Podcasts about Chinatown

Zibby speaks to creative writing professor and author Jane Wong about Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City, an incandescent, blazing memoir that she describes as a lovesong to her mother and to growing up in a low income, working-class Chinese American immigrant family. Jane talks about her family's immigration story and fractured American Dream; her father's gambling addiction; her beautiful, lyrical writing style (she's a poet!); and her recent trip to Atlantic City–a powerful, emotional return. She also describes her writing process and her recent book tour, from Seattle to New York City's Chinatown, with her mother by her side. Purchase on Bookshop: https://bit.ly/3rEZONoShare, rate, & review the podcast, and follow Zibby on Instagram @zibbyowens! Now there's more! Subscribe to Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books on Acast+ and get ad-free episodes. https://plus.acast.com/s/moms-dont-have-time-to-read-books. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

SynopsisOn today's date in 2000, a new cello concerto with an unusual title received its premiere performance at the Barbican Center in London. Billed as the “Crouching Tiger” Concerto, this score was by the Chinese composer Tan Dun, and was derived from Tan's film score for Ang Lee's mystical and magical martial arts film titled “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.”That score featured a prominent cello part, tailor-made for cellist Yo-Yo Ma, as well as a variety of traditional Chinese instruments and a percussion battery that included a North African frame drum. The haunting score matched the film so effectively that it was nominated for—and won—an Academy Award.It was director Ang Lee who suggested that Tan Dun rework his film score into a cello concerto, and even offered to put together a special film to accompany the concerto. In effect, saying, “Turnabout is fair play—you composed music to fit my film, now I'll compose a film to fit your concerto!”Lee pulled together shots from the original film and mixed in real and imaginary scenes from New York's Chinatown and 19th century Beijing for the new film designed to accompany performances of the new concerto.Music Played in Today's ProgramTan Dun (b. 1957) Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon filmscore Yo Yo Ma, cello; Shanghai Symphony; Tan Dun, cond. Sony 89347

On today's episode of All in the Industry®, Shari Bayer's guest is Wilson Tang, owner and operator of Nom Wah, the century-old New York City brand, who has overseen the brand's expansion over the last decade with outposts in Philadelphia, Nolita, Chelsea, and Shenzhen. To celebrate the restaurant's centennial, Wilson published his first cookbook, The Nom Wah Cookbook: Recipes and Stories from 100 Years at New York City's Iconic Dim Sum Restaurant (October 2020), which celebrates his restaurant and the local businesses around it. Today's show also features Shari's PR tip to celebrate lasting brands; Industry News Discussion on The New York Times' The 25 Best Restaurants in Los Angeles Right Now, by Tejal Rao; plus, Shari's Solo Dining experience at the legendary Zingerman's Deli in Ann Arbor, MI, which has been championing local farmers and food purveyors for over 40 years; and the final question. ** Check out Shari's new book, CHEFWISE – Life Lessons from Leading Chefs Around the World (Phaidon, Spring 2023, #CHEFWISEBOOK), now available at Phaidon.com, Amazon.com and wherever books are sold! ** Join Shari in Philadelphia on Monday 10/9 for Happy Hour at El Merkury presented by Cookbooks & Convos where she'll be reading passages from her book and signing copies, and small bites and drinks by Delola will be served; tickets available at OpenTable. ** Shari is also celebrating the 20th year of her company, Bayer Public Relations, which she founded in October 2003. Happy Anniversary! **Photo Courtesy of Nat Chitwood.Listen at Heritage Radio Network; subscribe/rate/review our show at iTunes, Stitcher or Spotify. Follow us @allindustry. Thanks for being a part of All in the Industry®. Heritage Radio Network is a listener supported nonprofit podcast network. Support All in the Industry by becoming a member!All in the Industry is Powered by Simplecast.

Show Notes Sadly still applicable: We stand with SAG-AFTRA Content warning: We do speak about the Polanski of it all. We have indicated with time stamps when that occurs. There is also incestual sexual assault referred to in this film so if you want to skip this one, we get it and we'll see you next week. This week we're discussing a masterpiece of neo noir, 1974's Chinatown. The lighting, the pacing, the costuming, the script, the deep fragility of Faye Dunaway, the disquiet emanating off John Huston, and the best(?) Jack Nicolson performance, we talk about it all. Recommendations: A Haunting in Venice (In Theaters); A Discovery of Witches (AMC+) Next up: Deliverance (1972) Email us at latecomers@gmail.com Twitter: @latecomerspod Find Amity @ www.amityarmstrong.com and @AmityArmstrong on Twitter Our Facebook group is here for those who consent: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1754020081574479/

In this episode, Bright and Anousha invited Kai Kollins, program coordinator at the Philadelphia Chinatown Development Corporation (PCDC) to share insights and updates on the collaboration between PCDC and the Hepatitis B Foundation. PCDC is a trusted community organization and has partnered with the Foundation on a frequent basis to improve awareness, education, and outreach for hepatitis B and liver cancer among Asian communities residing in Philadelphia!Support the showOur website: www.hepb.orgSupport B Heppy!Social Media: Instagram - Twitter - Facebook

This week in Asian American news: We cover a NYTimes article that profiling some young Asian Americans in Chinatown. Aaron, an organizer in that same Chinatown, has some thoughts. One of the country's oldest unions, United Auto Workers, goes on strike! They get the big 3 manufacturers play whack-a-mole with the plants and boy do GM, Ford, and Stellantis miss every mole. A new Pew study finds that among Asian Americans, those who are young, 2nd gen, and…Democrat? are more likely to hide their culture and identity. We try to figure out why peopl are still coming up with studies like this. The New Yorker drops a bombshell of an interview with Hasan Minhaj that has the internet in an uproar: the man exaggerates in his stand-up! As comedians, we discuss the ethics of lying in one's jokes.  - WHAT'S  POLITICALLY ASIAN PODCAST? -- We're two Asian American comedians talking about politics and the Asian American community to get more Asians talking about politics! Join Aaron Yin (he/him) and Gerrie Lim (they/them) for 45 minutes-ish each week as we discuss current topics and events related to Asian Americans through the lenses of history, class, and advocacy. CHECK US OUT ON SOCIAL MEDIA:  Instagram: https://instagram.com/politicallyasianpodcast/  Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@politicallyasianpodcast  Twitter: https://twitter.com/politicasianpod  Website: https://politicallyasianpodcast.com Support us at https://buymeacoffee.com/politicalasian  COMMENTS, THOUGHTS, OPINIONS, HOT TAKES, FEEDBACK: politicallyasianpodcast@gmail.com  MUSIC by Clueless Kit: https://soundcloud.com/cluelesskit Song title: live now

The New York Times bestselling Front Desk series, which takes inspiration from the author's childhood when her family immigrated to the United States from China to manage a motel in California, continues with TOP STORY (FRONT DESK #5) by KELLY YANG. Beloved protagonist, Mia Tang, achieves her dream of attending journalism camp, but when the gatekeepers don't like her story ideas about Chinatown, she must find another way to share her voice with the world! Mia Tang is at the top of her game! She's spending winter break with Mom, Lupe, Jason, and Hank in San Francisco's Chinatown! Rich with history and hilarious aunties and uncles, it's the place to find a great story—one she hopes to publish while attending journalism camp at the Tribune. But this trip has as many bumps as the hills of San Francisco…Mia's camp is full of older kids, with famous relatives, fancy laptops, and major connections! Can she compete with just her pen and passion?Lupe's thinking about skipping ahead to college! Will Mia ever get a chance to just chill with her best friend?Jason's crushing hard on a new girl. For the first time ever, Mia is speechless…and jealous. Can she find the courage to tell Jason—gulp—that she has a crush on him?Even for the best writers, it's not always easy to find the right words. But if anyone can tell a top story, it's Mia Tang!

Welcome to Season 3, Episode 37. We're taking a couple weeks off for vacation, so we're posting a few ICYMI Encore Episodes. Today we're re-posting The History of Stereotypical Chinatown Architecture from Season 2, Episode 58. Most Chinatowns across the world have similar structural elements: pagodas, specific colors, terra cotta tiles, and more. So how did this happen? It might surprise you that stereotypical Chinatown architecture was created by white people hired by Chinese Americans. Although San Francisco was the first place this happened, their success in creating a welcoming environment influenced the re-design of almost all Chinatowns across the world. For previous episodes and information, please visit our site at https://asianamericanhistory101.libsyn.com or social media links at http://castpie.com/AAHistory101. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions, email us at info@aahistory101.com. Segments 00:25 Intro on Chinatown Architecture 01:44 The History of Stereotypical Chinatown Architecture

This week, bring us the axe! We're joined by the amazing Sophia Ciminello (co-host of the Oscar Wild Podcast) to take a deeper look at the career of screen icon Faye Dunaway! From Bonnie and Clyde to Network, from Chinatown to Supergirl, we cover it all! And this is the exclusive extra long extended cut! If you have any questions/comments/suggestions for the show, follow us on twitter @TheMixedReviews, like us on Facebook, e-mail us at reviewsmixed@gmail.com, visit our  Instagram or  TikTok for extra content, become a patron on  our Patreon, or stop by  our shop and pick up some podcast merchandise! Don't forget to subscribe to us on  iTunes,  Stitcher Radio,  Spotify,  Podchaser,  Audible, or  Google.  

Today, we talk to reporter Sonia Paul about a first-in-the-nation measure to add caste to state anti-discrimination laws. And we hear from three Bay Area authors with three very different novels. Then, we meet the ladies of the Grant Avenue Follies who celebrate mid-century Chinatown's cultural scene one song and dance at a time.

We all know the importance of DEIB. Yet many are feeling burned out. How do we stay motivated?   For this Women of Color Rise episode, Analiza talks with Betty Ng, Founder and CEO of Inspiring Diversity. Betty grew up in Chinatown, NYC and experienced bullying because she was Asian American. After graduating from Stanford with her BA and Harvard with her MBA, she continued to experience challenges as an Asian American during her 20+ year corporate career, including roles at Citibank and American Express. Betty transformed this pain to find her power and purpose, starting Inspiring Diversity, which helps organizations, educators, and families foster cultures of diversity and inclusion.   For this Women of Color Rise episode, Analiza talks with Betty Ng, Founder and CEO of Inspiring Diversity. Betty grew up in Chinatown, NYC and experienced bullying because she was Asian American. After graduating from Stanford with her BA and Harvard with her MBA, she continued to experience challenges as an Asian American during her 20+ corporate career. Betty transformed this pain to find her power and purpose, starting Inspiring Diversity, which helps organizations, educators, and families foster cultures of diversity and inclusion.   Betty shares the importance of doing DEIB to build strong cultures and how to keep people motivated and engaged: Make it individual - While policies, programs, and training are helpful, real transformation happens at the individual level since a culture is the sum of individual people. Inspiring Diversity includes individual assessments with recommendations of what to change. Focus on conscious inclusion and well-being - DEIB encompasses many things. Inspiring Diversity hones in on conscious inclusion, which means asking how we can be more inclusive of each other, and well-being instead of bad behavior. Make it playful - Team and culture building is powerful when we can incorporate play. How about incorporating play into DEIB too? Betty (a certified pickleball coach) has a pickleball program that integrates DEIB.   Get full show notes and more information here: https://analizawolf.com/ep-61-how-pickleball-can-promote-deib-with-betty-ng-founder-and-ceo-of-inspiring-diversity

Show Notes Sadly still applicable: We stand with the WGA and SAG-AFTRA   This week, we get to Lemuel's favorite (if we go by number of times he has mentioned it this series), 1962 John Frankenheimer mind-freak The Manchurian Candidate. We try to make it make sense without getting too lost in the twists and turns. We talk about the surprising performances, the fascinating directorial choices and the lip sweat – there's so much lip sweat.   Recommendations: The Pope's Exorcist (Netflix); They Cloned Tyrone (Netflix)   Next up: Chinatown (1974)   Email us at latecomers@gmail.com Twitter: @latecomerspod Find Amity @ www.amityarmstrong.com and @AmityArmstrong on Twitter Our Facebook group is here for those who consent: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1754020081574479/

Matt and Samer talk about a mix tape with songs where the main artist was overshadowed by the big name they got to feature on the track.1. No Diggity (feat. Dr Dre & Queen Pen) by Blackstreet2. Tormenta (feat. Bad Bunny) by Gorrilaz3. Chinatown (feat. Bruce Springsteen) by Bleachers4. Good Love (feat. Billy F Gibbons) by The Black Keys5. No Favors (feat. Eminem) by Big Sean6. And So It Went (feat. Tom Morello) by The Pretty Reckless7. The Alcott (feat. Taylor Swift) by The National8. Despacito (feat. Justin Bieber) by Luis Fonsi & Daddy Yankee9. Old Town Road (feat. Billy Ray Cyrus) by Lil Nas X10. Think Fast by Dominic Fike & Weezer11. Monsters You Made (feat. Chris Martin) by Burna Boy12. Tiny Cities (feat. Beck) by Flume Support the showVisit us at https://www.superawesomemix.com to learn more about our app, our merchandise, our cards, and more!

