, the administration has been basically taking people from Venezuela on the basis of tattoos. A tattoo of a crown of a [00:42:00] rose, right? Even when experts have said there's no relationship between what Tren de Aragua does and tattoos, right? And basically just kidnapping people and shipping them to the torture prison in El Salvador. As I'm sure you know of the case of Kimber Abrego Garcia, I'm sure we'll hear more about this from Christopher. There's a very small fraction of the persons that have been sent to this prison in El Salvador who actually have any criminal history. And I will say, even if they had a criminal history, nobody should be treated in this manner and sent to this prison, right? I mean, it's unbelievable that they've been sent to this prison allegedly indefinitely. They're paying $6 million a year to hold people there. And then the United States government is saying, oh, we don't have any power to facilitate or effectuate their return. And I think there's a struggle as to what to call this. It's not just deportation. This is like kidnapping. It's rendition. And there are people, there's like a particular person like who's completely [00:43:00] disappeared. Nobody knows if they're alive or dead. There are many people in that prison. People don't know if they're alive or dead. And I'm sure you've heard the stories of people who are gay asylum seekers, right? Who are now in this situation. There are also people that have been sent to Guantanamo, people were sent to Panama, right? And so I think there questions for us to think about like, what is this administration doing? How are they trying to do this in a spectacular fashion to instill fear? As we know as well, Trump had said oh, like I think it would be great when he met with Bukele if you build four more or five more facilities. I wanna house homegrown people in El Salvador, right? So this is all the more importance that we stick together, fight together, don't, as key was saying, don't let ourselves be split apart. Like we need a big mass coalition right? Of people working together on this. Annie Lee: So thank you leti and I think you're absolutely right. These Venezuelans were kidnapped [00:44:00] in the middle of the night. I mean, 2:00 AM 3:00 AM pulled out of bed, forced to sign documents they did not understand because these documents were only available in English and they speak Spanish, put on planes sent to El Salvador, a country they've never been to. The government didn't even have to prove anything. They did not have to prove anything, and they just snatch these people and now they're disappeared. We do have, for now the rule of law. And so Chris, there are judges saying that, Kimber Abrego Garcia has to be returned. And despite these court orders, the administration is not complying. So where does that leave us, Chris, in terms of rule of law and law in general? Christopher Lapinig: Yeah. So, I'm gonna make a little personal. So I graduated from Yale Law School in 2013, and you might know some of my classmates. One of my classmates is actually now the Vice President of the United States. Oh man. [00:45:00] Bless you. As well as the second lady, Usha Vance. And a classmate of mine, a good friend Sophia Nelson, who's a trans and queer, was recently on, I believe CNN answering a question about, I believe JD Vice President Vance, was asked about the administration's sort of refusal to comply with usual orders. Yeah. As we're talking about here and JD had said something like, well, courts, judges can't tell the president what he can't do, and sophia, to their credit, said, you know, I took constitutional law with JD, and, we definitely read Marbury Versus Madison together, and that is the semial sort of Supreme Court case that established that the US Supreme Court is the ultimate decider, arbiter, interpreter, of the US Constitution. And so is basically saying, I know JD knows better. He's lying essentially, in all of his [00:46:00] communications about, judicial orders and whether or not a presidential administration has to comply , with these orders. So, to get to your question though, it is of course unprecedented. Really. It is essentially, you know, it's not, if we not already reached. The point of a constitutional crisis. It is a constitutional crisis. I think it's become clear to many of us that, democracy in the US has operated in large part, and has relied on, on, on the good faith in norms, that people are operating good faith and that presidents will comply when, a federal judge issues an injunction or a decision. It kind of leaves us in an interesting, unprecedented situation. And it means that, lawyers, we will continue to litigate and, go to court, but we can't, lawyers will not save the country or, immigrants or communities. We need to think extensively and creatively. [00:47:00] About how to ensure, that the rule of law is preserved because, this administration is not, abiding by the longstanding norms of compliance and so we have to think about, protests, advocacy, legislatively. I don't have the answers necessarily, but we can't rely on the courts to fix these problems really. Annie Lee: Oof. That was very real, Chris. Thank you. But I will say that when there is resistance, and we've seen it from students who are speaking up and advocating for what they believe is right and just including Palestinian Liberation, that there is swift retaliation. And I think that's partly because they are scared of student speech and movement and organizing. But this is a question to all of you. So if not the courts and if the administration is being incredibly retaliatory, and discriminatory in terms of viewpoint discrimination, in people and what people are saying and they're scouring our social [00:48:00] media like, Ke warns, like what can everyday people do to fight back? That's for all of you. So I don't know who, which of you wants to take it first? Ke Lam: Oh man. I say look at history, right? Even while this new president, I wanna say like, this dude is a convicted felon, right? Don't be surprised at why we country is in the way it is, because this dude's a convicted felon, a bad business person, right? And only care about the billionaires, you know? So I'm not surprised how this country's ending up the way it is 'cause it is all about money. One way that we can stand up is definitely band together, marched on the streets. It's been effective. You look at the civil right movement, that's the greatest example. Now you don't have to look too far. We can actually, when we come together, they can't fight us all. Right? It is, and this, it's like you look at even nature in the cell. When things band together, the predators cannot attack everyone. Right? They probably could hit a few of us, but in the [00:49:00] long run, we could change the law. I think another thing is we, we, as the people can march to the courts and push the courts to do the job right, despite what's going on., We had judges that been arrested for doing the right thing, right? And so, no matter what, we have to stand strong just despite the pressure and just push back. Annie Lee: Thanks, Ke. Chris? Christopher Lapinig: What this administration is doing is you know, straight out of the fascist playbook. They're working to, as we all know, shock and awe everyone, and make Americans feel powerless. Make them feel like they have no control, make them feel overwhelmed. And so I think first and foremost, take care of yourself , in terms of your health, in terms of your physical health, your mental health. Do what you can to keep yourself safe and healthy and happy. And do the same for your community, for your loved ones, your friends and family. And then once you've done that do what you can in terms of your time, treasure, [00:50:00] talent to, to fight back. Everyone has different talents, different levels of time that they can afford. But recognize that this is a marathon and not necessarily a sprint because we need everyone, in this resistance that we can get. Annie Lee: Thank you, Chris. Leti Volpp: There was a New Yorker article called, I think it was How to Be a Dissident which said, before recently many Americans, when you ask them about dissidents, they would think of far off countries. But they interviewed a lot of people who'd been dissidents in authoritarian regimes. And there were two, two things in that article that I'm taking with me among others. One of them said that in surveying like how authoritarian regimes are broken apart, like only 3.5% of the population has to oppose what's going on. The other thing was that you should find yourself a political home where you can return to frequently. It's almost like a religious or [00:51:00] spiritual practice where you go and you get refreshed and you're with like-minded people. And so I see this event, for example as doing that, and that we all need to find and nurture and foster spaces like this. Thank you. Annie Lee: Bun, do you have any parting words? Bun: Yeah. Like Ke said, to fight back, getting together, understanding issues and really uplifting, supporting, urging our own communities, to speak Up. You know, there's folks that can't speak out right now because of fear and danger, but there are folks here that can speak out and coming here learning all our situation really give the knowledge and the power to speak out for folks that can't speak down [unclear] right now. So I appreciate y'all Annie Lee: love that bun. I was gonna say the same thing. I feel like there is a special obligation for those of us who are citizens, citizens cannot be deported. Okay? Citizens have special rights based [00:52:00] on that status. And so there's a special responsibility on those of us who can speak, and not be afraid of retaliation from this government. I would also urge you all even though it's bleak at the federal level, we have state governments, we have local governments. You have a university here who is very powerful. And you have seen, we've seen that the uni that the administration backs down, sometimes when Harvard hit back, they back down and that means that there is a way to push the administration, but it does require you all putting pressure on your schools, on your local leaders, on your state leaders to fight back. My boss actually, Vin taught me this. You know, you think that politicians, lead, politicians do not lead politicians follow. Politicians follow and you all lead when you go out further, you give them cover to do the right thing. And so the farther you push and the more you speak out against this administration, the more you give them courage to do the right thing. And so you absolutely have to do that. A pardon [00:53:00] is critical. It is critical for people who are formerly incarcerated to avoid the immigration system and deportation. And so do that. Talk to your family, talk to your friends. My parents, despite being immigrants, they're kinda old school. Okay guys, they're like, you know, birthright citizenship does seem kind of like a loophole. Why should people like get like citizenship? I'm like, mom, we, I am a birthright citizen. Like, um, And I think for Asian Americans in particular, there is such a rich history of Asian American civil rights activism that we don't talk about enough, and maybe you do at Berkeley with ethnic studies and professors like Mike Chang. But, this is totally an interracial solidarity movement. We helped bring about Wong Kim Ark and there are beneficiaries of every shade of person. There's Yik wo, and I think about this all the time, which is another part of the 14th Amendment equal protection. Which black Americans fought for that in San Francisco. [00:54:00] Chinatown made real what? What does equal protection of the laws even mean? And that case was Seminole. You've got Lao versus Nichols. Another case coming out of San Francisco. Chinatown about English learner rights, the greatest beneficiary of Lao v Nichols, our Spanish speakers, they're Spanish speaking children in schools who get access to their education regardless of the language they speak. And so there are so many moments in Asian American history that we should be talking about, that we should educate our parents and our families about, because this is our moment. Now, this is another one of those times I wanna pass it to Mike and Harvey for questions, and I'm so excited to hear about them. Mike and Harvey: Wow, thank you so much. That's a amazing, panel and thank you for facilitating annie's wanna give it of a great value in terms of that spiritual home aspect. Norm how does your great grandfather's , experience in resistance, provide help for us [00:55:00] today? Norman Wong: Well, I think he was willing to do it. It only took one, if no one did it, this, we wouldn't be having the discussion because most of us would've never been here. And we need to come together on our common interests and put aside our differences because we all have differences. And if we tried, to have it our way for everything, we'll have it no way for us. We really need to, to bond and bind together and become strong as a people. And I don't mean as a racial or a national group. Mm-hmm. I mean, we're Americans now. We're Americans here think of us as joining with all Americans to make this country the way it's supposed to be. The way [00:56:00] we grew up, the one that we remember, this is not the America I grew up believing in. I'm glad he stood up. I'm proud that he did that. He did that. Him doing that gave me something that I've never had before. A validation of my own life. And so yes, I'm proud of him. Wong Kim Ark is for all of us. It's not for me to own. Yeah. Wow. Really not. Thank you so much. Wong Kim Ark is for all of us. And, and , talking about the good , that we have here and, the optimism that Harvey spoke about, the opportunity, even in a moment of substantial danger. Thank you so much everybody. Mike and Harvey: This was amazing and really appreciate sharing this space with you and, building community and solidarity. Ke Lam: But is there any, can I leave with a chant before we close off? Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. Thank you so much. So this is a chant that we use on the ground all the time. You guys probably heard it. When I said when we fight, you guys said we [00:57:00] win when we fight. We win when we fight, we win. When we fight, we win up. Swati Rayasam: Thanks so much for tuning into APEX Express. Please check out our website at kpfa.org/program/apexexpress to find out more about the show tonight and to find out how you can take direct action. We thank all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating, and sharing your visions with the world. Your voices are important. APEX Express is produced by Miko Lee, along with Jalena Keene-Lee, Ayame Keene-Lee, Preeti Mangala Shekar, Anuj Vaida, Cheryl Truong, Isabel Li, Ravi Grover, and me Swati Rayasam. Thank you so much to the team at KPFA for their support, and have a good [00:58:00] night.   The post APEX Express – 6.26.25-Deport. Exclude. Revoke. Imprison – Wong Kim Ark is for All of Us appeared first on KPFA.

Megan and Lia make the case for Let Free the Curse of Taekwondo, a Korean BL drama that launched its way to the top of our favorites lists with its earnest storytelling, heartfelt acting, and incredibly satisfying ending. Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

It's another week of Asians in Baseball, and everybody's taking notes! First, our reaction to the Dodgers' response (or lack thereof) to the protests, the updated IL report, and a trade rumor and a DFA.In position player news, Anthony Volpe needs the bump, Bo Bichette and Christian Yelich definitely do not, Steven Kwan shows off his Gold Glove defense, Seiya Suzuki counters two errors with two homers, and Kim Hyeseong earns more playing time. Over in pitching, Tomoyuki Sugano and Yoshinobu Yamamoto are tired, the Angels continue to leave Yusei Kikuchi high and dry with the L, and Orion Kerkering has not given up an earned run since May 6th!And Ohtani leads by example after getting HBP in the Padres/Dodgers Tour de Plunks and returns to the mound...maybe a little too early.

On this episode, we welcome award winning author and illustrator Mike Curato to the podcast to chat about his latest graphic novel, Gaysians, an adult graphic novel following four gay Asians navigating love, identity, found family, and friendship in early 2000's Seattle.Follow Mike on Instagram at @mike_curato and check out his latest graphic novel Gaysians available now on the Books & Boba bookshop!Books & Boba is a podcast dedicated to reading and featuring books by Asian and Asian American authorsSupport the Books & Boba Podcast by:Joining our Patreon to receive exclusive perksPurchasing books at our bookshopRocking our Books & Boba merchFollow our hosts:Reera Yoo (@reeraboo)Marvin Yueh (@marvinyueh)Follow us:InstagramTwitterGoodreadsFacebookThe Books & Boba June 2025 pick is Afterparties by Anthony Veasna SoThis podcast is part of Potluck: An Asian American Podcast Collective

In the first episode of Season 9, our hosts Naina, Eden, and Meghna get personal as they reflect on their career paths so far and what it means to grow up navigating work, culture, and identity.