The Orphans' base of operations is complete! But before they can really get a chance to enjoy it, they get a visit from Matt Murdock who is there to have the dreaded discussion surrounding the Orphans acceptance of the Sokovia Accords. Their meeting is interrupted, however, by a distress call from the leader of the former Skrull Kill Krew, and they must travel to Chinatown to attempt to subdue the SKK member known as Riot whose powers have gone out of control. On the scene, they are surprised to find Damage Control struggling to capture the rampaging Riot, placing the Orphans in a real predicament. Set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the immediate aftermath of Thanos' Snap, this series follows the exploits a group of young heroes trying to find their way in this near apocalyptic new world. Left completely alone after the Blip, they are brought together by chance - will they get past their differences and forge a new path or wallow in their misery? These are the Orphans of the Blip!A Marvel Superheroes RPG Live Play utilizing Foundry VTTCheck out these other Dreamslayer Studios recommendations: Dreamslayer Studios RPG Podcast - edited for your listening pleasure! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dreamslayer-studios-rpg-podcast/id1549919041Dreamslayer Studios' first Actual Play series: The Great American Novel by Christopher Grey - Devil's Canyon: https://youtu.be/PaUfI-2SGqYDreamslayer Studios' Classic Marvel Superheroes RPG Live Play - IROSHAN Gods and Monsters: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1jDqzufIrg&list=PLZrWbwUCH4XA3EeGmthj67Y_fUMOpU2h-Music from this episode may come from the following sources: https://www.darrencurtismusic.com/https://tabletopaudio.com/https://www.digitaljuice.com/