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Tonight's show is June 19th. We are all connected. We are talking with Asian and Asian American Children's book authors. PowerLeeGirls host Miko Lee talks with Chi Thai and Livia Blackburne about the power of storytelling, maternal heritage, generational trauma, and much more. Title:  We Are All Connected Show Transcripts Opening: [00:00:00] Apex Express Asian Pacific expression. Community and cultural coverage, music and calendar, new visions and voices, coming to you with an Asian Pacific Islander point of view. It's time to get on board the Apex Express.   Ayame Keane-Lee: [00:01:17] Welcome to Apex Express. Tonight's show is June 19th. We are all connected. We are talking with Asian and Asian American Children's book authors. PowerLeeGirls host Miko Lee talks with Chi Thai and Livia Blackburne about the power of storytelling, maternal heritage, generational trauma, and much more. First, we want to start by wishing everyone a happy Juneteenth, Juneteenth commemorates, an end to slavery and the emancipation of Black Americans after the Civil War. In 1865, 2 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, enslaved people in Galveston, Texas finally learned of their freedom. Juneteenth marks the day the last enslaved people learned of their freedom. Though outright slavery became illegal, the systematic oppression of African Americans continues to this day. We see that show up in almost every aspect of American culture, from the high rate of infant mortality to the over punishing of Black children in schools, to police brutality, to incarceration. We must continue to recognize the importance of championing Black lives and lifting up Black voices. We are all connected. June 19th is also an important day in Asian American history. In 1982 in Detroit, Vincent Chin was at a bar celebrating his bachelor party prior to his wedding the next day. Ronald Ebens, a white auto worker, and his stepson Michael Nitz taunted Vincent with racial epithets. They thought he was Japanese and were angry about the Japanese rise in the auto industry. When Vincent left the bar later, the two men attacked and killed Vincent with a baseball bat. He was 27 years old. Ronald Ebens never did time for this murder. Ronald Ebens is 85 years old now. Ebens not only skirted prosecution, he has used bankruptcy and homesteading laws in Nevada to avoid a wrongful death civil suit settlement. Ordered by the court in 1987 to pay $1.5 million to Chin's family, the Chin estate has received nothing. Lily Chin, Vincent's mom could have stayed silent about the racist attack on her son. Instead she spoke out. She took a courageous stance to highlight this most painful moment in her life. In doing so, she helped ignite a new generation of Asian American activists working for civil rights and social justice. We find ourselves in a new wave of activism as our communities band together to work against the injustices of the current regime. And what does this have to do with children's books? It is all connected. We highlight children's books by Asian and Asian American authors because we want our next generation of children to know and appreciate their own heritage. We want them to proudly represent who they are so that they can work in solidarity with other peoples. Our struggle is interwoven. As Grace Lee Boggs said, “History is a story not only of the past, but of the future.” Thank you for joining us on apex express. Enjoy the show.   Miko Lee: [00:04:24] First off. Let's take a listen to one of Byron Au Young's compositions called “Know Your Rights” This is part of the trilogy of the Activist Songbook. This multi-lingual rap, give steps to know what to do when ICE officers come to your door.    MUSIC   That was “Know Your Rights” performed by Jason Chu with lyrics by Aaron Jeffries and composed by Byron Au Yong Welcome, Chi Thai to Apex Express.    Chi Thai: [00:07:13] Hello. I'm really happy to be joining you, Miko.  Miko Lee: [00:07:16] I'm really happy to meet you and learn about you as an artist, as a filmmaker, as a children's book author. And I wanna first start with a personal question, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you? Chi Thai: [00:07:30] Ooh, what a great question. You know what? I love being asked stuff that hasn't been asked kind of before. I mean, there's a kinda really kinda natural answer to that, which is, you know, family are my people. Of course. 100%. And certainly, you know, the reason why I'm talking to you today, you know, in regard to the, to the book, you know, it's about my family's journey. But I found, and I don't know if this is. Somewhat to do with, you know, being a child of two cultures and you know, being a child of the diaspora that you really have to kind of find your own family too. 'cause I suppose I grew up feeling, I didn't quite relate to maybe my parents in a way that, you know, you normally would if you weren't part of the diaspora. And I felt estranged from my birth country and I didn't really feel like British either a lot of the time. So in terms of like, who are my people? I've gathered those people as I've kind of grown up and it's, it's a kind of strange feeling too. I feel like it's taken me a really long to grow up and to figure out who I am. And I suppose that's why, you know, the people that I have a really, a lot of people that have come, kinda later in my life, I actually have no friends in my childhood as an example of that. I've had to kind of find these people as I've grown up, but it's taken me a long time to grow up because growing up in the UK there wasn't any literature to read about what it was like to be Asian. And British, to be a refugee and things like that. So it just took me longer and I then, as a result, it just took me longer to find my tribe. but I have it now, but it's still work in progress. That was a very convoluted answer. I'm very sorry Miko.    Miko Lee: [00:09:15] No, it wasn't. No worries. It's fine. And what legacy do you carry with you?   Chi Thai: [00:09:19] Kind of an extension to that answer, I think when you're an artist, practicing your voice, figuring out your voice, can take a while. And I think I've only really started maybe the last like five to 10 years at the most really figured out what I want my legacy to be. The things I wanna talk about are really about s tories from the diaspora, certainly, and about community and healing. These are the things I think that are really important to me, especially when we talk about maybe coming from struggle. I don't feel it's enough to be an artist today and just talk about struggle. I want to talk about justice as well. And justice really is about healing, you know?    Miko Lee: [00:10:00] Oh, that's beautiful. Can you talk a little bit more about that healing and what that means to you and how that shows up in your work?    Chi Thai: [00:10:07] A couple years ago, no, not even that long ago, I produced a, a feature film. This is probably the best example for it, but I produced a feature film called Raging Grace, which we called it Horror with a small H and it. Basically took the story of what it was like to be, undocumented Filipina in the uk who was also a mother. And I think if that film had been made 10 years ago, it would just shown how hard her life was, and unrelentingly. So, and I think the reason why Raising Grace is so special is it goes beyond the trauma, it takes us to a place of justice, of being able to speak out for someone who has felt invisible, to be visible for someone who's not. Had a voice, to have a voice and to begin that kind of healing process of sticking up for herself, making a change transforming herself from maybe the good immigrant to the bad immigrant and things like that. I think that's a really great example and I think I read a really wonderful thing. It might have been in a Guardian article where we, so a lot of my work is around, inclusion representation of like diasporic stories. And I think when you have, when you exist in the poverty of like representation, I. the solution to that is plentitude. I think that Viet Thanh Nguyen probably said that, so I don't wanna take credit for it. He comes up with so many wonderful things, and that's a wonderful thing to be able to move from poverty, like to plentitude and that be the solution, is kinda really wonderful. So I enjoy being really prolific. I enjoy supporting artists to be able to do their work. So as a community, we can also be prolific and I wanna support, narratives that. Take us beyond a place of struggle and trauma to a place of like healing and justice and so forth.    Miko Lee: [00:11:57] Your work crosses so many genres. You were just mentioning how that film was kind of a horror film and, and then you've done these kind of dreamy animation pieces and then now this children's book. Do you select the genre and the format and the medium, or does it select you?   Chi Thai: [00:12:16] Oh, I think the story chooses it. I like 100% believe that. I just actually was thinking about this 'cause I was doing an interview on something else, people, often ask about the creative process and I, can only speak for my own. But usually when I get an idea for a story, the general shape of it comes almost like really well formed. There's a sense of a lready kinda what genre it'll be. There's a sense of the character, there's a sense of the journey and all these things. I felt the same about, writing The Endless Sea I knew it would be from the voice of a child. This probably sounds like my creative process is terrible, but it was just. This is how it was going to be. That kind of part was writing itself, or at least I feel that it'd been writing itself like that in my subconscious for many, many years before it kind of surfacing and writing. Like the writing bit is just the tip of the iceberg at the end of the day. there wasn't like a kind of decision about that. the story in that sense was quite intact. So I often feel like the story is demanding something about kind genre and for, for Raging Grace 'cause I've talked about this a lot, not just in listen to me, but other things. But we always said like if you are an an undocumented person, every breath you take is taken in a hostile environment. It's so natural for it to be a horror. So there's not a sense that you kinda decide that it's like that is the very reality of someone who's going, you know, that's their lived experience. And if you're going to represent that truthfully, it will be through the prism of horror. And I suppose that's how I think about genre. the story is kind of telling you what it needs to tell its emotional truth. and I felt that way, with The Endless Sea same thing with the Raging Grace, with Lullaby. And I think you talked about The Promise, I suppose I, with The Promise, which is an adaptation I had less choice about that because that was a book and it was a adapted into an animation. I've heard Nicola, who's the author of the book, talk about that and she talks about like the story coming to her in a dream and tiptoeing down her arm coming onto the page, she like describes it really beautifully. so maybe our processes are the same. It feels that way. there's not long deliberations. I mean, that's not to say the writing process isn't difficult. It is. But that, I've never found the, [genre] the difficulty or the bit that's required a lot of, I don't know soul searching with it.    Miko Lee: [00:14:28] So with that being said, how did Endless Sea your latest children's book? How did that tiptoe into your imagination?    Chi Thai: [00:14:36] This is a strange one because this is probably the closest thing to like, almost autobiographical work. What I can say is like, it's the true story o f how I and my family, which would've been at the time my mom and dad, my older sister, me, how we fled Vietnam after the fall of an Saigon. we actually left quite late we left in 1979 w hen things were tr were getting truly, truly, truly, quite terrible. And, this was very much a last resort. I think my parents would try to make things work, but realized that they couldn't. This journey that we took on these, boats that were made badly, made poorly, that many of which sank has become almost like the genesis story of our family. It's like it's a big, it has a long shadow, right? Ever since you know I, it is like the first story that I can remember. It's one of the few stories my mom would tell me again and again when we, when they see their old friends, it's something they talk about. So it's something that has happened to it to us, but it's such a big thing that it's just, echoed In my life growing up, as I've you know, got older and older, and the wonderful thing about having a story kinda live with you eventually it's in your blood and in your bones, but also if it's a thing that's kinda shared with you again and again, you actually build up this, there's something about the repetition of it, and then every time you hear it told from an uncle or a family friend or from your mom, a new little detail is embroidered that someone adds. So I've kinda lived with this story for 40 plus years and I've been collecting all these little things about it all this time and all that time it was, I think, kind of just writing itself, you know? You know, it was doing all that work before I actually put like pen to paper. Um, yeah.    Miko Lee: [00:16:31] Was there a catalyst or something that made you actually put the pen to paper?   