On this Tuesday topical show, Crystal chats with Tanya Woo about her campaign for Seattle City Council District 2. Listen and learn more about Tanya and her thoughts on: [01:06] - Why she is running [02:02] - Lightning round! [12:49] - What is an accomplishment of hers that impacts District 2 [17:13] - Housing and homelessness: Frontline worker wages [19:36] - Homelessness: Involvement with opposition to SODO shelter expansion [25:15] - Public Safety: Alternative response [27:08] - Victim support [30:52] - City budget shortfall: Raise revenue or cut services? [36:02] - Small business support [39:16] - Childcare: Affordability and accessibility [40:28] - Bike and pedestrian safety [45:59] - Transit reliability [48:02] - Difference between her and opponent As always, a full text transcript of the show is available below and at officialhacksandwonks.com. Follow us on Twitter at @HacksWonks. Find the host, Crystal Fincher, on Twitter at @finchfrii and find Tanya Woo at @votetanyawoo.   Tanya Woo My family immigrated to Seattle in 1887. I grew up on Beacon Hill, worked at our family business in the Chinatown International District and now live in Rainier Beach. I've seen how South Seattle has changed. I've seen what happens to neighborhoods that don't have a voice and are expected to just live with bad city policies. I want to change that, and that's why I'm running for Seattle City Council. I spearheaded the renovation of my family's building, the Louisa hotel, that provides small business space and workforce housing. Twice a week, my Community Watch walks around Little Saigon, Nihomachi (Japantown) and Chinatown trying to make our streets safer for everyone, which includes our unhoused neighbors. My work against government discrimination in the Chinatown International District has taught me a very important lesson: the only time people in South Seattle are heard is when we make those in positions of power listen.   Resources Campaign Website - Tanya Woo   Transcript [00:00:00] Crystal Fincher: Welcome to Hacks & Wonks. I'm Crystal Fincher, and I'm a political consultant and your host. On this show, we talk with policy wonks and political hacks to gather insight into local politics and policy in Washington state through the lens of those doing the work with behind-the-scenes perspectives on what's happening, why it's happening, and what you can do about it. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review show and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, the most helpful thing you can do is leave a review wherever you listen to Hacks & Wonks. Full transcripts and resources referenced in the show are always available at officialhacksandwonks.com and in our episode notes. Well, I am very pleased to be welcoming Tanya Woo, Seattle City Council candidate in District 2, to the program. Thank you so much for joining us, Tanya. [00:01:04] Tanya Woo: Well, thank you for having me - I'm really excited to be here. [00:01:06] Crystal Fincher: Excited to have you - and just wanted to start off by understanding why you chose to run and why now? [00:01:14] Tanya Woo: Yes, and so this comes from a long history of work in the Chinatown International District, as well as being a lifelong resident here in District 2. Just seeing the effects of the pandemic on our community, as well as seeing all of these high-impact projects that are happening around the Chinatown International District these last four years - and realizing that the district is really fighting for its life, basically. And so we were fighting for a seat at the table, we were fighting to amplify voices and to be heard - and realizing that the best way to get a seat at the table is to fight for it and to run for it. And so after a lot of discussion and a lot of encouragement, I decided to throw my hat into the ring. [00:02:01] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. Well, as we get started on this show - I mean, we do candidate interviews a lot - we're adding a new dimension into the interviews this year, which is a lightning round before we get to the rest of our regular conversation and discussion. And so just a number of yes or no questions, that hopefully are easy, or super one-answer choice questions. So we'll just run through this and then get back to the other questions. So this year, did you vote yes on the King County Crisis Care Centers levy? [00:02:31] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:02:32] Crystal Fincher: And this year, did you vote yes on the Veterans, Seniors, and Human Services levy? [00:02:37] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:02:38] Crystal Fincher: Did you vote in favor of Seattle's Social Housing Initiative 135? ... In February. [00:02:43] Tanya Woo: I may not have voted for that. I may not have voted for that one. [00:02:53] Crystal Fincher: Okay. And in 2021, did you vote for Bruce Harrell or Lorena González for Seattle Mayor? [00:03:00] Tanya Woo: I did not vote in that election. [00:03:02] Crystal Fincher: Okay. Okay, so I guess that covers - let me find that - so City Attorney. Last year in 2022, did you vote for Leesa Manion or Jim Ferrell for King County Prosecutor? [00:03:17] Tanya Woo: Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. I don't know which elections I voted for, which ones I did not vote for. [00:03:21] Crystal Fincher: Okay. [00:03:22] Tanya Woo: I'll have to pull up my record to answer. [00:03:23] Crystal Fincher: We will skip the... [00:03:26] Tanya Woo: I am so sorry. [00:03:27] Crystal Fincher: It's fine, it's fine. We'll skip the rest of those. We'll go to the other questions. Do you rent or own your residence? [00:03:34] Tanya Woo: My husband owns the residence. [00:03:36] Crystal Fincher: Okay, are you a landlord? [00:03:39] Tanya Woo: My family is a landlord. [00:03:41] Crystal Fincher: Okay, would you vote to require landlords to report metrics, including how much rent they're charging, to help better plan housing and development needs in the district? [00:03:50] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:03:51] Crystal Fincher: Are there any instances where you would support sweeps of homeless encampments? [00:03:59] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:04:00] Crystal Fincher: Will you vote to provide additional funding for Seattle's Social Housing Public Development Authority? [00:04:06] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:04:07] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree with King County Executive Constantine's statement that the King County Jail should be closed? [00:04:18] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:04:19] Crystal Fincher: Should parking enforcement be housed within SPD? [00:04:28] Tanya Woo: Oh. I don't think I've ever really thought about this one. Probably yes. [00:04:43] Crystal Fincher: Okay. Would you vote to allow police in schools? [00:04:51] Tanya Woo: I think that's up to the schools. [00:04:52] Crystal Fincher: Do you support allocation in the City budget for a civilian-led mental health crisis response? [00:04:59] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:00] Crystal Fincher: Do you support allocation in the City budget to increase the pay of human service workers? [00:05:03] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:04] Crystal Fincher: Do you support removing funds in the City budget for forced encampment removals and instead allocating funds towards a Housing First approach? [00:05:13] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:14] Crystal Fincher: Do you support abrogating or removing the funds from unfilled SPD positions and putting them towards meaningful public safety measures? [00:05:24] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:24] Crystal Fincher: Do you support allocating money in the budget for supervised consumption sites? [00:05:33] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:34] Crystal Fincher: Do you support increasing funding in the City budget for violence intervention programs? [00:05:40] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:05:41] Crystal Fincher: Do you oppose a SPOG contract that doesn't give the Office of Police Accountability and the Office of Inspector General subpoena power? [00:05:54] Tanya Woo: Do I oppose it? Yes. [00:05:56] Crystal Fincher: Do you oppose a SPOG contract that doesn't remove limitations as to how many of OPA's investigators must be sworn versus civilian? [00:06:05] Tanya Woo: So sorry, can you repeat the question? [00:06:09] Crystal Fincher: Sure, sure, sure. Do you oppose a SPOG contract that doesn't remove limitations as to how many of OPA's investigators must be sworn versus civilian? [00:06:21] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:06:22] Crystal Fincher: Do you oppose a SPOG contract that impedes the ability of the city to move police funding to public safety alternatives? [00:06:32] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:06:33] Crystal Fincher: Do you support eliminating in-uniform off-duty work by SPD officers? [00:06:45] Tanya Woo: Such as traffic control? [00:06:49] Crystal Fincher: That would fall under one if they're off-duty, I think, yeah. [00:06:54] Tanya Woo: I do not oppose it, so. [00:06:56] Crystal Fincher: Okay. Will you vote to ensure that trans and non-binary students are allowed to play on the sports teams that fit with their gender identities? [00:07:07] Tanya Woo: And this isn't - do I oppose it? [00:07:09] Crystal Fincher: No - will you vote to ensure that - [00:07:10] Tanya Woo: Oh, sorry - okay. [00:07:10] Crystal Fincher: - trans and non-binary students are allowed to play on the sports teams that fit with their gender identities? [00:07:18] Tanya Woo: Oh, I think that's a conversation we have to have with the sports teams, but I would be in support of it. [00:07:25] Crystal Fincher: So when you say conversation to have with the sports teams - if they voted against it, would you support that? [00:07:31] Tanya Woo: I think we have to support - yes. [00:07:33] Crystal Fincher: Okay, so you would support-- [00:07:35] Tanya Woo: If the sports teams voted. [00:07:37] Crystal Fincher: Sports team said that they couldn't play, then they couldn't play. [00:07:40] Tanya Woo: If they had good reason. [00:07:41] Crystal Fincher: Got it. [00:07:42] Tanya Woo: 'Cause I think every sports is different. [00:07:44] Crystal Fincher: Will you vote to ensure that trans people can use bathrooms or public facilities that match their gender? [00:07:51] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:07:52] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree with the Seattle City Council's decision to implement the JumpStart Tax? [00:07:58] Tanya Woo: I'm so sorry, going back to the gender one - their stated gender or their perceived gender? [00:08:04] Crystal Fincher: Whatever gender they identify as. [00:08:06] Tanya Woo: Okay, yes, then - we need to ensure that it's served - okay. [00:08:10] Crystal Fincher: Do you agree with the Seattle City Council's decision to implement the JumpStart Tax? [00:08:17] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:08:17] Crystal Fincher: Will you vote to reduce or divert the JumpStart Tax in any way? [00:08:29] Tanya Woo: That's a very complicated question. [00:08:31] Crystal Fincher: Okay, we can leave it as - it's complicated, it's not a yes or no - and we can get to that. We have plenty of time to talk about this in the other questions, so we can cover the details of that. [00:08:41] Tanya Woo: Okay great. Yeah - that's a lot of -- Oh, go ahead. [00:08:45] Crystal Fincher: Are you happy with Seattle's newly built waterfront? [00:08:50] Tanya Woo: Yes, I love the direction it's going in. [00:08:52] Crystal Fincher: Do you believe return to work mandates, like the one issued by Amazon, are necessary to boost Seattle's economy? [00:09:01] Tanya Woo: And that's the three days a week, right? [00:09:05] Crystal Fincher: Theirs is three days a week - whatever, you know, if they're mandating a return and not work from home in whatever form that would be. So it could be three, it could be five. [00:09:15] Tanya Woo: I think yes. Oh, okay. I think it's great to start with three. And then, of course, the willingness to work with families where that could be a barrier - where there's any barriers involved. [00:09:26] Crystal Fincher: Okay, so do you think - I mean, do you think the mandate is necessary or is that it's on a case-by-case basis and-- [00:09:33] Tanya Woo: Well, I think it's necessary to revitalize the downtown area. I know there's a lot of barriers for some people not being able to physically return to work - I think case-by-case in those situations should be allowed. [00:09:48] Crystal Fincher: Gotcha. Have you taken transit in the past week? [00:09:52] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:09:53] Crystal Fincher: Have you ridden a bike in the past week? [00:09:55] Tanya Woo: No. [00:09:56] Crystal Fincher: In the past month? [00:09:59] Tanya Woo: No. [00:10:01] Crystal Fincher: Okay. Should Pike Place Market allow non-commercial car traffic? [00:10:11] Tanya Woo: Oh, I know that is being talked about right now. I think it'd be nice to not allow it, but I know some of the business owners want it - so I think definitely let Pike Place Market decide on how they want to proceed. [00:10:30] Crystal Fincher: Should we accelerate the elimination of the ability to turn right on red lights to improve pedestrian safety? [00:10:44] Tanya Woo: For all red lights? [00:10:45] Crystal Fincher: Yes. [00:10:47] Tanya Woo: Okay. That would add a lot of needed infrastructure. I would support that, but I think we'd have to put together a plan to be able to carry that out. [00:11:03] Crystal Fincher: Okay. Should significant investments be made to speed up the opening of scheduled Sound Transit light rail lines? [00:11:15] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:11:16] Crystal Fincher: Have you ever been a member of a union? [00:11:20] Tanya Woo: No. [00:11:20] Crystal Fincher: Will you vote to increase funding and staffing for investigations into labor violations like wage theft and illegal union busting? [00:11:31] Tanya Woo: Would I support putting money into investigations? [00:11:35] Crystal Fincher: Increasing funding and staffing for investigations into labor violations like wage theft and illegal union busting? [00:11:42] Tanya Woo: Oh - yes. [00:11:43] Crystal Fincher: Have you ever walked on a picket line? [00:11:46] Tanya Woo: No. [00:11:47] Crystal Fincher: Have you ever crossed a picket line? [00:11:49] Tanya Woo: No. [00:11:50] Crystal Fincher: Is your campaign unionized? [00:11:53] Tanya Woo: They have the option to do so, but I do not believe so. [00:11:57] Crystal Fincher: Okay. If your campaign staff wants to unionize, will you voluntarily recognize their effort? [00:12:02] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:12:03] Crystal Fincher: Are any of the staff employed by your businesses unionized? [00:12:14] Tanya Woo: If, are my staff employed by businesses unionized? [00:12:18] Crystal Fincher: Any staff employed by your business unionized? [00:12:22] Tanya Woo: No. [00:12:24] Crystal Fincher: If they wanted to unionize, would you voluntarily recognize their effort? [00:12:28] Tanya Woo: Yes. [00:12:30] Crystal Fincher: Well, look, that's the end of the lightning round - you survived, it's wonderful. [00:12:34] Tanya Woo: Okay great - these are always rough because I feel like sometimes issues are so complicated and there's a lot of gray - it's not always black and white - but yeah, that wasn't so bad. [00:12:45] Crystal Fincher: Which is why we have a robust conversation in front of us to talk about all of that. But I want to start out for - helping to give people a feel for what you prioritize and how qualified you are to lead, which a lot of people see throughout the community. Can you describe something you've accomplished or changed in your district and what impact that has had on residents? [00:13:08] Tanya Woo: Yes. Three years ago, during the pandemic - when there were a lot of pandemic racism, anti-Asian hate happening - our businesses were forced to close down throughout the city. And a lot of people were uncertain and just confused about what was happening, especially in our communities of color. I helped start a group called the Chinatown International District Community Watch. We saw there was a lack and a gap in services between the hours of 6pm and 6am - and that was the time when many of our streets, because of the stay-at-home mandate, it was just a ghost town. And so we wanted to make sure that people felt supported, that our small businesses felt supported in the Chinatown International District - which includes our housed and unhoused neighbors and residents. And so we started like this alternative to policing group that kind of just went through the three neighborhoods - Little Saigon, Chinatown, and Japantown - and just made sure everyone was okay. We believe that building trust between our unhoused neighbors and those who are there at 12th and Jackson engaged in the illegal markets were okay. We always believe that trust was the best way to de-escalate the situation. And they wanted to build connection and build relationships with people to help connect people to resources and to just be there. We wanted to give hope to our seniors and to our small business owners who were working through the pandemic. And so wanted to let them know that we were here and available if they need help - we did senior escorts. We also did something regarding self-defense training, which mainly focused on situational awareness - many in the Asian culture, people don't - there's not a lot eye contact, people are not looking around when they're walking. And so there are a lot instances where our seniors were unfortunately being attacked - we had a hate incident happen within the CID. And so we wanted to be there to show support for the community. And it's been three years and we're still going strong. We kind of segued into different sections. There was a couple of large encampments that had grown in the first, second, or third year. And we started doing outreach and engagement in the encampments - getting to know our unhoused - we saw who was doing what, we saw the [unintelligible] who were engaged in the sex trade, who was engaged in the illegal markets. But we wanted to make sure that people who needed services and help were also being heard. So we were actively going into the encampments during that time - and now that those encampments have been resolved, we're going into Little Saigon area and 12th and Jackson with water bottles and meals. And trying to make that connection - that community cares, we want people to be okay. And we've done things where we've had to administer Narcan and CPR. And we really see that there's a need here. And so I believe that we're very, very slowly - there are many success stories - people who have found housing come back and say hi to us, and they invite us to see their homes. Many people who we have connected to other services, like brought to the hospital - helped bring to the hospital - have come back to thank us. And just seeing that we're making a difference in people's lives, I think brings me worlds of happiness. And so-- [00:17:03] Crystal Fincher: Now-- [00:17:03] Tanya Woo: --that was-- oh, go ahead. [00:17:05] Crystal Fincher: Oh, no, go ahead, finish. [00:17:06] Tanya Woo: Oh yeah, and so that's one of the things I'm really proud of and excited about - that this is continuing. [00:17:12] Crystal Fincher: Excellent. Now talking about homelessness, one thing called out by experts as a barrier to the homelessness response is frontline worker wages that don't cover the cost of living and that impairing the response. Do you believe our local nonprofits have a responsibility to pay living wages for our area, or that this is a problem with the response? And how can we fix it if it is a problem with how the City bids for contracts and services? [00:17:39] Tanya Woo: Yes, I agree we have to pay a living wage and that is a huge barrier. I mean, even if - there's a huge turnaround in a lot of our nonprofits and our services - we have amazing people who are moving on and that turnaround, especially with caseworkers, is a bit detrimental to further relationships with many members of the community who need behavioral health services, addiction treatment, who are partnered with people to lead them through the journey from being unhoused into finding housing. And how important is that we pay a living wage to case managers so we don't see that there's a huge gap in services and that people are being missed or forgotten. And in other service sectors, I think there has to be - we have to meet those needs because the best way to fight homelessness is to prevent it. So especially with City contracts, there has to be - now that many City contracts are being renegotiated - to get a cost of living wage and also a percentage to match, for every single year going forward, the increase in the cost of living. I think that has to be comparable to other cities, other markets that we're seeing. And we have to make it a priority because we have to put people first, and we have to allow people to be able to live here and work here, as well as be able to negotiate these contracts so that they are fair. And also we have to make other, look at other things as well in terms of City contracts - I think trying to employ more minority businesses in City contracts, as well as female businesses, in terms of the larger contract picture is also very important. [00:19:36] Crystal Fincher: Now, you were involved in the opposition to the proposed - it was nicknamed the "Megaplex" - but a services complex for the homeless there. And I think there were legitimate issues raised over the past several years about the CID residents being left out of discussions about what infrastructure is being built and developed, and mitigations or lack thereof. And the CID and its residents experiencing hardships and consequences out of proportion to people in other parts of the city, and that being a growing frustration - and then this happens and it feels like they're repeating the same cycle. While that's competing with the need to provide supportive housing, and to providing behavioral health treatment and services, and places where people can go and be, and offer these services. So if the right place or the right way to do it wasn't with that, what is the right way and the right place to do it? [00:20:41] Tanya Woo: So first off, I want to make it very clear, we're not against the shelter. We were not against behavioral health services. We just wanted a seat at the table. This comes in a long line of historical high-impact projects that received no community input. And we're looking at I-5, we're looking at Sound Transit, we're looking at the stadiums, the Seattle Streetcar - all high-impact projects that have been detrimental, has really affected our community - but there was no community engagement or outreach. And so in the case of this shelter complex, the lease was signed in May, but the community was not notified until September for a facility that was supposed to open in November, December. And we asked, you know - there's something called the Racial Equity Toolkit that we have provided the City that dictates or advises on how to do that community outreach and engagement - and something that we desperately need and would like to see carried out. And so if King County and the City had started community outreach and engagement back in May, this would not even have been an issue. And so basically in September, when we were first notified during a public safety meeting that only contained a few of us, we were asking around - Have you heard about this project? - and no one's heard about it and people were confused. And so we reached out - and we were a community in crisis - and none of our elected officials showed up for us. And so that's why we started protesting, was because, you know, protests that are loudest are the people who are not being heard. We went to King County, we went to City Council meetings - and we realized there are a lot of barriers for how communities of color, especially non-English speakers, communities of refugees and immigrants can engage in the political process. We requested for a translator ahead of time - we're told no, we had to bring our own - and then translation only goes one way, only goes towards the City councilmembers, it does not go back towards the community. And so we were just standing up in between breaks, yelling at the community members - this is what's happening, this is what people are saying. And that's emblematic of what's happening in the entire district. There is just not very much outreach and engagement and we definitely need more of that, we would like to see the table. There were a whole lot of issues that we would like to have been addressed. For instance, there should have been a good neighbor agreement between the community and the shelter that should have been in place when the shelter had opened back in 2020. And there should have also - we were seeing these encampments that were right outside the doors of the shelter - and last year, there were about seven homicides in the CID. I believe all but one were within the encampments. And so we were also asking for safety for our unhoused neighbors and wanted to enter a discussion with a public, a safety plan for everyone, including our unhoused neighbors. And we can go on and talk about all the reasons, I guess, that we wanted that discussion, engagement - and instead of giving that to us, they just decided to cancel the whole project and no one was happy. [00:23:59] Crystal Fincher: Well, and so I guess that's my question - and so if you are in favor of providing services and doing that, where do you think they should be sited in the district? [00:24:11] Tanya Woo: I think that area would have worked, but what we needed was that outreach and engagement. We were getting no information. We were holding our own town halls and reading off what we knew based on media and - of course we had our facts wrong 'cause no one was telling us what was happening. And that was basically - this is why I'm running - we wanted a seat at the table. And it's not gonna be given to us - we have to demand it. [00:24:42] Crystal Fincher: So would you be supportive of starting a new process with that site as the goal, but with the appropriate amount and type of authentic community engagement and collaboration? [00:24:55] Tanya Woo: Yes. And that's all we wanted - was that community engagement and collaboration. And we've historically have not gotten it. And so we feel like our community, that CID community, has suffered from the lack of investments and the lack of attention. [00:25:14] Crystal Fincher: I gotcha. Now I also wanna talk about public safety - and starting talking about alternative response - in other jurisdictions around the country, and in our own region and King County, have rolled out alternative response programs to better support those having a behavioral health crisis. And Seattle is stalled in implementing, which is one of the most widely-supported ideas by Seattle voters and voters in District 2 - which is standing up non-police public safety issues and solutions. What are your thoughts on these and what are your thoughts on civilian-led versus co-response models? [00:25:51] Tanya Woo: Yes. So I believe that Community Watch is a great example of alternatives to policing. And also there are a lot of organizations who do a lot of great and important work in community - We Deliver Care, LEAD, REACH, Co-LEAD, JustCARE - throughout the years that I would love to see grow on a larger scale and be able to support the entire city. I know they have little pockets within the city where they're doing this amazing work and it's working - and I would love to see more of that. That alternative to policing model is present, it's there - we just need to put City funding and City support behind it. So I also believe, like Health One, which pairs a case worker, case manager with a response team definitely needs to be expanded. Having more case workers out there should be a priority. Having case workers with officers should definitely be explored - and so I do support that model. [00:27:06] Crystal Fincher: Gotcha. Now, a lot of times we hear people talking about what victims would want, but in survey after survey and talking to victims directly and BIPOC communities - the community in District 2 is largely at-risk for violence at greater proportions than other places in the city - but largely they say two things. They first wanna make sure that what happened to them doesn't happen again. And they want support - better support - through the systems. We've had business owners in the City of Seattle talk about - Yeah, I can call police, it takes them a long time to respond. But even if they come, it's not really helping me move forward. But something like a victim compensation fund or more support or something like that would happen. - How do you think we could better support victims of crime in the city? And how do you think that might change the overall feeling of safety? [00:28:04] Tanya Woo: Yes. So for example, there have been about 14 robberies in the Beacon Hill, Rainier Beach area - mostly targeting Asian American seniors, but they're targeting young and old people as well. And so in those instances where they're targeting non-English speakers, we're seeing that not only are people not reporting in a timely manner, but they're not reporting at all - because that structure has not been put in place to help our immigrant, refugee, non-English speaking community. There's one survivor who I met recently who was severely traumatized by this experience - this person can't sleep at night, they have nightmares, and it's very obvious they need a lot of support. But that support structure has not been put into place, especially if you're a non-English speaker. So we were working with this person on connecting them to agencies to help - they have a $5,000 Harborview bill that they have to pay, working two jobs each, as well as dealing with all this trauma. And so we need something in place to help survivors, especially the refugee non-English speaking immigrant community members, to have access to these services, to be able to get assistance in paying their bills, or assistance in being able to get therapy, or other help that they may need. And that's - navigating the process is very difficult. Also - with these 14 burglaries - the community was not notified. I don't know why they waited until 14 to get the word out. Even now, we're not entirely sure what the circumstances are. We know that for one instance, this person was followed from King's Plaza - but how do we stop these from happening by watching out for each other? Especially if these are starting out at King's Plaza or other grocery stores, how can we allow for these marketplaces to keep an eye out for each other and make sure that they're not being followed? Just getting the word out is very difficult, and I wish there'd be more City agencies working with our nonprofits and organizational partners who are in these communities to get the word out as well as to help connect survivors to resources. So I agree that there is a huge lack, but I think we really need to work together to build upon what we have. [00:30:52] Crystal Fincher: Now I wanna talk about the City budget - and the City of Seattle is projected to have a revenue shortfall of $224 million beginning in 2025. Because the City's mandated to pass a balanced budget, the options to address the deficit are to either raise revenue or cut services. What approach are you going to take? [00:31:13] Tanya Woo: Ah, I think we have to look at the entire budget and define metrics of success for every single agency and making sure that there are results. We put so much money into KCRHA, which is the Regional Homeless Authority, but there is no metric for success, we don't know where this money is going - well, we have a general idea, but we don't know what the results are. How many people are they housing? I know right now they're going through a process where they're trying to come up with a system similar to that, but I would like to see something done for all government agencies. I mean, for any of us who have ever applied for a grant, we know how arduous it is to just basically name every single line item, and then be accountable for it, and then also show the results to be able to close out that grant. I think we have to hold all our agencies to that same level. [00:32:10] Crystal Fincher: So does that mean that that might be an area where you'd look to cut? Is that what you're saying? [00:32:16] Tanya Woo: Or not cut, but to maybe move around - see what programs are successful, what are not successful, and then invest in the programs that are showing results. [00:32:26] Crystal Fincher: So given that, if the money is just shifted and we're still dealing with a big budget deficit, how would you move to fix that? [00:32:38] Tanya Woo: Ah, then we'll have to look at - so we have to look at our priorities and really focus on those. And so I think it's looking at the overall budget - and yes, I guess, moving money around does equal cuts and other things, but giving a real clear picture of where the results are and moving the money to where the results are, I think, should be the priority. [00:33:09] Crystal Fincher: Okay, I think I've read that you're on record opposing a lot of the new revenue proposals and options. Is that correct? [00:33:17] Tanya Woo: Well, I wanted to see what the Progressive Revenue Task Force was going to put out. And I believe they gave a list of recommendations, and three is moving on to further legislation. And so I do not oppose any of the recommendations so far, but I want to see where the legislation - what the legislation looks like before making a final determination. [00:33:46] Crystal Fincher: Okay, so jury's still out, depends on what ultimately happens. So at this point, is it fair to say that you are not a strong supporter, or won't be leading any charge to implement new revenue, and may be a vote in support or in opposition? [00:34:02] Tanya Woo: Well, from my understanding - the three things that are being pushed forward are just continuations of things that are currently in place. And so I just want to wait and see. [00:34:15] Crystal Fincher: Well, the capital gains tax would be one, or a CEO tax would be another one, expanding the JumpStart tax. Yeah, so those ones are not currently in place. So are you looking to limiting what you would do to things that are already in place, or would you support something potentially beyond that? [00:34:37] Tanya Woo: Oh, I would want to see - I think some of them were not considered - I think the legality of each is being considered. So I probably would not be an advocate for any particular tax currently. I just want to see what legislation gets pushed forward before making determination of which I'm supportive or opposed of. [00:34:58] Crystal Fincher: Okay, so if that doesn't shake out and there isn't any new revenue, how would you propose doing things like supplementing victim services, or increasing public safety, or increasing homeless services that need new revenue? Would that just have to be offset by cuts in other areas, shifting to more higher priority areas on your agenda? [00:35:26] Tanya Woo: Yes, I think it's looking at the budget in its totality and seeing where we can make those cuts and how these programs could be successful because I believe they're in place - we're not reinventing the wheel here - we're just supporting and being able to help build capacity of some of these organizations and nonprofits, as well as I think - communication, outreach, and engagement is really important and making sure that communities of color know what's available and have access or even knowledge of these resources. [00:36:01] Crystal Fincher: Gotcha. Now, I want to talk about small businesses and the economy. You are a small business owner. Seattle and District 2 have very diverse businesses. Seattle has some of the largest corporations in the world headquartered here and some nearby, and also just a vibrant and diverse small business community - which is very important to our local and regional economy and just how the city is developing and feeling. What is most important - what would you lead and do to support small businesses in your district? [00:36:40] Tanya Woo: Yes, my family has been involved with a lot of small businesses. My grandparents had the Moon Temple Restaurant that they worked at for 32 years. Then my parents used that to help fund and open Seattle's first Chinese bakery, the Mon Hei Bakery in the Chinatown International District - I grew up in there, in the bakery, doing odd jobs for 50 cents an hour. And then later my dad - because we were able to build that intergenerational wealth through these small businesses, able to buy the building that the bakery was in. And so realizing how important our small businesses are in terms of being the social center for many community members, also being a safe haven for community as well. And making sure that we have that economic engine to help provide good paying jobs and allowing for many communities to stay in place. And so I think we have to be more proactive versus reactive. We had the broken window fund that really helped a lot of businesses, but the application process was a bit cumbersome and a lot of people who did not understand it. And so I think it'd be nice to have these, like City of Seattle service stations - I know Othello has one, the U district has one - but to have some in locations where small businesses can have access to be able to get their questions answered regarding City resources and being able to get City grants. Now, many of our small businesses are dealing with graffiti and the City will send notices to our small businesses demanding that they pay a fee every single day that that graffiti remains in place. And so having access to government to be able to, to, I guess, push back on these notices, as well as to get help in terms of how to access resources, and also to just basically address their concerns. I know at 12th and Jackson, there is a huge illegal market there, as well as many people using fentanyl - and that's really affected the business community. And so how do we interact with local government and agencies to bring light to this issue, to get more attention, and possibly work with community in trying to resolve and help people. [00:39:16] Crystal Fincher: Now, I also wanna talk about childcare, which is really important. And we recently received news that childcare is now more expensive than a college education - which has a devastating impact on families. Do you have plans to fix this? [00:39:32] Tanya Woo: Yes, I think the City could do a lot to help, I guess, childcare businesses to grow and to help with permitting process for childcare businesses to get started. And looking at - and just basically working in partnership with the childcare business community - figure out what the barriers are in place to provide more childcare. I think also helping accessibility - not only physically, but financially. And also helping with choices, so people are not having to drive across the city to be able to access good childcare options. I think that's something we need to work in partnership with not only businesses, large and small, but also with what families need. So I think there's a lot of work we can do in that area. [00:40:27] Crystal Fincher: Absolutely. Also wanna talk about transit and transportation. Pedestrian and bicycle safety has been atrocious. Pedestrians and bicyclists are not currently safe. What would you do to improve that? [00:40:42] Tanya Woo: Yes, I know there's a lot of traffic calming measures that community has been asking for, but SDOT has not been able to put in place. And so trying to find out what those barriers are and - within SDOT itself - be able to implement these traffic calming measures. There are many promises that have been made in these last 10 years and many projects - communities really excited for - that have not been implemented. So I think it's really holding agencies accountable and finding out those barriers are to get through that. And looking, especially in South Seattle, our traffic death numbers have not, pedestrian traffic death numbers have not gotten any better - and I think they're getting worse at this point. So is there - I know there's a lot of discussion groups, a lot of people who are really passionate about this issue - but how do we draw everybody in and make these things happen? And I've heard the frustration where people are - We're gonna go out there and paint that sidewalk ourself, or we're gonna put that planter in - we can't wait for the City to act. - and so how do we allow for these community projects? I know there's been a lot of speed bumps that have been helpful. How do we look at other traffic calming measures and make them happen is of paramount importance. [00:42:02] Crystal Fincher: It is, and I guess, what I'm getting at or what I'm wondering is - there have been a lot of promises made by SDOT, and the City, and various politicians and promises to bring change and it hasn't happened. So how exactly can you hold, what will you do to hold SDOT and your other colleagues accountable if you were to make it onto the council - as well as the mayor - to get action in District 2? [00:42:33] Tanya Woo: Yes, and I think that's the big question that a lot of people are wrestling with. And I think it's just getting down to - what are the barriers? Is there a lack of staffing? Or a lack of permitting - is the permitting process the barrier? Is there a community engagement process that needs to be done? And being able, I think, trying to understand what that barrier is. Is it just not a priority? [00:43:02] Crystal Fincher: If it is an issue of priority, how do you overcome that? [00:43:06] Tanya Woo: I think we have to make it a priority - it's lives on the line here - and we have to draw everyone in. And I know a lot of people have a lot of suggestions, like we need better lighting and that's a bigger infrastructure issue - putting that in place. And there's discussions regarding the traffic signals and cameras, especially. But I think there's a very divided community in terms of how to attack the situation, but I think it's going to have to be a - it's all-of-the-above situation - but I think it's getting SDOT to act is the biggest barrier. And if SDOT doesn't have the capacity, how can we give them the capacity or allow for community members to step in and to help? [00:43:53] Crystal Fincher: Yeah, definitely allowing community members to step in and act would be good. Unfortunately, SDOT is not that fond of that in many instances, if it's not already part of a pre-planned program. A lot of it seems to be coming down to right-of-way and investment in car infrastructure versus bike and pedestrian infrastructure. And so parking spaces - that type of infrastructure and space that could be used to provide safe facilities there - would you vote to eliminate parking spaces in order to provide safe infrastructure for pedestrians and bicyclists in your district? [00:44:30] Tanya Woo: Yes, I think that is a - I support that, but I think that's a community-by-community approach. I know for the Chinatown International District - that many people using bikes go through there, yet it's also part of the downtown core where parking is a huge importance, especially since there are many seniors there who cannot utilize the bike lanes or who need those handicap parking spaces. And so I think it's a community-by-community approach and definitely having those discussions is important, but it's a larger picture of how do we - it's growing pains we have - we haven't planned for the city to grow so quickly. So how do we fit that in into our communities? How do we bring in Sound Transit, Metro to offer more consistent schedules? Metro just got some schedules cut and with ST3 coming into place and that discussion happening, we have to involve and look at not only ST3, but bike lanes and draw Metro in on the discussion for a larger planning for the next couple of years so that we set ourselves up for success. [00:45:57] Crystal Fincher: Gotcha. Now transit reliability is becoming an increasingly pressing issue with staff shortages and other challenges creating ghost buses, missed buses, canceled trips, eliminated routes and trips - and it is jeopardizing transit ridership, jeopardizing so much in the city. Now Sound Transit is a regional body and King County Metro is a county body, but what can the City do to help stabilize transit reliability? [00:46:33] Tanya Woo: I think we have an aging workforce that's not being replenished. And so how do we go about that is a good question that needs - I think we need to talk about. Also, I think a lot of - there's a lot of public safety concerns that I think permeates through all of our issues, especially with hearing from - people going to, children going to school being on buses and seeing a drug use happening, as well as drivers having to deal with a lot of behavioral health issues or unhoused residents trying to stay warm or on their buses. And so how do we work together to promote the feeling of safety? And I think it's also looking, trying to offer more routes, more options and choices for people to be able to take the bus and have that system work. I know like a lot of people don't find it reliable because they always complain like - We're waiting longer than we feel like for buses to show up and then there's three or four buses at the same time that shows up - and how do we look at, make sure there's more consistent consistency and more options for people. [00:48:02] Crystal Fincher: Gotcha. Now a lot of people are trying to make a decision about who they're gonna vote for, about who aligns with their values. What do you tell them in order to help them make their decision between you and your opponent? [00:48:17] Tanya Woo: Yes, and so I've spent my whole life working towards a lot of the issues that I feel are huge priorities for the city - to provide more housing. My family actually went and we - have the Louisa Hotel - recently redeveloped and opened right before the pandemic. We have 84 units of workforce housing, which only charges people a percentage of their income so no one's forced to pay rent they cannot afford. I think we need more of that in the city and I know how to build. And we have about 20 units working with our organization called Housing Connector to be able to house the formerly unhoused, and that organization also pairs people with a caseworker to help partner through their journey from - into finding housing. And I think that's a really important project that many people - or many, I guess, apartment owners - should get involved in. I helped start Community Watch, which I feel like is a great model for alternatives to public safety. And so I see that there is a need, and we have to act, and so I've gone out and done that. We go into our unhoused community - try to bring services and connect people to resources. And so I have a lot of on the ground experience - I'm embedded in community within our encampments, I see firsthand the trickle down effects of policy, and I also see displacement and gentrification - which is something I've been working against my whole life and trying to protect our communities of color from that. And so I know what it's like to be in a community that feels like they're not being heard. To see a community, I guess, being on the list of one of the most endangered neighborhoods of the nation - a list we're not proud of - but we have to do more and we have to act to make sure that no other neighborhood gets put on that list in the City of Seattle and how do we get our neighborhood off that list is really important. So I'm a person of action. And I'm in community and I hear the gunshots every single night where I live - I live in the Rainier Beach area, I work in the CID, I go to the CID and I hear gunshots there and I realize public safety is so important and not a topic that's being addressed by our current councilmember. I agree that police need to be reformed, but we need - my group, we were in place of a shooting and we are not equipped to be able to deal with that and so for that, we absolutely need a police department. But we need a police department that's culturally competent and that will prioritize de-escalation. And so having that in place, I believe, is really important - in partnership with community investments with the community, as well as we need more after-school programs for youth, our community centers, our libraries, and our parks to resume the programming that they had pre-pandemic. And so I think there are a lot of actionable items that can be done to help empower people that could be done that's not currently being done. So there's a lot of work in certain areas that I would like to help implement and those will fall in the three priorities, like with public safety, homelessness and housing, as well as transportation. And so as a movement of action and want to help amplify voices of community and make sure that our communities of color are not forgotten, especially in a district where there is a lot of diversity and we should celebrate that. And so part of the reason why I'm running is because I've seen all this in the last four or three - many years - I've lived here my entire life, I know the communities. And we have to act, time for action is now - we can't just talk about ideology and debate amongst each other about what will work and what not will work - and in the end, not coming to solutions. And this should be a priority - going to solutions and problem solving, and especially making sure that the perfect solution is not an enemy of a good one. [00:53:09] Crystal Fincher: Well, gotcha. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to share with us today, candidate for Seattle City Council District 2, Tanya Woo - much appreciated. [00:53:19] Tanya Woo: Thank you - have a good rest of your day. [00:53:21] Crystal Fincher: You too. Thank you for listening to Hacks & Wonks, which is produced by Shannon Cheng. You can follow Hacks & Wonks on Twitter @HacksWonks. You can catch Hacks & Wonks on every podcast service and app - just type "Hacks and Wonks" into the search bar. Be sure to subscribe to get the full versions of our Friday week-in-review shows and our Tuesday topical show delivered to your podcast feed. If you like us, leave a review wherever you listen. You can also get a full transcript of this episode and links to the resources referenced in the show at officialhacksandwonks.com and in the podcast episode notes. Thanks for tuning in - talk to you next time.