Chi Thai: [00:16:36] That's really interesting. You know, I probably don't mind it is probably something really banal like. I think I probably wrote it during Covid and I had more time. Um, I think there are probably be some bigger forces in place. And you know what, I can tell you what it is actually if I'm, I'm forcing myself to think and examine a bit closer so when this is totally true. So I remember hearing the news about Viet Thanh Nguyen win winning the Pulitzer for The Sympathizer. And it made such a mark on me and I kind of felt, wow, someone from our community has achieved this incredible thing. And I thought, why? Why now? Like, and I was like, well, you know what? It's probably taken our community certain amount of time to come of age, to develop not just the abilities to write, to create, to make art, but also to have possibly the relationships or networks in place to be able to then make the art and get it out into the world. And I kind of felt when he was able to do that and came of age, I kind of felt there was going to be like other people from the kind of diasporic Vietnamese community that would also start to flourish. And that made me feel really good. About probably being a bit older than the average kind of artist, like making their, kinda like their pieces and everything and saying, you know what? My time can be now. It's okay. And I just find it just really inspiring that, you know our community was kind of growing, growing up, coming of age and being able to do these, these things And I kind of felt like it had given me the permission, I suppose the, the confidence to go, “Oh this story that I've been carrying my whole life, which I don't really see a version of out there I can write that and now I can write it and I'm the right person to write it.” And I had just done The Promise so I had a relationship with Walker. I was like, I have a, you know, a relationship with the publisher. I feel my writing is matured. Like I can do this. And so it was like a culmination and, you know, convergence of those things. And, but I do remember having that thought thinking, “This is a good time to be alive in our community 'cause we're actually able to make our art and get it out there now.” I, I felt it was like a real watershed moment really.   Miko Lee: [00:19:11] What made you decide to do it in this format as a Little Kid's Children's Illustrated book? We were talking earlier about how to, to me, this is the first more realistic version of a boat people experience in a very little kid's voice. What made you decide to do it in this style?    Chi Thai: [00:19:33] So interesting. At the same time, I was writing The Endless Sea. I was writing also the script for a short film, which is called Lullaby, which is takes an incident that happened on my boat but expresses it as a film, as a little kinda horror kinda drama, but a kid cannot watch that. It's like too terrifying. Um, and I wrote, you know, The Endless Sea at the same time. And again, I can't, it's really hard for me to articulate. I just knew it was gonna be a kid's book, like, and I knew it'd be written from the voice of a kid, and I didn't actually, can I say I didn't even ascribe a particular kind of value to that. It wasn't until I had started conversations with the publisher they're like, you know, we see like there's a really high, like this is really great that it's written in the voice of the kid. It somehow gives it something else. Something more is something kind of special. I didn't set out to like, overthink, like what was the most effective way to tell this story? I, I think I just told the story as honestly as I could, you know, with the words that I felt that, you know, I had in me to de, you know, to describe it. In the most authentic way to, to me. And like I say, at the same time, I knew, like I knew that was a kid's book. There was another part of that I wanted to express that was really important to me and that was survivor's guilt. But that I felt was like, that was a horror, so that was really not gonna be suitable for kids. So I was definitely thinking about lots of things to do with the same subject of the same time, but they were definitely being expressed in different ways. And again, Lullaby came to me very kind of quickly, almost fully formed. And I knew, you know, it would be a ghost story. I knew it would be the story of a mother and things like that. And I often maybe, you know, I should, I, I should interrogate more, but I kinda, I take these kinda. These ideas, which are quite well shaped and, and then I just like lean into them more and more and more. But they, the way they arrive it, I've kinda, I, I can see a lot of what is already about to unfold.   Miko Lee: [00:21:43] And do you still dream about that experience of being on the boat as a kid?    Chi Thai: [00:21:52] It's, it's a really difficult thing to explain because you know that that happened now so long ago, and I've probably heard the story thousands of times. I've watched all the terrible Hollywood movies, I've seen all the news clippings, I've watched all the archive. I've listened to, you know, people talk, and I have my own memories and I look at photographs and I have memories of looking at photographs. I feel like, you know, my memory is really unreliable, but what it is instead is it's this, this kind of, kind of tapestry of, you know, of the story of memories, of, you know, images as I grow up of hearing the story, like all coming together. One of the things I did when I wrote, I wrote The Endless Sea, is I then went back to my mom and I did a recorded interview with her 'cause I was really worried about how unreliable my memory might be. And I interviewed her and I asked a lot of questions and I said, and I, it was like, you know, in the way I would've just like listened to the story quite passively before this time I interviewed her and I asked a lot of questions about details and all sorts of things. 'cause I really wanted to be able to represent things, you know, as factually as I could. And that was kinda one of my kinda kind of fact checking kinda exercises I did 'cause I was, I was much quite worried about how unreliable my memory was about it all. And you know, what is, what is a memory of a memory of memory, like, you know, especially when it comes to thinking about that time on the boat and the feelings I had. Yeah. So, you know,    Miko Lee: [00:23:34] and you were so young also to    Chi Thai: [00:23:37] Totally 100%. And sometimes, I don't know, you know, is it a memory of a memory? Is it a dream of a dream?   Miko Lee: [00:23:44] Mm-hmm.    Chi Thai: [00:23:44] Or just some, yeah.   Miko Lee: [00:23:46] Was there anything that your mom said that surprised you?    Chi Thai: [00:23:50] Yeah. Um, she didn't realize how bad it was gonna be and she was like, “God, if it, I'd known how terrifying it was I dunno if I, we could have done it.” I think there's a certain amount of naivety involved and I suppose that surprised me. You know? 'cause we know already now how bad it was. Um, so things like that surprised me.    Miko Lee: [00:24:15] and your mom, the dedication of the book is to your mom. What does she think when she first read it?    Chi Thai: [00:24:22] I've got a funny story. My parents, you know, they, we left, they were in their early twenties and I think it was, you know, the escape was hard for them, but settling in new country was really hard for them. That's. That's been kind of their struggle. They had to work so hard, so many hours to kind of, you know, give us a great life. And, I think a lot of that meant they weren't people that could go out, enjoy, enjoy movies, look at art, read lots of literature and things like that. They're very, very simple, very working class. Simple life or working class kinda life. Very much all about, uh, the work. Um, and I remember when I had a, the publisher had made like a mockup of the book and I gave it to my mum to read 'cause I wanted her to be happy about it too, and she's probably been my toughest critic. I think everything I've done, she hasn't really liked, to be honest. Um, and when I gave her the mockup to read. She went, “Yeah,” but she said it in such a way I knew what she meant was Yeah, that's right. You know, that's the truth. That's the, you know, the book isn't the testimony, but it felt like she was saying yeah. It was like the simple kind of approval. It wasn't like a lot    Miko Lee: [00:25:50] That is the most Asian mom's approval ever.    Chi Thai: [00:25:54] It's so funny, like people say to me, oh Chi, it's such a beautiful book. Oh, the writing so lit, like lyrical. It's stripped back, it's elegant. Like, you know, Viet Thanh Nguyen , like God bless his like consults, gave me a comment to put in the book, said these wonderful things, and my mom goes, “yeah.”. You know, it made me laugh at the time, but I knew what it meant. And I also was old enough, I was mature enough, you know, God, if she'd given me that, if I'd been 20 written that I might have cried and my heart might have broken. Right. But I, I knew I had, I've so much compassion, you know, for my parents. Mm-hmm. And people like my parents, what they've been through and, you know, but    Miko Lee: [00:26:38] That was incredibly high praise for her.    Chi Thai: [00:26:40] It was, I couldn't have asked more.   Miko Lee: [00:26:47] Oh, I totally get that. I think that's such an Asian thing. That is so funny.    Chi Thai: [00:26:53] It is, it is. I didn't feel bad. I, I remember showing her Lullaby, um, and she didn't like it at all.    Miko Lee: [00:27:02] What did she say? What is her not like voice? What did she say to that?    Chi Thai: [00:27:05] Oh, she. Well, firstly, she, well, the, the film is almost silent because basically it tells a story. It's inspired by a mother that was on our boat who lost her baby on the border crossing, and I was very much ever, for as long as I knew about this woman's story, I was like, I was very much haunted by it, and I was haunted by, you know, the fact that that's how she felt and her guilt. Over losing her baby on this journey. And I knew, I knew I wanted to tell her story. 'cause one of the things I feel very strongly about is when you are on the losing side. So I'm from South Vietnam, like that's not the, you know, that's not the story that's told, the story is told of who triumphs at the end of the day. And I was just like all those people that we lost at sea, this mother, her baby. The stories kind of aren't told. So I kind of felt really strongly that this was somehow a very creative way to put down like a, an historical record like this happened. And actually I found out after making the film that five babies were lost in our boat, not just one.   Miko Lee: [00:28:24] Wow. So what did she say, your mom say?   Chi Thai: [00:28:28] Yes. So I made this film, which was for the most part, a silent film. This is a woman that's shut down. She barely speaks anymore. She is living with the guilt ever. You know, when she was on the boat before her baby died, she sang a lullaby, and ever since then, she hasn't been able to speak again. And then we find out that she has been haunted by the ghost of her child that she lost. And then a bit too, you know, to kind of free herself from that. She, she actually sings, you know, the, the film culminates in her singing the Luby one last time. S saying Goodbye finally being able to move beyond her Gild and I Griffin, saying goodbye and hoping she's able to, you know, progress. So I made a film about that was largely silence except for this lullaby, and my mum watched it. She went, next time you make a film, you know you need more words. I was just like, oh, I think my heart probably did crumple off a bit a bit at that point.    Miko Lee: [00:29:30] Aw.    Chi Thai: [00:29:31] You know? Um, but yeah. But yeah, it's okay. It's okay because you know what? My mom doesn't get to see stuff like that very often. So sometimes she doesn't have the wider, and this is why, I mean, like, the life that she's had, you know, hasn't been one where she's been able to surround herself with, oh, I'm so lucky. You know, my life has been so different, but it's been different. Different because of, you know what she's, what she's done for us, so it's okay. I can take it on the chin when she says my film doesn't have enough dialogue in it.    Miko Lee: [00:30:04] I love that. For you, have you had conversations with your mom about your life as an artist, and what are her thoughts on that?   Chi Thai: [00:30:16] Well say. So I, so my mom, I don't really like, you know, she's probably not that into it. I'll be honest about being an artist. I can understand why she wants you to have a good life. And I would say for the most part, being an artist is, is a, is a tough life because it's hard to make, you know, the, the pennies work, right?   Miko Lee: [00:30:44] She wants stability for you, right?    Chi Thai: [00:30:45] Yeah, exactly. But she's made a peace with it. And basically what happened, I think all the best story is gonna be about my mom, right? Is that she basically, I, I, um, I have a partner, we've been together for 15 years. Um, he's a really nice guy and he has a reliable job and we have two kids together and i,    Miko Lee: [00:31:08] So that makes it okay.   Chi Thai: [00:31:10] So yeah, this is what I was saying. So she said to me like. It doesn't really matter what you do now. 'cause she, you are already peaked. You're somebody's wife. We're not married. But she told everyone in Vietnam we were married 'cause she couldn't cope with this not being like having kids out of wedlock. In her head. She's rewritten that we are married. Right. She's like, you are married, you're somebody's wife and you mother, it doesn't get better than that. So if you are an artist or if you're a filmmaker, whatever, it doesn't matter. 'cause nothing can be better than that. Right. So she's accepted on the basis that I've already fulfilled, kind of my promise.   Miko Lee: [00:31:46] Wow. Interesting.    Chi Thai: [00:31:50] And she means that in the nicest possible way.    Miko Lee: [00:31:52] Yeah.    Chi Thai: [00:31:52] That she feels like you have a home, you have stability, you have someone who loves you, you know, you have a, a purpose in life, but really her value, you know, the way, I think, the way she measures my value is like, that's how she looks at it. The, the art is something else.    Miko Lee: [00:32:10] Well, I really appreciate you sharing your art with us in the world and your various, um, genres and styles. And I'm wondering how our audience can find out more about your work. Clearly we'll put links to where people can buy the book and let's see, but how do they find out more about your films?   Chi Thai: [00:32:28] Um, so that like, because it is the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War in 2025. Actually the very anniversary of that is the tomorrow, the 30th, April, right? Um, you can watch Lullaby on Altar, which is a YouTube channel. Um, and I can give you the link for it. Rating Grace is on Paramount Plus if you want to, if you've got Paramount Plus, but you can also buy it from all the usual kind of places too. Um, and you know, and we'll see us from all great book stockists, I imagine in, in the us.   Miko Lee: [00:33:07] Thank you so much. Um, I'd love to get, I'd love for you to send me the link so I could put 'em in the show notes. I really appreciate chatting with you today. Um, is there anything else you'd like to share?    Chi Thai: [00:33:19] Um, no, I think, I think that's good. Your, your questions are so good. Mika, I'm already like, kinda like processing them all. Uh, yes.    