Bangkok is a city which rewards many repeat visits and my recent trip there proved it! Putting together Episode 304 was a special chance for me to chat with several friends, old and new, who I had the joy of travelling with on our recent trip to Thailand.  In this episode, I start of chatting with Paddy Jenkins about our mutually favourite part of this Bangkok trip - visiting the Portuguese quarter or Kudijin (Kudichin). Diving deeper into the history of Bangkok here and learning about the Portuguese influence was so interesting (and side note, also delicious!). Next up, I speak with Bonnie Grima about another fun part of our Bangkok days, exploring some of its most famous temples, Wat Arun and Wat Pho. This time, we had with us master guide Suree, and she helped us know more of the extra-interesting details about these temples, both historical and modern. For Jules Park, a committed foodie, our evening in Chinatown was an especially memorable part of our Bangkok stay and we had a good chat about the atmosphere and some of the special treats we got to eat. Finally, I have included a part of an interview I recorded with our guide Suree while we were sitting in the cafe of the delightful Baan Kudichin museum in the Portuguese quarter. She gives me another good Bangkok tip, but we mostly chat about Thai culture and why Thai people often seem so content. Links: Thai Talk with Paddy - https://www.youtube.com/ThaiTalkwithPaddy/ Bonita Grima - https://www.bonitamaygrima.com/ Jules Park - @amazingsydney life - https://www.instagram.com/amazingsydneylife/  Talat Noi in Bangkok -  https://www.tourismthailand.org/Attraction/talat-noi Amazing Thailand - https://amazingthailand.com.au/ Join our Facebook group for Thoughtful Travellers - https://www.facebook.com/groups/thoughtfultravellers Join our LinkedIn group for Thoughtful Travellers - https://notaballerina.com/linkedin Show notes: https://notaballerina.com/304 See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Season 03 : The American Southwest Minisode : A Lynching in Chinatown : Los Angeles, CA Immigration is a process of moving from your home country to another country. The reasons a person might want to immigrate to another country are numerous: job opportunities, family reunification, or they simply don't feel safe in their own home anymore. Throughout the world, most people can immigrate to another country without many problems. Sometimes though, their new home does not welcome them with open arms.Check us out on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/c/SomewhereSinisterFollow us on social media:https://twitter.com/SomewhereSinhttps://www.instagram.com/somewheresinister/You can support us by donating a few bucks here:https://www.buymeacoffee.com/somewheresin

TOCER LNE recently suffered a broken spine after falling off a rooftop. While painting a roof in Chinatown, 3-4 cops ran up the building with mistaken concerns of a burglary. In an attempt to escape, TOCER jumped from roof to roof, did not make the clearing and fell. Losing feeling in his legs, he began to crawl away with his arms; eventually getting arrested and shackled to a hospital bed. It is a long road to recovery, but he is okay and will make a full come back. We spoke to him about the fall, ideas on life, recovery, police and more.http://patreon.com/angelandzpodcasthttp://angelandzpodcast.com