Miko Lee: [00:33:30] Well, it was a delight to chat with you and to learn more about your artistic vision, and my wishes are that you continue to grow and feel blessed no matter what your mama says, because deep down, she's still proud of you. Even if she doesn't say it out loud.    Chi Thai: [00:33:47] I believe it. I totally believe it.    Miko Lee: [00:33:50] Yay. Thank you so much for spending time with us on Apex Express.Next up, listen to stay, go from dark heart, a concert narrative by singer and songwriter Golda Sargento.   MUSIC   That was the voice of Golda Sargento from the new Filipino futurism punk rock sci-fi dark heart. Welcome, Livia Blackburne Children's book, author of Nainai's Mountain. Welcome to Apex Express.    Livia Blackburne: [00:38:56] Thank you so much for having me.    Miko Lee: [00:38:58] I wanna start with a personal question, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    Livia Blackburne: [00:39:05] I am Chinese American, and so I carry the stories of my grandparents who fled China to Taiwan, fled that war. And I also carry the stories of my parents and myself who immigrated. To America, and I am, I grew up in New Mexico, so I have fond memories of green chili and new Mexican food. I went to college, Harvard and MIT on the east coast. So I've got a bit of that kind of ivory tower. And now I'm in LA and, you know, my people are, my family and my community, the writing community here. So I, I'm a big mix. Yes.    Miko Lee: [00:39:44] What legacy do you carry with you?    Livia Blackburne: [00:39:47] I mentioned a bit of my grandparents and my parents. What they went through in the war in China, and then my parents and me coming here. the experience of being here in two worlds, coming from Taiwan having that cultural background and also, growing up in the United States. The culture I've been surrounded with here as well.    Miko Lee: [00:40:06] Thank you so much for sharing. Can you tell us about your new illustrated children's book? Nainai's Mountain. What inspired this work?    Livia Blackburne: [00:40:14] The story of this book actually started with another book that is coming out in a couple years that actually I can't share too much about. My grandparents fled the war in China and then my. Parents grew up in Taiwan and I wanted to preserve that family story. My parents are getting older. So I started doing oral interviews with my parents about their childhood, what it was like, growing up. I wouldn't say they weren't refugees in Taiwan. It's a very complicated political situation, but they were transplants to Taiwan, and what it was like growing up there, their daily life. What kind of things they did when they were a child, their pastimes, I wanted to preserve their stories and I got a lot of great material., A lot of that is going into a novel that I'm currently working on. But also as I worked on it, there were so many great details that I thought would be really good in a picture book as well. Also, I'm a mother now. I have an 8-year-old daughter, and she is half Caucasian, half Asian. She has never gone to Taiwan before and I. As I'm writing this, I'm thinking, it would be really great to, I do want to share Taiwan and, my own childhood, home with her at some point. And so I start imagining what would it be like to bring her back to Taiwan and show her everything. And that became the seed for Nainai's Mountain, which is a. Story of a girl visiting Taiwan for the first time with her grandmother. And her grandmother shows her around and tells her stories about her childhood, and the girl through her grandmother's eyes, sees Taiwan, you know, for the beautiful place that it is.    Miko Lee: [00:41:56] You also wrote the book I Dream of Popo. How are these companions to each other and also for audiences that might not speak Chinese. One is a grandmother on the mother's side, and the other is the grandmother on the father's side. Can you talk about how I dream of Popo is linked to Nainai's Mountain?   Livia Blackburne: [00:42:15] Thank you for pointing that out. Yes. So Popo is maternal grandmother, and Nainai is a paternal grandmother. And that is a fantastic question. So I dream of popo is kind of my story. So it's about a little girl who moves from Taiwan , to the United States and it's about her relationship with her grandmother who stays in Taiwan. And it talks about, how a close relationship, navigating long geographical distances about the language barrier that comes up. And that was very much me, Nainai's Mountain. It's kind of like Popo in reverse, you know, it's now it's someone going back to Taiwan and kind of getting in touch with those roots. That, as I mentioned, that's inspired by my daughter. And you'll see in Nainai's Mountain, I specified that the child should be, half Asian, half Caucasian. Because, I wanted more of that representation in the children's literature.    Miko Lee: [00:43:07] Thank you. I, I wonder if you could talk a little bit about the artistic style. So you are the author, but you had different illustrators for both of the books and the style is really different. The in, when I look at Nainai's Mountain, which I'm holding here, it's sort of collage and really vibrant colors. Where I Dream of Popo has a different, more. I'm almost realistic, kind of look to it. And I'm wondering what your process was like in collaborating with illustrators.    Livia Blackburne: [00:43:37] That's one of the best things about being a picture book author, is that you get to collaborate with so many illustrators and they all have such different styles, such different visions. Most of the time it's the publisher who chooses the illustrator, although they. Consult me usually. My editor for I Dream of Popo picked Julia Kuo. And she sent me samples and I loved it. And, it was great. I'm friends with Julia now and that book did really well. It was very well known, especially in kind of Taiwanese American, Asian American circles. And so when I did, Nainai's mountain, that was with a different publishing house and my editor. He very consciously said, you know, because it's also a book about Taiwan and a grandmother. We don't want to get it confused with I dream of Popo. So, we made a conscious decision to pick an artist with a very different style and Joey Chou is fantastic. He's very well known for his Disney art. You can see his art in a lot of the hotels and cruise ships. And, he, very bright, vibrant, and I, he's also from Taiwan. I think he did a fantastic job.   Miko Lee: [00:44:41] And have the artistic work ever surprised you as being really different from your imagination while you were writing?    Livia Blackburne: [00:44:48] That's a great question. I don't think they've ever surprised me. By being different. They surprised me in the specifics that they've chosen. For example, I dream of Popo. Julia, spent a lot of time in Taiwan and she put in these great, Taiwan details that, you know, if you're from Taiwan, you would know for sure. There's like a specific brand of rice cooker called the rice cooker, and she has one there and like the giant bag of rice in the corner, and the calendar on the wall.   Miko Lee: [00:45:16] Even the specificities of the food and the trays and everything is quite lovely.    Livia Blackburne: [00:45:20] Yeah, yeah. You know, every time I read that, I look at that spread, I get hungry. So surprise there. And, with Joey, I, I love how he does the different, there's kind of flashback pictures and there's, pictures now and. The thing about him, his color, I just love the color that he put in from the greens, of Taiwan to kind of the bright fluorescent lights, neon lights of Taipei, and then there's kind of the slight sepia tones of the past and he just, you know, brings it so to life so well.   Miko Lee: [00:45:49] I didn't know he was a Disney animator, but it totally makes sense because it feels very layered. It does feel animated in a way and kind of alive. So I appreciate that.   Livia Blackburne: [00:45:59] I'm not sure. If he's an animator. He does a lot of art for the theme parks and like products and the cruise ships and stuff. I'm not sure.    Miko Lee: [00:46:07] Oh, interesting.   Livia Blackburne: [00:46:07] He does like movies and  stuff.    Miko Lee: [00:46:08] Interesting. It looks like animation though. Your book.    Livia Blackburne: [00:46:13] It does look very, yeah. Lively. Mm-hmm.    Miko Lee: [00:46:16] That I'm looking forward to that series. That would be so cute. The grandmother series as a whole little mini series traveling to different places. can you tell us about your new book, Dreams to Ashes? Has that been released yet?   Livia Blackburne: [00:46:29] Dreams to Ashes? That has been released that, released about a month before Nainai's Mountain. Yeah, that one's quite a bit different. So that one is a nonfiction book and it's a picture book, and it's about the Los Angeles massacre of 1871. Whenever people, I tell people about that, they're like, wait, you wrote a picture book about a massacre? Which is slightly counterintuitive. So I never knew about the Los Angeles massacre growing up. And, and, given that I am a Chinese person in Los Angeles, that is kind of weird. Basically, it was a race massacre that occurred. One of the biggest mass lynchings in history, uh, where there was a between two rival Chinese organizations and a white bystander was killed. And because of that, , a mob formed and they rounded the Chinese population up basically. And. Blame them for that death. In the end, 18 Chinese men were killed and only one of them were involved in the original gunfight. It was a horrible tragedy. And unfortunately, as often happened with these kind of historical tragedies in our country, nobody was really punished for it. A few men were indicted and convicted, but their convictions were overturned and it just kind of disappeared into history. And it really struck me that, you know, nobody knew about this. I wanted to kind of bring this to light and unfortunately when I was writing it, it was also, during the Covid pandemic and, I was seeing a lot of anti-Asian rhetoric, anti-Asian hate crimes were going up. And I saw so many parallels between what happened. Back then, because, you know, Chinese people specifically were being vilified , they were being called immoral, stealing people's jobs. And you can see in the years before the massacre the newspapers were saying horrible things and, you know, the hate was just becoming very strong and all that exploded one night into an unspeakable tragedy. Unfortunately as an author, you want your work to be relevant, but sometimes you don't want your work to be relevant in this way. Right. Nowadays I'm seeing so much rhetoric again against immigrants and not of many ethnicities. And in some ways I'm sad. That, this is happening now. And I also hope that this book will contribute to the conversation and show how the danger of racism and xenophobia and hate and what, what can happen because of that.   Miko Lee: [00:48:55] So this occurred in the late 1800s, right? Was it before the Chinese Exclusion Act?    Livia Blackburne: [00:49:03] Yes, it was before the Chinese Exclusion Act. So you'd hope that people kinda learn from these things. And it was just kind of one of the, one of the horrible things that happened on the way to the Chinese Exclusion Act and Chinese immigrants being excluded basically Chinese laborers at least.   Miko Lee: [00:49:23] Oh wow. Okay. I'm looking this up now. And 1882 we know was the Chinese Exclusion Act and this incident actually happened in 1871. Yes. A decade beforehand, Helen Zia always talks about these moments that are missing. MIH missing in history and this is clearly another one of, another time of just wiping out a population.I'm wondering if you could speak a little bit more about how Children's Books can make a difference in the world that we're currently living in, where our government is banning books and you know that there's a narratives that they want to align with a certain kind of conservative ideology. Can you talk about the power of being a Children's Book author in this time that we're living in right now? . I'm really thinking about dreams to Ashes and even I dream of Popo and even Nainai's Mountain, which you would think, oh, they're, you, they're visiting their grandparent, their grandmothers, that would not be controversial. But now when even words like inclusion and diversity are threatened and books are being banned, I'm just wondering if you could. Share a little bit more about your superpower as a children's book author?    Livia Blackburne: [00:50:31] Yeah, that's a fantastic question. We live in a time right now, there's, a lot of hate, a lot of intolerance, a lot of fear of different people groups. And a lot of that I think is because people are unfamiliar with people unlike themselves. They see. People who are different, look differently, act differently, speak differently, and it scares them. And I think the best way to get around that is to actually get to know people of other backgrounds, to see them as human. And I think that's where children's books come in. ‘Cause we don't, children are not born. With this hate of the other. They learn it. But, if they grow up being familiar with people of different backgrounds seeing their stories seeing them as, normal human beings, which, should be obvious, but sometimes it's hard, for adults to realize. Then, I'm hoping, as a children's book author that it will lead to a more empathetic world. And perhaps that's why the government sometimes in certain groups are wanting to, censor this and control the flow of children's books because, children are the most their minds are still open. They're still able to learn.    Miko Lee: [00:51:48] And Livia, tell us what you're working on next.   Livia Blackburne: [00:51:53] So right now I am. Working on a historical middle grade. We haven't quite announced it yet, so I can't say the title or too many details, but it is based on my family history of my parents and grandparents who moved from China to Taiwan after the civil War.   Miko Lee: [00:52:12] Please check out our website, kpfa.org. To find out more about our show tonight. We thank all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating and sharing your visions with the world because your voices are important. Apex Express is created by Miko Lee, Jalena Keane-Lee, Preti Mangala-Shekar, Swati Rayasam, Aisa Villarosa, Estella Owoimaha-Church, Gabriel Tanglao, Cheryl Truong and Ayame Keane-Lee.   The post APEX Express – 6.19.25 We Are All Connected appeared first on KPFA.