This week on Script Apart, the writers behind Pixar's latest heartwarming spectacle take us down to Element City where the tree people are green and the Vivisteria Flowers are pretty. Yes, today we're joined by Kat Likkel and John Hoberg, the husband-and-wife duo whose script for Elemental – co-written with Brenda Hsueh and director Pete Sohn – has been enchanting audiences all summer. The film a hugely affecting tale whose premise, on first glance, looked to have a certain shared DNA with past Pixar hits. One popular internet theory suggests that the studio's best-known films all ask variations of the same question: “What if X abstract concept – toys, cars, monsters, rats – had feelings?” Elemental, though, is more than a movie about elements with emotions. It's a family drama about parental expectation. It's an immigrant tale, about the struggle to assimilate into a new society while keeping your own culture alive. It's a romantic comedy – When Harry Met Sally with fire and water. And it's also a disaster movie that takes side-swipes at how structural racism leads to minority communities being put in harm's way.In this week's episode, Kat and John join us to discuss an early draft of the movie, in which Elemental was shaping up to be Pixar's answer to Chinatown. The finished film follows fire element Ember as she fights to save her father's shop from closure, with the help of Wade, a water element working as a city inspector. Along the way, they uncover a leak in the city's canals emanating from a problem with a nearby dam, neglected by authorities. In the spoiler conversation you're about to hear, however, John and Kat explain how Wade's mother was initially intended to be the film's shock antagonist, orchestrating an evil cover-up. We talk about how Ember was originally written with much more of a Disney princess vibe before being retooled as an older, more streetwise character. And we uncover the meaning and power of “the bow” – a motif in the movie that ends up becoming one of Elemental's final, most emotionally devastating shots. Get fired up – this is a fun and fascinating deep dive into one of the year's best animations.Script Apart is hosted by Al Horner and produced by Kamil Dymek. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, or email us on thescriptapartpodcast@gmail.com.Support for this episode comes from MUBI, ScreenCraft, Arc Studio Pro and WeScreenplay.To get ad-free episodes and exclusive content, join us on Patreon.Support the show

Septième et dernier épisode de notre série « nouvelles routes de la soie, dix ans après ». Le projet phare de Xi Jinping s'étend dans le Pacifique et vient bousculer l'échiquier géopolitique de la région. Aux Îles Salomon, le rapprochement avec la Chine, lancé sans concertation par le Premier ministre Manasseh Sogavare, divise la classe politique et électrise la société sur fond d'accusations de corruption.   Ce 17 juillet 2023, Manasseh Sogavare revient de Chine, où les pontes du Parti communiste lui ont déroulé le tapis rouge. Le chef du gouvernement salomonais a vu Xi Jinping, le président chinois, et signé neuf nouveaux accords avec Pékin en matière d'agriculture, d'aviation, de tourisme, de commerce, de climat et de maintien de l'ordre. A ses yeux, c'est un triomphe, et il ne cache plus ses ambitions : il veut aligner la stratégie de développement des Salomon sur les « nouvelles routes de la soie ». Dès sa descente d'avion, il organise une conférence de presse à l'aéroport d'Honiara et se félicite devant les journalistes d'un déplacement « extrêmement fructueux ». Mais très vite, l'exercice d'autocélébration tourne au règlement de compte et les mots du Premier ministre claquent comme des gifles, qu'il lâche mâchoires serrées, droit dans son costume sombre. « Permettez-moi de répondre aux articles que j'ai pu lire, relayant l'inquiétude de l'Australie et des États-Unis à propos de la coopération policière entre la Chine et les îles Salomon. Cette diplomatie réductrice et coercitive qui consiste à cibler nos relations avec Pékin n'est rien d'autre qu'une forme d'interférence dans nos affaires internes. La Chine n'est pas en train d'envahir ou de coloniser un État étranger. La Chine subvient à nos besoins en matière de maintien de l'ordre et nous sommes en demande de solutions nouvelles à l'ensemble de nos problèmes. Depuis 45 ans, nous sommes laissés de côté et traités comme la basse-cour de nos voisins. Nous devons briser le joug et les chaînes de la dépendance. » Au sens de l'ONU, les Salomon font partie des pays les moins avancés, au même titre que l'Afghanistan, Haïti ou le Soudan. Le produit intérieur brut plafonne à 2 200 dollars par habitant et la population, en majorité rurale et sous-éduquée, vit sous perfusion étrangère depuis l'indépendance concédée par la tutelle britannique en 1978. Incapable de boucler son budget, l'archipel a très vite eu besoin de soutien économique et s'est tourné vers son grand voisin, l'Australie, qui reste un partenaire incontournable. Entre 2009 et 2019, les programmes d'assistance australiens ont encore représenté 65% de l'aide internationale versée aux îles Salomon. Pendant des années, les Australiens ont mis la main au pot sans arrière-pensée, pensant n'avoir rien à craindre de la région Pacifique, une zone sans enjeux stratégiques (« strategically benign », disait-on à Canberra), considérée comme stable, neutre et isolée, que l'Australie chapeautait de loin, sous le regard bienveillant de son vieil allié américain. Avant l'an dernier, elle n'avait jamais négocié de traités de défense bilatéraux avec les micro-États du voisinage, comme les Fidji ou les Tonga, car la nécessité d'un filet de sécurité fabriqué maille par maille au nord des côtes australiennes, ne s'était jamais fait sentir.Présence militaire chinoise à trois heures de Brisbane ?A tort. La percée de la Chine aux Salomon fait désormais planer l'hypothèse d'une présence militaire chinoise à trois heures de vol de Brisbane et vient contrarier l'idée d'un espace indopacifique « libre et ouvert » promue par l'administration Biden. Humiliée dans son jardin, en pleine guerre d'influence avec les autorités chinoises, la Maison Blanche s'est dépêchée de rouvrir début 2023 son ambassade des États-Unis à Honiara, après 30 ans d'absence.  Quant au gouvernement australien, il s'est appuyé sur une recette bien connue : accroître, en désespoir de cause, la coopération avec l'exécutif salomonais pour limiter l'emprise de Pékin sur les domaines régaliens. Depuis que les Salomon avaient appelé l'Australie au secours au début des années 2000 pour rétablir l'ordre après plusieurs épisodes de tensions ethniques et de conflits fonciers,  l'entraînement des policiers faisait partie de son pré carré. Et les omniprésents 4x4 à l'emblème kangourou remplis de formateurs « aussie » s'étaient fondus dans le paysage.  Mais la lune de miel entre la Chine et l'équipe Sogavare a grippé la mécanique et l'atmosphère bon enfant du « Police Open Day ». La journée portes ouvertes des forces de l'ordre qui se tient chaque année en plein air dans la capitale, n'est plus tout à fait la même. Sans doute à cause de l'énorme canon à eau anti-émeute offert par les autorités chinoises, qui trône au milieu du pré. « Bien sûr, on a de l'équipement chinois, nous confie Anseto Maeai, un agent de la Police Response Team, devant son stand d'exposition. Ils nous ont donné des matraques télescopiques, des pinces d'immobilisation, et ici, devant vous, il y a les boucliers tactiques financés par l'Australie et des ensembles balistiques. La police australienne nous aide toujours, dans le cadre de la SIAF, la Force internationale d'assistance à la sécurité. Pour le reste, vous savez, on ne peut pas se permettre de refuser de l'aide, on prend tout ce qu'on nous offre. J'ai moi-même suivi la formation au tir avec les policiers chinois, qui a commencé l'an dernier. C'est assez proche de ce que l'on faisait déjà avec les Australiens, sauf que les Chinois ont leurs propres méthodes d'enseignement, ce n'est pas toujours facile. Avec les Australiens, on peut interagir. Avec la Chine, ça passe par des traducteurs ». La commissaire-adjointe qui prend la parole sur scène ce jour-là dans son uniforme de gala se nomme Evelyn Thugea. Elle a la particularité d'avoir organisé l'événement, censé renouer le lien entre la police et les citoyens, et d'avoir passé un mois en Chine dans le cadre d'un séminaire de formation destiné aux officiers. La question est simple : quelle est exactement l'étendue des services offerts par la police chinoise à son homologue salomonaise depuis la signature de leur protocole d'entente ? « Nous sommes organisés en différents services, avec plusieurs directions. Chaque direction de la police travaille avec différents partenaires étrangers et je ne ferai aucun commentaire là-dessus, car je ne travaille pas directement avec chacune de ces directions. » OpacitéUne fois de plus, les Salomon refusent de rendre public un texte ultra-sensible signé avec Pékin, dont le contenu alimente les pires fantasmes. « Imaginez que des policiers chinois soient appelés à encadrer les prochaines élections où Sogavare joue sa peau, nous glisse un diplomate occidental en poste à Honiara. Quelles garanties de sincérité pour le scrutin ? » La même opacité avait entouré l'accord de sécurité conclu en 2022. Un document explosif, dont seule une version provisoire circule sur les réseaux sociaux, selon laquelle les îles Salomon pourront faire appel à des forces armées chinoises et autoriseront leurs navires à stationner dans l'archipel. Le Premier ministre a beau nier toute militarisation rampante et promettre à la communauté internationale que la Chine n'est pas là pour ça, personne n'est en mesure de le vérifier. Pas même le patron de l'opposition, Matthew Wale, qui s'y est cassé les dents lorsqu'il a demandé des explications officielles. « Chez nous, l'exécutif peut signer des traités internationaux sans passer par le Parlement, il n'a aucune obligation de communiquer avec les élus. C'est un système très particulier, qui n'avait jamais posé problème auparavant. Mais il en pose depuis cet accord de sécurité signé avec la Chine l'an dernier, qui a rendu l'Australie et les États-Unis très nerveux et qui nous place au beau milieu des rivalités régionales. Personne ne sait ce que contient ce texte ni quels seront ses effets. » « En réalité, moins le Premier ministre fait preuve de transparence à propos de ces accords, plus cela provoque d'hostilité, estime Matthew Wale. C'est contreproductif, à la fois de la part du gouvernement et de la part des Chinois, alors qu'il y a de la place pour la Chine. Il y a ce sentiment dans la population que si des pays comme l'Australie, les États-Unis ou la France font copain-copain avec Pékin pour des raisons commerciales et profitent de l'argent chinois, pourquoi pas nous ? Ce qui est important, c'est la façon dont on mène cette relation, et la transparence doit en être un élément primordial. » « Cadeau d'anniversaire pour Pékin »Le péché originel, c'est la bascule qui s'est produite en septembre 2019, quand Manasseh Sogavare a décidé d'établir des relations diplomatiques avec la Chine au détriment de Taïwan, l'allié historique des îles Salomon. Du jour au lendemain, sans explication, le gouvernement salomonais a enterré trois décennies de coopération avec les autorités taïwanaises et fait un choix précipité, clivant, voire suspect, selon le député Peter Kenilorea Jr, qui y voit une manipulation grossière de l'appareil politique. « Cela faisait 36 ans que nous étions du côté de Taïwan, regrette l'élu. Et pour beaucoup de gens, Taïwan n'avait rien fait de mal, rien qui justifiait d'être jeté dehors. Par ailleurs, c'est un sujet qui n'avait jamais été abordé pendant les dernières élections. Délaisser Taïwan au profit de la Chine ? Personne n'avait fait campagne sur ce thème. Pourtant, dès son arrivée au pouvoir, c'est devenu la priorité du gouvernement et cela a laissé bon nombre d'électeurs perplexes. Dans la phase qui a précédé le scrutin, la Chine poussait de manière très agressive et je pense que des promesses ont été faites en coulisses. Certains groupes politiques ont dû s'engager à reconnaître la Chine s'ils gagnaient les élections. » « Pour moi, soutient Peter Kenilorea Jr, c'est devenu évident à la lecture de leur première recommandation : il fallait à tout prix passer de Taïwan à Pékin avant le 1er octobre 2019, parce que le 1er octobre coïncidait avec les 70 ans de la Chine communiste fondée par Mao en 1949. Absolument aucun Salomonais n'aurait pu écrire ça, c'est sorti de nulle part. Et là, j'ai compris que la reconnaissance était juste un pur cadeau d'anniversaire pour Pékin. » Ce que cet ancien cadre des Nations unies suggère avec ses mots choisis, Ruth Liloqula nous le confirme au bazooka entre deux conférences dans un hôtel du centre-ville. D'après cette figure de la société civile salomonaise, plusieurs fois primée pour son combat contre la corruption et représentante aux îles Salomon de l'ONG Transparency International, le chef du gouvernement s'est laissé acheter par le régime chinois. « La Chine fournit de l'argent liquide pour consolider le parti de Sogavare, accuse-t-elle. 250 000 dollars par tête. J'ai vu de mes propres yeux la liste contresignée par le Premier ministre stipulant qui devait être payé pour survivre à la motion de censure déposée contre lui en 2021. 250 000 dollars pour chaque membre du Parlement prêt à soutenir son action. Aujourd'hui, la plupart de ces élus font partie du gouvernement. Tout le monde en parle mais il va falloir que quelqu'un se lève et s'engage à aller jusqu'au bout. Or, ceux qui détiennent ces informations et pourraient servir de témoins crédibles ne sont pas prêts à y aller, parce que s'ils le font, ils perdront leur emploi. » Manasseh Sogavare n'a pas souhaité nous recevoir, mais son directeur de la Communication, George Herming, nous accueille au siège de l'exécutif à Honiara. Selon lui, cette liste n'a jamais existé et le système de pots-de-vin dont tout le monde parle est une invention de l'opposition. « On attend toujours des preuves concrètes. Ces accusations ont toujours été proférées pour des raisons politiques par des personnes opposées à la ligne du gouvernement. Si vous avez la preuve que la Chine nous soudoie ou a soudoyé des députés afin d'acheter leur vote, je vous en prie, levez-vous et portez plainte auprès des autorités compétentes, afin que le personnel corrompu soit poursuivi et condamné. Jusqu'ici personne n'a porté plainte, personne n'a d'éléments montrant que telle ou telle personne a reçu telle ou telle somme d'argent. Ce ne sont que des mots, sans aucune preuve tangible ». Émeutes et communauté chinoise traumatiséeInvérifiable, impossible de suivre la trace d'une valise de billets, mais ces rumeurs et ce climat délétère ont fait des dégâts bien réels au mois de novembre 2021, quand des émeutes ont éclaté à Honiara. Les manifestants ont envahi le Parlement, incendié un commissariat de police et débarqué dans le quartier de Chinatown, qu'ils ont réduit en cendres. L'explosion de violence a fait trois morts et traumatisé la communauté chinoise. Dix-huit mois plus tard, sous couvert d'anonymat, un commerçant que nous surnommerons M. Chan accepte de nous emmener sur place, dans ce quartier chinois d'Honiara qui ne comprend qu'une seule artère, désormais déserte, où les bâtiments noircis et éventrés ont à peine été nettoyés. Ses ancêtres arrivés de Chine il y a plusieurs générations avaient fondé leur magasin ici après la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Tout a brûlé, y compris les souvenirs de famille. Entre deux soupirs fatalistes, M. Chan souffle qu'il se bat toujours contre un syndrome de stress post-traumatique. « Il n'y a rien plus à voir. C'était un vieux magasin en bois des années 1950. Le jour des émeutes, des amis m'ont prévenu, ils m'ont envoyé la vidéo. Les gars ont mis le feu à ce magasin-là, ça s'est propagé à côté et c'est venu jusqu'au nôtre. Aux Salomon, les gens utilisent avant tout les manifs pour casser, pour voler ou pour piller. La plupart de ces émeutiers n'étaient pas de vrais manifestants, ils se sont juste dit que c'était l'occasion de piquer des trucs. Le prétexte, c'est "on n'est pas d'accord avec la politique du gouvernement", etc. Mais le plus stupide là-dedans, je vous le pose là : qui les a élus, ces politiciens ? Ce ne sont pas les Chinois qui ont voté pour eux. » Les troubles ont débouché sur une centaine d'arrestations et polarisé encore un peu plus la société salomonaise, incapable de déterminer par elle-même si les « nouvelles routes de la soie » constituent une aubaine ou un poison pour les îles Salomon. « Peu importe le donneur »Même les vieux sages comme Johnson Honimae, journaliste et chef de la radio publique salomonaise, que nous rencontrons sur le campus de l'Université d'Honiara, ont du mal à crever l'abcès. « Il y a des doutes parce que la Chine est une nouvelle venue dans la région. Beaucoup de gens ont des a priori. Aux Salomon, nous sommes chrétiens, ce n'est pas le cas de la Chine. Nous sommes un pays démocratique, nous tenons à ces valeurs, ce n'est pas vraiment le cas de la Chine. » « Mais au bout du compte, poursuit Johnson Honimae, la question, c'est de savoir qui va nous aider le plus possible, parce que nous avons des bouches à nourrir, des besoins de développement considérables et pas assez de revenus. Le commerce du bois s'est écroulé, et grosso modo, même si nous nous asseyons sur une partie de nos convictions, la nécessité à la fin du mois, c'est de joindre les deux bouts. » En ville, tous les immeubles en dur sont financés et construits par des entreprises étrangères. Les Américains ont aménagé le nouveau Parlement national, Taïwan a offert le siège de l'opposition et le dernier centre de conférences, près de l'aéroport, est une réalisation indonésienne. Il y a tant à faire, routes, ponts, hôpitaux, communications… Pourquoi s'étonner que la Chine vienne d'emporter un nouveau marché auprès de la Banque asiatique de développement afin de rénover le port international d'Honiara et deux débarcadères en province ?  « Peu importe le donneur, tous les gens qui travaillent dans le secteur du développement ici vous le diront, tempère Thierry Nervale, le directeur français de l'Autorité maritime des îles Salomon, un organe indépendant du gouvernement. Il y a effectivement des projets qui sont menés par des entreprises chinoises comme la China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC). Mais dans la majorité des cas, ce n'est pas la Chine qui en est à l'origine, c'est la Banque asiatique de développement qui monte des projets, lance un appel d'offres et choisit les candidats. Et visiblement les entreprises chinoises sont compétitives puisqu'elles sont souvent sélectionnées pour travailler en Asie et dans le Pacifique. » Pas de raz-de-marée, en tout cas pas pour l'instant. À terme, le gouvernement des Salomon n'exclut pas de travailler directement avec la Chine dans des domaines aussi sensibles que les télécommunications, l'installation de câbles internet sous-marins ou les infrastructures énergétiques. « À la lumière du dernier déplacement de notre Premier ministre à Pékin, il y a des discussions à venir autour des "nouvelles routes la soie", cela dépendra de nos besoins, prévient George Herming, le porte-parole de l'exécutif. Pour ce qui est de l'assistance militaire, ce n'est pas à l'ordre du jour, mais c'est une possibilité. Nous devons nous inspirer de que la Chine a été capable de faire pour se développer. »À lire aussiRetrouvez l'intégralité de notre dossier sur les «nouvelles routes de la soie» 

SynopsisThe American composer Henry Cowell lived from 1897 to 1965 and wrote thousands of musical works in a wide variety of styles. As a young boy, Cowell lived near San Francisco's Chinatown, so Asian influences are as likely to crop up in his music as European models. And among Cowell's aggressively experimental works are piano pieces that employ what he called “tone clusters”—chords played with a fist or forearm. Those pieces piqued the interest of European composers like Bartók and Janáček, but in addition to avant-garde scores, Cowell wrote dozens of conventionally tonal works, often hauntingly beautiful.In 1941, Cowell discovered a collection of evocative 19th century American hymns titled Southern Harmony. These reminded him of even earlier works by the 18th century American composer William Billings, who liked to write what he called “Fuguing Tunes.” Combining these two influences, Cowell came up with his own series of “Hymns AND Fuguing Tunes” for various combinations of instruments.Cowell's Hymn and Fuguing Tune No. 10 for oboe and strings, for example, was premiered on today's date in 1955, in Santa Barbara, California, by oboist Bert Gassman and the Pacific Coast Music Festival orchestra, conducted by Leopold Stokowski.Music Played in Today's ProgramHenry Cowell (1897 - 1965) Hymn and Fuguing Tune No. 10 Humbert Lucarelli, oboe; Manhattan Chamber Orchestra; Richard Auldon Clark, cond. Koch 7282