Your noonas have rewritten an ending or two, but that's not what today is about. For this episode, we get to the heart of the matter and talk about what actually makes a good (or not so good) ending. We discuss what happens when a good drama has a bad ending, whether or not a good ending can save a bad drama, and of course, the best and worst (in our opinion) endings in our K-drama experience. Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

This week's topics: • Slick Rick's new album • Intangible things that enhance music • What makes someone a nerd • How many sports do you have to now before you can be a sports expert • Club World Cup • Are nerds cool now and if so, why? • Music and Sports stars sharing partners • Kendrick's concerts in Toronto • Top 20 Hip Hop diss songs • Issues with playing music on our podcasts • Language and culture • Fake social media videos • AI and non tech savvy people • IShowSpeed v Ashton Hill • Great multi-skilled artists • Mixing cultures • Is Spain or Poland more racist • Which country or race gets more hate from British WASP • Do non Asians know the difference between an Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi • Being a good neighbour • Am I The Asshole for drinking more alcohol around obnoxious non alcohol drinkers? • #StavrosSays : Pocketcast Podcast App [https://pocketcasts.com/] Catch our guest at: www.instagram.com/cleopatrafigure8 Connect with us at & send your questions & comments to: #ESNpod so we can find your comments www.esnpodcast.com www.facebook.com/ESNpodcasts www.twitter.com/ESNpodcast www.instagram.com/ESNpodcast @esnpodcast on all other social media esnpodcast@gmail.com It's important to subscribe, rate and review us on your apple products. You can do that here... www.bit.ly/esnitunes