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. Host Miko Lee speaks with the creatives behind San Francisco Chinatown's 2nd Annual Contemporary Arts Festival – Under the Same Sun: Reimagining the Edges of Chinatown. This community event is produced by Edge on the Square, the same folx who produced last year's Neon was Never Brighter. Miko chats with curator Candace Huey and artists Connie Zheng and members of the Macro Waves Collective.   Under the Same Sun Transcripts [00:00:00] Opening: Asian Pacific expression. Unity and cultural coverage, music and calendar revisions influences Asian Pacific Islander. It's time to get on board. The Apex Express. Good evening. You're tuned in to Apex Express. [00:00:18] Jalena Keane-Lee: We're bringing you an Asian American Pacific Islander view from the Bay and around the world. [00:00:22] Miko Lee: I'm your host tonight, this is Miko Lee. And you get the pleasure of hearing about the amazing edge on the square second annual contemporary art festival. I speak with the curator, Candace Huey, along with some of the powerhouse artists that are behind the interactive events that are happening as part of this festival in San Francisco, Chinatown on September 30th. Also, I'm going to be there. From seven 30 to eight 30, Leading a panel discussion all about the intersections between arts and politics and ways that we can think about how to re-imagine the edges of social justice and equity. We hope that you'll join us and listen tonight to this episode with some artists talking about how we can all be change makers, shake things up, enjoy some art and go out in the Chinatown community in San Francisco so enjoy the episode. Welcome Candice Huey to Apex Express. [00:01:23] Candace Huey: Thank you, Miko. So excited to be back here with you again. [00:01:26] Miko Lee: We are here to talk about Edge on the Square's second annual Contemporary Art Festival. I loved last year's Neon Was Never Brighter. First, just start by telling us about Edge on the Square. [00:01:40] Candace Huey: Thank you, Miko. So edge on the square is a new arts and cultural hub located in the heart of San Francisco, Chinatown. It is a project by C Mac, and it is a place based cultural hub that celebrates, explores and supports leading and pioneering creative expressions at the intersection of community, art and multiracial democracy. [00:02:04] Miko Lee: Ooh, that's so many things and so many important things in this time of turmoil that we're living in. Last year's Neon Was Never Brighter was so fun, so much interactive art. Tell us about the theme for this year and how you came up with it. [00:02:19] Candace Huey: Thank you. So this year, we're excited to be back. It's going to be Saturday, September 30th from 5 p. m. to 10 p. m. We were really excited to gather some amazing local and international API artists. We worked this year with esteemed curators. I'm joined by. PJ. Polly Carpio Arena, Alejo and Sarah Wesson Chang to help inform the vision of the theme, which is under the same sun. Reimagining the edges of Chinatown. [00:02:54] Miko Lee: Oh, I love that title. I have been talking with some of the artists which we're going to hear from soon about how they take that theme and what does it mean to them? Can you tell us what it means for you to have this theme of under the same sun? And what are the edges of Chinatown? What does this theme mean? [00:03:12] Candace Huey: Sure. Happy to share about The theme of the festival under the same sun reimagining the edges of Chinatown for this year's Contemporary Art Festival, while this year's festival is really focused on the unity and solidarity of the API communities coming together during this tough time ongoing, we're still grappling with the after effects of the pandemic and we're still in the pandemic and we're still facing a lot of adversity from the ongoing anti Asian rhetoric. And compounded with this past year's moments of, you know, tragic tragedies in the Supreme Court with overturning of Roe versus Wade affirmative action and other discriminatory policy policies, not only affecting API communities, but other underserved communities of color. we felt that it was still really important to focus on unity on solidarity and coming together, but also thinking about how could we re imagined and redefine, both Boundaries and borders real and imagined that exists not only in Chinatown, but beyond between different communities of color and coming together and commenting on the fact that the critical work for social justice and equity is continuous and ongoing. [00:04:27] Miko Lee: Okay, so as an audience member, I get myself into Chinatown. I'm on that the square. What do I see? [00:04:35] Candace Huey: We're having multimedia, fun, exciting art installations and activations ranging from dance performances to music to nighttime projections to artwork, interactive installations. There's even a sound bath. That's going to be located inside 800 Grant Avenue by the artist collective Macro Waves. We're having a digital work by Indira Allegra, which is a digital tapestry, a collective new take on what is a memorial monument in the community sense, but basically edge on the square and this contemporary festival is thinking about how can we use art to come together And to heal and really think about potent regeneration and thinking about collective power. [00:05:24] Miko Lee: Ooh, collective power folks join up and come to edge on the square, second annual contemporary art festival, the end of this month, September 30th. And we're going to hear next from a bunch of different artists, including the macro waves and Connie Zhang. So stay tuned. [00:05:40] Candace Huey: Under the same sun, reimagining the edges of Chinatown is a free, open to the public, family friendly event, accessible to wheelchairs. We are expecting lots of fun, so come, enjoy yourselves, and be delighted. [00:05:56] Miko Lee: Candace Huey, thank you so much for joining us. And more than that, thank you so much for putting this artistry out into the community so that we can grow and heal and make changes together. [00:06:07] Candace Huey: Thank you, Miko. It's a truly an honor to speak with you and also to work with such talented artists and curators. [00:06:17] Jalena Keane-Lee: Next up, listen, to find my way by Rocky Rivera. MUSIC [00:09:45] Jalena Keane-Lee: That was find my way by Rocky Rivera [00:09:49] Miko Lee: Thank you, Connie Zheng, for coming on Apex Express. [00:09:57] Connie Zheng: Thank you, Miko. [00:09:59] Miko Lee: We are so excited to have you here. You are such a brilliant artist, scholar. You do so many different things. And I just love to hear a little bit more about who are your people and what legacy do you carry from them? [00:10:15] Connie Zheng: Thank you so much for this question. It's a really generous and expansive question .When I think about who my people are there's a broader community of Asian American API progressives, artists, activists intellectuals who I consider part of my community. There's also people whose legacy I'd love to carry. But who maybe I don't know personally. When I think about who my people are they're really people who are dedicated to creating better futures for all of us who are dedicated to collective thriving and liberation and change. There's a very literal answer to that question, which is my people are other Chinese Americans, but I think it's really important for me to think of a larger, more expansive community of people who are committed to the same sorts of Politics and goals for collective health and thriving and and freedom. [00:11:41] Miko Lee: Thank you for that. And speaking of that, you are going to be one of the many artists in Chinatown Media and Arts Collaborative's second annual arts event. This year it's called Under the Same Sun, Reimagining Collective Liberation from the Edges of Chinatown. Can you tell me about what that theme title means to you? How do you interpret it? [00:12:03] Connie Zheng: Yeah. Thank you. So when, yeah, the first time the curators shared the framework of under the same sun for me, I was really excited about this idea of collective thriving and growing. Because we are literally all under the same sun. Maybe it shines differently for different people or we all respond to it differently. This is a cheesy answer, but we are all actually on the same planet and we're all responsible. That responsibility is distributed somewhat differently because of our how different people, use the resources and steward the land differently, but we are all responsible one way or another for , our collective future. For me, Under the Same Sun speaks to questions of responsibility, it speaks to questions of collective growth, and nourishment, and our ability to feel the same kind of joy or radiance, and the conditions that enable that radiance. [00:13:12] Miko Lee: What do you think from the edges of Chinatown means? [00:13:15] Connie Zheng: When I think about edges I think about borders and boundaries and how they're often very porous, and also how the edge is really where I some of the most visible forms of change happen. It's not usually from the center , I'm really interested in thresholds, and how no every edge is both the ending and beginning and that sort of space where beings and things and entities cross over to become something else is really fascinating for me, and so the edge of Chinatown there's the literal boundary on a map of where Chinatown as a neighborhood begins and ends, but also the community in Chinatown , it's not limited to those 9 or 10 or 11 blocks. It's much bigger than that. It's much more expansive and diffused than that. I think that slippage between where the sort of bureaucratic designation of a neighborhood and a community like that tension or flow is really interesting for me. [00:14:42] Miko Lee: Oh, I like this philosophical every end beginning. That's lovely. You were raised in China. So when did you first see San Francisco Chinatown? What was your first experience with that? [00:14:53] Connie Zheng: I think I first visited Chinatown in actually in college. So I was born in China, and I mostly grew up on the East Coast. I spent a lot of time in Boston Chinatown and before that I lived in a very predominantly white working class town in Pennsylvania. There were not very many Asian people. My parents would have to drive two hours every month to the nearest Chinese grocery store. Growing up for me Boston Chinatown was like a revelation and coming to San Francisco for the first time and going to Chinatown was like a shock. It was incredible . Walking through the neighborhoods or walking past the small vendors, The stalls, reminded me of being in Asia and it was really magical. I didn't know that existed outside of Asia. The more that I learned about San Francisco Chinatown, it's history why the architecture is the way that it is and how it was really like a safe haven for a lot of people. Specifically during Chinese exclusion. It's a place that is filled with so much significance and meaning, and it's really special to have been able to do work there over the past year and to continue doing work there. [00:16:25] Miko Lee: You've done a number of site specific interactive projects, can you tell us about the one that you will be doing as a part of the upcoming Under the Same Sun? [00:16:33] Connie Zheng: I will be making a modular outdoor garden installation called Nine Suns, and it's in reference to the Chinese myth of Houyi and the Ten Suns. In this story, there were once ten suns, in the days when gods roamed the earth. The ten suns would usually cross the sky one by one. One day all ten of the sun appeared in the sky at once and started burning the earth. This archer Shot down nine of the suns and left just the one that we have today. I'm really interested in trying to imagine a more gentle transformation of the nine suns who fall from the sky. In the standard myth the archer is like the hero but I've read like a number of sort of accounts that reference this myth that nuance the story a little bit by mentioning how like cruel and unkind this archer is. Especially since his wife is Chang'e, the moon goddess, who literally escaped from him I was really interested in reframing this myth and not having the emphasis be on this male archer who shoots down these nine sons, who Maybe we're just hanging out together and in this garden installation there will be nine circular planter tubs that are mounted on movable circular dollies. That are painted to look like the suns that were shot down by the archer. And [00:18:10] Miko Lee: so interest. That's very exciting. Wait, where will it be located? [00:18:15] Connie Zheng: I believe it will be located outside of CMAQ on Grant. I think the exact location is still being determined right now, but it'll be a street level installation. Each of the planters will be somewhere around 2 to 3 feet wide. There will be 9 of them and they will be arranged in a sort of wavy horizon line and each of the planters will have like Asian herbs. On the day of the festival, there'll be wavy line that's reminiscent of an undulating horizon. After the festival, the planters will be moved to Kaiming Head Start Preschool actually for use. For the school to use in their outdoor education program, which is really exciting. [00:19:04] Miko Lee: Oh, I love that. So you're making it, you're creating it for this one arts festival, but then it will have an ongoing life with young folks. [00:19:12] Connie Zheng: Exactly. Yeah. And that's really important. I think that was one of the most exciting things about this project. The planters, because they'll be installed on these circular platforms that have wheels on them, they'll be mobile and the idea is for them to be easily configured into different arrangements, depending on the school's needs. That feature was really exciting to me because it's inspired by The reality of very tight space in Chinatown and also in the interconnectedness of the community. I was like, really inspired by and struck by how so many residents of Chinatown are really mobile. They're tracing numerous orbits a day as they go to school, go to work, run errands, see friends and family, and just build these very rich lives with Lots of nodes of connection. The sort of connectivity is really important for me to think about here. I wanted these planters to be mobile, to be easily configured and modular and also to have a life outside of this one day event. [00:20:21] Miko Lee: So what is the walk away message that you want your audience, after coming to see this event, that's a reimagining of this folktale that many of us grew up with, what do you want people to know or to think about when they walk away from your exhibit? [00:20:37] Connie Zheng: It's really exciting for me when a project that I'm working on opens up different angles of thinking about a story that we've inherited. What happens to the fallen sons in this story is something that was really interesting for me and that I hope is interesting for others. The reimagining of these nine fallen suns as gardens is a really lovely thought for me I was really excited about the idea of each of these suns after they've been shot down from the sky, going off and nurturing their own earth, after they've Fall out of the sky, they like maybe roam through the solar system, and or the nebula, and [00:21:28] Miko Lee: They're just out there roaming around the universe. [00:21:31] Connie Zheng: Yeah, but then they find this maybe like a barren rock and then they nurture it into life. They start their own solar system, and so I think this idea of rejected things, creating new life or being the basis of a new ecosystem is something that's always been fascinating to me and I hope that the installation might encourage others to think about that as well the idea of, Things that are fallen, or thrown away, or considered useless as these nine sons were, things that were considered useless, actually being like, the source of new life. [00:22:09] Miko Lee: Rebirth. From the phoenix, they rebirthed. [00:22:13] Connie Zheng: Yeah, totally. I love that. [00:22:15] Miko Lee: Fun, fun. You do so many different types of mediums. You do film and drawing and writing, food events, maps, and plants, we were chatting earlier about mooncake design, and filmmaking, all these different mediums that you utilize. Can you talk a little bit about how the different mediums you use? impact the issue that you're exploring? Are you drawn to film because of this issue or does it just come to you organically? [00:22:43] Connie Zheng: I do like to come to materials organically. I think there's like a lot of unconscious intelligence that we have. If I have an idea for something, usually I'll try to sit on it for a while before I actually make the thing. There's some projects where the form and the material manifest themselves very quickly and early on. Sometimes it's just very obvious for example I recently finished a nine foot long map of Asian farmworker history in California, and I started making it while I was an artist in residence at the 41 Ross Space on Ross Alley. When I first started thinking about how to create this archive of Asian farmworker history in California, the map form was very obvious to me. I was like, oh, it definitely has to be a map. That was a project where I knew exactly what it would be once the idea, once the sort of like germ of the idea bloomed in my brain. [00:23:59] Miko Lee: Oh, I look forward to seeing that work. That's, is that up still? [00:24:03] Connie Zheng: Yeah. Yeah. It's up at the Berkeley Art Center right now, and it will be going To the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts for the Bay Area now triennial in September. that show opens in October. [00:24:16] Miko Lee: Oh, great. So folks can have access to your work in multiple ways. [00:24:20] Miko Lee: I noticed in a lot of your work is addressing environmental awareness and climate change. Have you always woven your politics into your artistry? [00:24:29] Connie Zheng: Certainly not. I think figuring out how to weave my politics into my creative work has been an ongoing process with a lot of trial and error. Not all of my work displays my politics so visibly. I feel like a lot of my creative practice is really just like a series of experiments to figure out what my creative languages. My earliest work was very personal, and as I started to have more of an audience for my work, I was trying to, figure out what kind of dialogue I wanted to have with people. My first short film was, very angry like film essay that was focused on how racialized and class, a lot of American mainstream media rhetoric about pollution is. That was very much inspired by my experiences of my childhood in China and also growing up traveling back and forth between China and the U S and seeing how intensely polluted a lot of the places where my family lived were and then learning more about how that came to be a lot of the worst pollution around the world , can really be traced back to multinational corporations that are based out of the U. S. or North America and Europe. A lot of this terrible pollution is outsourced to countries of the global south, developing nations and also like poor communities, often communities of color in the United States. And the more I learned about this, the more sort of furious I got about it. My first film essay was this extremely finger pointing piece, and the reception for it was really interesting for me. I noticed that the people who responded to it most tended to be like other Asian diasporic people or Asian Americans I received a lot of feedback from That it was didactic. At first that made me really angry to hear that it was didactic, mostly from white viewers and then I think that changed, , and then, , Got me thinking about , what kind of conversation do I want to have? How do I want people to respond to a work? I don't necessarily mean is that going to piss them off or not? I realized that it felt uninviting for people and it felt uninviting for the exact, people I wanted to have that conversation with. I wouldn't say like I've completely changed the way that I work. My writing tends to be much more pointed and my visual work I try to move through a spectrum of Different strategies and ways of weaving my politics into the creative work. Sometimes with certain projects, I want to be more inviting and to plant the seeds of that politics in people, and sometimes it's more like an open conversation, and sometimes it's a little more direct. For the last several years, I've really been experimenting with different strategies and approaches to bring my politics into the work and also to try to make it depending on the context, as inviting as possible without hiding what my politics are. [00:28:32] Miko Lee: Thank you for that. What are you interested in exploring at this Under the Same Sun event? Will you have a chance to walk around and see some of the other artwork, or are you staying with your exhibit? [00:28:43] Connie Zheng: I hope I'll be able to walk around and see other artwork. [00:28:46] Miko Lee: And what is it for yourself? How would you like to walk away from the festival? [00:28:51] Connie Zheng: I would love to have conversations with people about what the festival means to them and what questions it's opening for them and how they see, the installation what inspires in them, what questions it opens for them, I'm really humbled when people bring any real presence to my work, and it's not something I take for granted. I think really just engaging thoughtfully with a creative work that you see is it requires an act of like generosity. Would just be very excited to have conversations with people. [00:29:38] Miko Lee: Well, Connie Zhang, thank you for spending so much time with me. I appreciate you, look forward to seeing your artwork. [00:29:44] Connie Zheng: Thank you. Yeah this has been really lovely and thank you for your time and your attention. [00:29:50] Jalena Keane-Lee: Next up, listen to turn you by Rocky Rivera. MUSIC [00:29:53] Jalena Keane-Lee: That was turn you by Rocky Rivera. [00:32:53] Miko Lee: You're tuned into APEX express on 94.1 K PFA and 89.3 KPFB in Berkeley and online@kpfa.org. Welcome to Apex Express Macro Waves. I'm so excited to talk with you all. You are a locally based creative collective and you create interactive pieces that are around conceptual art, new media, and design. Welcome Robin Bird David, Dominic Cheng, and Jeffrey Yip to Apex Express. [00:33:25] Dominic Cheng: Thanks for having us. [00:33:26] Robin Birdd David: Glad to be here. [00:33:29] Miko Lee: Can I just start with each of you, because we have three different important voices. Can I start with each of you telling me who you are, who are your people, and what legacy do you carry from them? [00:33:45] Robin Birdd David: My name is Robin Bird David. I go by she, they, and that's a big question. I don't think we've ever been asked that question. I think it's an important one. Specifically there's five of us technically in the collective. There's three of us today, who are working on our current project that's coming up with CMAC and Edge on the Square. The collective also includes Tina Kashiwagi and Anam Awan but they are not here today. Specifically with us three, we're all born and raised in the Bay Area, Asian American second generation. So I think that holds an important aspect of the communities we serve. We've been doing a lot of work around stories of different generations of migration, the diaspora particularly with Filipino American, Chinese American we've done work around Japanese American stories, intergenerational stories. So I'll leave it there and pass it along to Dominic. [00:34:50] Dominic Cheng: For the most part. We represent our collective, which is mostly Asian American and Pan Asian artists. All of us come from different backgrounds of art practice. we really strive to collaborate and share our skills and our different experiences and really tried to build upon work that isn't necessarily representative of one single individual. And it's more centered around our collective experience and so as My collective mate Robin had mentioned we do a lot of work that's really introspective and looking at our ancestry as Asians in America or Asian Americans in America. We really try to focus a lot on exploring intergenerational experiences and issues, a lot of trauma and healing that we try to integrate with a lot of the work that we're producing. And that's what brings us here today to the project that we are creating as part of the Under the Sun Festival. [00:35:57] Miko Lee: So Jeffrey, who are your people and what legacy do you carry from them? [00:36:06] Jeffrey Yip: When I think of my people, I think of family. How I identify in general is for my upbringing, for my family and all the arguments I've had all the kind of love that was shown to me. I think as you get older, you start to have chosen family, right? Macrowaves we consider ourselves a family and I consider them my chosen family. Our broader community folks, there's so many people, there's so much love , in the Bay Area and specific being the creative kind of scene. Our legacy is we all have something to share in this world, right? As a collective, we've learned that we all bring something special to the table. We highlight our kind of like strengths. We do what we can to help each other. As a collective, we also do that in the broader kind of communities. It's like we, we have something to share. We mentioned this before, is like a collaboration and bring people on board and get to know people, build community, and like grassroots kind of way. [00:37:08] Miko Lee: So thank you for that. [00:37:12] Robin Birdd David: The reason why Macwaves got together in the first place was because we were really craving a place for people of color. Queer folks to come together to have a safe space to create artwork together. That was really removed from the competitive nature that is often in art spaces, as we know, like art within capitalism and within the society, it builds this structure of you're competing for grants or for residencies. The people that we want to serve and the people that we build with are other artists, queer people of color artists to really create a space where we can build and share resources and skills to create work together rather than to be competing. So that's something that we emphasize in our work. I think the Bay Area holds a special place as a place where a lot of revolution has happened, a lot of community building has happened in the Bay Area for people of color, for marginalized communities. I think that is a legacy we hope to carry as we continue to do this collective work. [00:38:16] Miko Lee: That's so great. Can you talk a little bit more about how you came to be, how your collective came into fruition? [00:38:23] Robin Birdd David: Yeah, that's a good question. Jeffrey and I attended San Francisco State together and we met in a cybernetics new media art class. We were craving a space that wasn't so white focus and wasn't so white wall focus. My background is in painting and Jeff was in the program for new media. We felt that there was this divide of either like the fine arts world, which was a very like white wall space. Then there was the art and technology spaces, which also felt white. There was just a specific type of artists and community that came along with both those spaces and us being people of color, Asian, and growing up in the Bay area. I felt like I didn't necessarily belong in those spaces at the time. We decided why don't we do our own thing? So we started doing these one day events, art experiences parties where we would do like installations and have like DJs and performers and chefs come and we would do this whole experience where like different senses were activated. That's how we started and it just formed naturally. [00:39:35] Miko Lee: So it started out Robin, you, and Jeffrey, and then you've grown to add more people? [00:39:40] Robin Birdd David: Yes, we started in the ideating phases, and then we brought in other folks, like Dominic, to come help and create these one day experiences. Then from there, the folks who were collaborating with us, we naturally formed into a collective. [00:39:56] Miko Lee: Does each artist play a specific role? How do you interact with each other? [00:40:01] Dominic Cheng: I think one of the things that we've felt really special about being in a collective is that we bring different strengths, but it doesn't necessarily dictate like what we can and cannot do in the collective. There's a lot of responsibilities with a lot of the organization, a lot of the finances, but then there's also the responsibility of developing concepts and like refining what approach we want to take towards making installation or an experience. I think organically we have developed concepts for our projects collectively. Some folks tend to take lead on some ideas and others follow and provide support, which is always I think something that has been really uplifting for us is to not really. Think about it from like an individualized perspective where one singular artist needs to do every single thing on their own. That really opened up a lot of opportunities for us as creatives and artists to think beyond what we individually can create and really honing in on the resources and the creative like experiences and techniques that other folks bring to the table. [00:41:14] Miko Lee: So macro waves focuses around future ancestry intergenerational experiences and collective healing. How does this relate to the Under the same sun, reimagining collective liberation from the edges of Chinatown, which is the theme of this year's second annual festival. [00:41:33] Dominic Cheng: We have been a collective since 2015. A lot of the work that we have been doing has been centered around storytelling and exploring our ancestry through a lot of experiences that we've encountered between us and our parents or us and our grandparents or others. Us and folks that are probably not an ancestor quite just yet. We have always been fascinated in utilizing that area as like a point of adventure as a place for us to explore ideas outside of conventional storytelling. We have been creating works specifically looking at how trauma has been passed along through cultures of just brushing things under the rug, or how those types of experiences can really build up a like a hard shell for folks to really break through and to heal. We've also been doing work that has been exploring some of the experiences that we all share like today especially through the pandemic [00:42:38] Miko Lee: How does the theme of Under the Same Sun make you feel and what does it inspire in you all as a collective? [00:42:46] Robin Birdd David: So MacroWave's coming together in the first place. Is really reimagining art practice like collective work. In this case collective care, which is what our project focuses on. We're really interested in including other communities in our work. We did a project called alternate realm in SF Chinatown, where we interviewed shop owners during the pandemic when a lot of the restaurants and businesses were closed down and we're only doing takeout. And so we saw an area where we could. Utilize our work to help small businesses out. And so we interviewed these small these business owners about their experiences around alters and specifically Qingming And we asked them how did their rest or their business restaurant shop start and what are your alters that you have at home. Through these interviews, we collaborate with other artists outside of the collective to create augmented reality alters that became a walking tour that communities can experience through their cell phones or iPads. And so really just like bringing. outside communities that are not necessarily in the art scene to experience what other people are doing in the community and how do we bridge the gap between different generations of people and continue this legacy of storytelling and to learn more about in this particular project, more about like our Asian community and the diaspora and how they were able to start a business in the first place. [00:44:27] Miko Lee: I really appreciated those short videos about Qingming and just getting to hear from a shopkeeper's perspective about what the things they're burning for their ancestors. I think about that a lot when I'm doing Qingming with my family. So I appreciate that there's this video that's there on the internet will just last, but then you had this temporary piece with where you would go and scan a QR code. Is that right? [00:44:53] Dominic Cheng: Yeah, part of this. That project really involved us really capturing the stories of these local businesses who are not just only struggling financially and economically to survive, but they were also like experiencing heightened like violence in their communities and xenophobia. And this was like during a time where we felt that. It was important for us to open up this project as a platform for other creatives, other artists who identify as Asians to create a digital offering, like a digital art altar offering to each business in response to the stories that they were hearing [00:45:33] Miko Lee: Jeffrey, can you talk about the piece that you're going to be showing at the exhibit coming up for under the same sun? [00:45:43] Jeffrey Yip: Yeah it's a huge project and we've been conceptualizing for about two years now. It's Actually a culmination of the work that we have been doing. In 2000, I think 17 or 16, we started creating like healing spaces. One of which was like Protectural Voyager, which showed at SoMa Arts. It was this geodesic dome and there was like healing feedback sensors attached to it. There was like one that could read your brain. A brain wave reader and what was a heart wave reader. We're inviting folks to meditate inside this dome and when they we're at a calmer state, then the visuals will be more meditative and encourage meditation. We've created a number of these kind of like healing spaces and exhibitions. Collective futures is the one that we're going to be showing at this festival this year. Idea is around community care, collective care and also questioning the idea of self care and self care is important and we all need self care and sometimes that can get caught up in Western individualism and I think it is important to have that delineation and emphasize the the collective care because because you can't do everything by ourselves. We need community. We need family members. We need people to show up for each other. [00:46:59] Robin Birdd David: Our piece is called collective futures. Our installation is a critique about self care and coming out of shelter in place. We were encouraged to take care of ourselves, but also as a means to be productive and to get back out there and to work. it's like what Jeff mentioned is really important, but there needs to be a shift to like community care like how do we take care of ourselves. If institutions aren't are not working if certain systems are not working, how can the community show up for each other and I think that. Under the Same Sun is an example of this collective experience of coming together to reimagine new ways of experiencing art and really integrating and bringing together different communities outside of Chinatown, into Chinatown bringing other migrant, people of color communities who all have similar ways of showing up and caring for each other rather than being segregated Into like different communities by ethnic groups, but like, how do we come together? [00:48:04] Miko Lee: Jeff. If I walk into Edge on the Square, what do I see? [00:48:10] Jeffrey Yip: If you walked into Edge on the Square, you would see a mound full of moss. We're inviting people to come and sit down on and in the middle of that mound, there's going to be like a bowl of water that will be vibrating and the whole platform is actually vibrant. So we're inviting participants to come on and feel these vibrations that are being produced by the sound artists that we're inviting to, to provide sound. On these platforms, there are transducers that essentially work like speakers, but instead of pushing air out of the cone, they vibrate . And so basically that's essentially what this project's about. We'll be like having a platform building a platform that will be vibrating. So there'll be like a, like a sound installation that will vibrate the same frequencies into the platform. And so there's this idea called a vibroacoustic therapy. And it's the idea that like. under certain vibrations that can be a healing thing, right? And so we're inviting folks to come on this platform and all vibrate on the same wavelength and essentially just have the intention to heal. And I think a lot of times with these healing spaces, we're not like, Oh yeah, these spaces are going to heal you. It's more it's more so like we're inviting to people with to come in with the intention to heal because I don't identify as a healer, but I feel like we all can do the work to heal ourselves. [00:49:31] Miko Lee: Where is your piece going to How can people find it? [00:49:36] Robin Birdd David: Collective Futures installation can be found in the Edge on the Square gallery space. It is part of the gallery exhibition that will be up, till next year, June. And the location is 800 Grant Avenue in San Francisco, Chinatown. The nature of the installation is really about collaboration. We're inviting other collaborators to come in to either create sound performances where the sound performance connects to the vibration. On this installation can feel can physically feel the music being played at the same time. We also are inviting other healing practitioners, we're hoping to invite a Tai Chi instructor to host a class, maybe with different, with elders, with different community members in Chinatown to be able to utilize the platform in different ways. [00:50:35] Dominic Cheng: We wanted to create a platform as a means of opening up dialogue about other community engagement opportunities. Some of the folks that we have been interested in is cone shaped top, which is arts and culture space based in Oakland that has been doing a lot of work opening up space for a new emerging sound artists to have a space to perform and just to share music and be in community with each other. [00:51:01] Robin Birdd David: Cone Shaped Top will be collaborating with us for the opening of Under the Same Sun Festival on September 30th. They will be hosting a series of other sound and performance based artists that will perform live for the festival. So we're really excited about that and to really kick off this installation where throughout the year, the rest of the year and next year, we'll be able to collaborate with other community folks. [00:51:28] Miko Lee: That is very exciting. Jeffrey Yip, what do you want audiences to feel? [00:51:35] Jeffrey Yip: Everybody's gonna have a different experience, right? I personally want to start with telling somebody how they should experience the work, like I really do feel like everybody's going to come in with a unique perspective. The way that they'll experience it will be new to themselves because for me part of the art right is the experience within the individual, and that's what they're bringing to the table. It's a almost a collaboration with the participants as well because they bring their unique experience to it and you know maybe they'll share some share the experience with somebody else and there might be similarities but they'll have a unique experience. Ultimately I would say a sense of togetherness and community. That would be ideal. [00:52:19] Miko Lee: What about you, Robin and Dominic, what do you want the audience to feel when they leave your exhibition? [00:52:28] Robin Birdd David: The concept behind collective futures really comes from that feeling that we had in the pandemic where we were actually able to take a break. The concept of self care, even though it existed already, was there was a hyper focus on self care, and whatever the care is that people needed, it was obvious that we all needed a break and we needed space from capitalism from the day to day work and hustle and bustle, and so this installation really is a nod to that. It's wait a minute, how we take a step back and think about like how do we show collective care? How do we show up for each other? How do we care for ourselves? In a way that I don't know if we really got to the We never really got to the root of the problem since we came back from COVID, even though COVID still exists. We never really figured that part out. Like here we are still continuing to hustle and continue the work which is all important. I'm hoping that people who experience our installation will be reminded of I need to rest and it's okay to take a break. It's okay to pause and it's okay to just lay here and be still and be okay with where they are in their lives, where we are in our lives. [00:53:47] Dominic Cheng: Building on to that, I really do think that one of the hopes that I have is for folks to come to this leaving with just more interest in exploring collective care. It's important to not just only continue to do the work of living day to day and trying to survive, but really to take those moments of rest and really to seek out opportunities to provide community collective care. It has to be a constant and it can't just be, like, a one time thing. That's what we're really hoping for folks to do is to really be moved by the collective experience that they share with. Either folks that they bring together with them to the space and to the installation or for folks that they meet and connect with organically just throughout their visit. [00:54:37] Miko Lee: What are you looking forward to at this whole event that's happening? Will all of you stay with your piece or will you get to wander around and experience the other events that are happening? [00:54:49] Robin Birdd David: That's a good question. I'm hoping we'll be able to experience the events. That's also my birthday. So I'm hoping to be able to celebrate, see folks I haven't seen in a long time in the community, and to learn about other artists work and to be able To also explore Chinatown as the way that the festival is, was designed to be able to support small businesses. And then also to be able to collaborate with Cone Shaped Top is such an honor and something that we've wanted to do for so long. [00:55:19] Dominic Cheng: I'm excited to just support other artists who are activating like different parts of the festival. I had attended last year's festival the inaugural festival and was really amazed and really moved by the ways in which folks were taking up taking up space in like public areas through art and were sharing different stories in different parts of the entire Chinatown neighborhood. That was really exciting for me to experience the first time and I'm hoping to experience that and something new this time around. [00:56:01] Miko Lee: What about you, Jeffrey? What are you looking forward to? [00:56:07] Jeffrey Yip: I echo everything they both said. I think being a spectator and experiencing What these other creatives are showcasing. I know Kim Ip is going to do a performance. I'm excited about that. TNT Tricycle is going to be there. Maybe I'll sing a song I know there is going to be a lot of great stuff. There's going to be the canto pop. I'm excited for that as well. So maybe dance a little bit in the street. , I think that would be nice. it'll be really good for me and Jeff to brush up on our Cantonese through dancing to canto pop DJ music. [00:56:43] Miko Lee: Okay, and we will just look forward to seeing you all dancing in the procession, which is going to be lion dance and then Duniya dance all the way around the block. So you can do a little Bollywood, a little lion dance. Thank you so much Macro Waves Collective for joining me on Apex Express. I hope people can get out in the streets and see this amazing artwork going down the end of the month, September 30th. Thank you all for joining me. [00:57:08] Robin Birdd David: Thank you so much for having us. [00:57:10] Dominic Cheng: Thank you so much Miko. [00:57:14] Miko Lee: Thank you so much for joining us. Please check out our website, kpfa.org backslash program, backslash apex express 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. [00:57:39] Miko Lee: Apex express is a proud member of the AACRE network. Asian-Americans for civil rights and equality. Find out more at aacre.org. Apex express is produced by me. Miko Lee. Along with Paige Chung, Jalena Keane-Lee, Preeti Mangala Shekar, Anuj Vaida. Kiki Rivera, Swati Rayasam, Nate Tan, Hieu Nguyen and Cheryl Truong tonight's show is produced by me Miko thank you so much to the team at kpfa for their support have a great Night. The post APEX Express – 9.7.23 – Under the Same Sun appeared first on KPFA.