We interrupt your regularly scheduled Asians in Baseball to discuss how the Dodgers refuse to acknowledge the raids in our city. ICE OUT OF LA!

The globalist resistance, pro-America, media has been completely exposed as nothing more than a new form of mockingbird press. The big patriot leaders are in unison calling for the end of “third world immigration” and even “non-white immigration,” becoming the very thing the left accused them of all along - while ignoring the fact that Asians, for example, commit little crime, use few drugs, and are some of the top earners and contributors to the country. All the hopes and dreams of “promises made, promises kept,” are evaporating in real time, with few able to further justify the increasingly obvious: the downfall of the Republic has been monetized and archetypically framed. With riots all across the country, fears of a black and white racial war have instead manifested as Mexican and American; the fear of outright civil war has manifested as a problem-reaction-solution of absolute information control and military martial law in the name of defending the country. Now the “No Kings” movement has nationwide protests planned for June 14th, 2025, the day of Saturn. Rather than arresting the organizers behind that, and the riots via the communist Indivisible, the AG has instead sued a coffee shop for antisemitism. The protests are meant to resist the massive military parade and presidential birthday parade in Washington on the same day. Don't like it? You will be met with “very big force,” says the President, if you don't like his “big parade.” BIG beautiful bill anyone? Not even Roman emperors held military parades for their birthdays, but they did hold them for victories in battle. So either the Trump camp is totally delusional, considering nationwide civil war as victory, or the display is meant to put the final nail in the Constitutional coffin. It all culminates with the US suddenly pulling all nonessential staff from embassies across the Middle East and putting the country on high alert the same week. The word is Iran is prepared to strike Israel's nuclear sites and Israel is fully poised to strike Iran (thus, the Houthis are warning of war too), and regardless of what the fake Donald-Benjamin feud suggests, the US will sacrifice its own citizens for the jewish state, which itself will, under the Samson Option, destroy the entire world if it doesn't get its way. Hence, the fake (maybe real) threat of Benjamin Netanyahu circulating the Internet: “if we do fall, many parts of the world will fall with us.” *The is the FREE archive, which includes advertisements. If you want an ad-free experience, you can subscribe below underneath the show description.-FREE ARCHIVE (w. ads)SUBSCRIPTION ARCHIVEX / TWITTER FACEBOOKYOUTUBEMAIN WEBSITECashApp: $rdgable Paypal email rdgable1991@gmail.comEMAIL: rdgable@yahoo.com / TSTRadio@protonmail.comBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-secret-teachings--5328407/support.

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. The post APEX Express – June 12, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

It's that time again...another episode of Afternoona Delight Uncensored: unedited, unvarnished, unhinged? Join Amy, Lia and Megan as we have a freewheeling drama conversation about everything from misunderstood walking emotional boo boos vs a well-adjusted emotionally stable heroes, character astrology, novels we wish would be made into a K-drama, and much much more.Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Wow, we take one week off, and now we have twice as much to discuss! (Makes sense.) First, the Asian baseball world mourns the passing of Yomiuri Giants legend, Shigeo Nagashima, "Mr. Pro Baseball." Then, into the nitty gritty. With June underway, it's that time of the year for the trade rumor mill to get up and running...and it seems like almost all the Asians on the Red Sox are possible trade chips. In other moves, we've got guys called up, guys on rehab stints, guys on the IL, and even a guy on a new team.In position player news, Asians are MASHING. Seiya Suzuki is the first player in MLB to reach 50 RBI, Trevor Larnach is delivering on the Twins, Kim Hyeseong stays above 400, and Tommy Edman's son Eli is the newest Asian in Baseball as he throws out the first pitch on Dada's bobblehead night. And in pitching, Tommy Sugar still leads Orioles pitching, Yusei Kikuchi and Yoshinobu Yamamoto get the Ohtani treatment, and Bryan Woo and Kodai Senga remain dominant. Lastly, Ohtani tries to have it all as a three-way player: DHing, ramping up his pitching regimen, and juggling dad life. Don't forget to vote for our guys for the All Star Game! https://www.mlb.com/all-star/ballot?affiliateId=asb-mediawall-asg-2025

Greg and Ed discuss the recent troubling decrease in overall Thai tourism numbers. In general, since COVID, the Thai tourism industry has bounced back quite well, and projections were that 2025 numbers would exceed the pre-COVID peak of 39 million visitors. However, starting at the end of last year, numbers didn't meet expectations, and since then the dip has become more severe. So what happened? The guys cycle through several different factors. First, the earthquake at the end of March certainly didn't help matters, with many tourists canceling their trips for the Thai New Year in April. Second, and perhaps more concerning, several security incidents affecting Chinese tourists has led to a bit of a backlash in the largest source of tourists to Thailand. In particular, a Chinese celebrity was kidnapped and held for ransom, sparking fears that Thailand was not safe. Further, numerous stories of Burmese and Cambodian scam call centers that press foreigners into service have magnified the problem. Ed notes that while overall numbers have dipped, the numbers from most Western countries have risen in accord with projections. Hence, the problem is limited to Asian tourists. Greg points out that the ‘White Lotus Effect' might be the kind of thing that sparks interest in Westerners, but not in Asians, who may already feel familiar with a tropical climate and many aspects of Thai culture.  Don't forget that Patrons get the ad-free version of the show as well as swag and other perks. We also sometimes post on Facebook, you can contact us on LINE and of course, head to our website (www.bangkokpodcast.com) to find out probably more info than you need to know.

In this episode of "Shoes Off Inside", we attempt to talk about everything and the kitchen sink because there is so much happening every week, every day, every hour. May, Kelly and Tamlyn recorded this episode before protests against ICE raids in the Los Angeles area were inflamed by Trump's order to send in the National Guard and threats of U.S. military intervention. But make no mistake, MKT do NOT hold back when it comes to their thoughts on Donald Trump and his policies, Elon Musk and his erratic behavior. But at the heart of this episode is a very sincere, vulnerable and painful talk about our elderly parents and the struggle and heartbreak of caretaking...especially as Asians. Get your tissues ready. This will strike a chord regardless of your situation because it's about the power of love and what we're willing to do for our loved ones.Please subscribe, rate and review us!And follow us on IG @shoesoffinsidemkt

In the latest episode of Intellectual but Ignant, Mako and Boogie might've taken the “ignant” part a little too far. Due to some sound issues, we had to pull back from our usual interview format—but trust, we still covered a lot. Mako, in a surprising twist, shifted his long-standing hate from Asians to Indian people (with what he claims are valid reasons). We also touched on the overlap between Men's Mental Health Month and Pride Month, shared our thoughts on the hype around the upcoming Lil Wayne album, and even threw out some NBA Finals predictions. Anyway, I'm tired of typing so sit back, relax, and don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe. And make sure to follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and TikTok!

Whether it's in Asia or Asian immigrants throughout the world ... Asians rarely commit crime. They even defy the "poverty = crime" notion. What's going on?You can also find me on Substack:  https://kenlacorte.substack.com/Documentation:  https://docs.google.com/document/d/10...

In this episode, we sit down with Hyerin, an Indonesian native living in Korea, to talk about the challenges she's faced as a Southeast Asian navigating life in Korea. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

⬇️ WATCH THE FULL BONUS EPISODES HERE! ⬇️⭐️

A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. The post APEX Express – June 5, 2025 appeared first on KPFA.

Mentors, heralds, allies, shapeshifters--today we explore secondary character archetypes, how a side character can be integral to the main character's growth as well as the overall plot itself, and the fact that some of the best secondary characters might not even be human--or living--at all. Some are gone too soon. Some almost die but don't. And some get their just desserts in the end. Whatever the outcome, we love a three-dimensional side character with main character energy and can't wait to hear about your favorites too! Secondary Character Archetypes by Jana Van der VeerK-Pop Rec: "Gnarly" by KatseyeMusic VideoLive Performance"Don't Tell the Boys" by Petey"Nobody's Perfect" by Mckdaddy from Unlock My BossReady to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Asians vs. Caucasians is back with more of our favorite Korean food! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, the Noonas discuss cliffhangers in Kdramas--what we like, what we don't, and what we are always eager to see more of. Warning, there are spoilers in today's episode, so listen with care!Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Join Lia, Megan, Alison, and Tonya (patching in from Osaka) as we discuss our time in the "way back machine" rewatching BTS enter Chapter Two in June 2022. Yep, that's right. We watched the Festa 2022 dinner to examine all the Easter Eggs and Hot Takes from the day and see how it lands at the threshold to June 2025. Our main takeaway: Promises made, promises kept. Apobango. NEW! Afternoona Army is now on PATREON!Join The BTS Buzz and get access to Afternoona Army's exclusive DISCORD channel, get shout outs on-air in podcast, and receive invitations to quarterly live support groups. Questions? Email afternoonaarmy@gmail.com for more information.Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Check out our sister pod www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest members of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Want to find more great BTS content? Head over to Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life and links to our social media.

Owen Thiele (Adults, Overcompensating) joins us in the call center to take stunning problems over the phone. We speak to callers about accidentally recruiting the fellow half Asians at work for a threesome, making out at the company outing, and stealing your boyfriends roommates toothbrushes.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on the pod: Lia, Megan and Amy share their spicy K-drama takes! Tune in for some friendly arguments, strong opinions, and maybe a few controversial confessions about your favorite shows!Ready to download your first audiobook? Don't forget to click HERE for your free Audible trial.*Audible is a sponsor of Afternoona Delight Podcast*Are your family and friends sick of you talking about K-drama? We get it...and have an answer. Join our AfterNoona Delight Patreon and find community among folks who get your obsession. And check out www.afternoonadelight.com for more episodes, book recs and social media goodness. And don't forget about the newest member of our network: Afternoona Asks where diaspora Asians living in the West find ways to reconnect to Asian culture via Asian/KDramas.Last but CERTAINLY not least....love BTS? Or curious what all the fuss is about? Check out our sister pod Afternoona Army for "thinky, thirsty and over thirty" takes on Bangtan life. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★

Wellness + Wisdom | Episode 738 What if the stories you're clinging to are preventing you from becoming your truest self? And are they even your stories to begin with? Leadership Coach John Wang joins Josh Trent on the Wellness + Wisdom Podcast, episode 738, to share how cultural pressure, generational wounds, and the fear of “not being enough” shape our identity from a young age, why challenging these scripts can help you rewrite your life, and how to close the gap between who you think you should be and who you really are. "The language that your parents speak to you becomes the language that you speak to yourself for the rest of your life. And if your parents didn't know how to speak the language of love, the language of nurture, the language of understanding, then it's likely that you didn't learn that language either." - John Wang