This is the All Local 4pm update for September 5, 2023

Sherry Kong is the co-founder of Mama Kong, a nomadic kitchen cooking up Cambodian food with her husband, Brandon since 2017. Her family immigrated to Austin in 1982 after fleeing the war in Cambodia. After teaching in Japan and New York's Chinatown, she nad her husband decided to reset the button on life, move back home and introduce Austinites to Cambodian food. She trained and cooked with her mom every week until she mastered  the recipes she grew up eating. You can find them at pop-ups, festivals and organizing private dinners / supper clubs. They're constantly introducing people to Cambodian food and exploring ways to curate special connections that revolve around deliciousness, positivity and shared experiences. Topics covered: •  Her family owning a donut shop in Round Rock and Cambodian's relationships to Donut Shops in the U.S.•  Learning recipes with her mom and sharing what makes Cambodian cuisine unique from other Asian cuisines.•  Curating the first menu for Mama Kong Cambodia's first pop up and the menus that follow. •  Perspectives on owning a brick and mortar location.•  Running Mama Kong with her husband, their strengths and weaknesses, and importance of allyship. •  Early memories of the Austin Cambodian Community and their reception to Mama Kong•  The differences between our parents generation vs our generation's relationship to eating out •  Future aspirations with Mama Kong, perspectives on owning a brick and mortar and what success looks like.Referenced materials in this episode: Mama Kong Cambodian Website ; InstagramThe Donut King DocumentaryEmma Long Metro ParkTan My Restaurant, Din Ho Chinese BBQ Restaurant 

For today's 'On Location' episode, we're exploring San Francisco in the most iconic way possible. San Francisco's cable cars are not only the first in the world – invented here in 1873 – they are also the last. And though they travel at a mere 9.5mph, with the wind in your hair, the bells ringing and track rattling, it feels more like a roller coaster tour of the city than anything else on the road.  Join us for a whirlwind journey, recorded on location, celebrating 150 years and counting of San Francisco's cable cars. As we travel, we're going to stop off at the highlights along the line, revealing the story of the city from its Gold Rush roots to the creativity and diversity that defines it to this day. We'll meet Val Lupiz, a legendary ‘gripman', or cable car operator, for a lesson on what it takes to drive an actual 150-year-old antique. We'll find a hidden music studio above a gift shop in Chinatown, and listen to a performance of a GuZheng, a more than 2,000-year-old traditional Chinese instrument. We'll eat fresh seafood in one of the oldest restaurants in Fisherman's Wharf, drink Mai Tai's during an indoor monsoon at the Tonga Room, listen to an impromptu poetry recital about cable cars, on the cable car itself, and lots more. Recorded on-location, this audio adventure is designed to do more than just let you hear what it's like to be there; it's designed to let you feel what it's like for real. For more information on how you can explore San Francisco for yourself, visit sftravel.com. Thank you to everyone who featured on this show: -       Val Lupiz, Cable Car Museum -       Gimmy Park Li, Wok Wiz Walking Tours -       Fang-Li (and students Katie and Catherine), Shangri-La Gifts -       Josh and Michelle, Fairmont Hotel and Tonga Room -       Tom Creedon, Scomas Restaurant -       James Morehead, Viewless Wings, Viewless Wings Poetry Podcast This show was produced by Armchair Productions, the audio experts for the travel industry. Find out about all our shows at armchair-productions.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Can you believe it?? We won a Golden Crane Award for Best Wellness/Self-Improvement Podcast from the Asian American Podcasters Association. It was an INCREDIBLE event in Chinatown, New York City!The very loved Leslie Page is back on the podcast! Today she offers beautiful encouragement and experiential insights from her journey through illness and healing. Leslie just celebrated her 8th ReBirthday! I think you will be so touched to hear her story, as we all link arms to support each other through illness and medical treatments - whether that's for yourself or for someone whom you love. Much love and healing wishes, Leslie Page is a professional singer, songwriter and music and dance teacher. Her life experiences resonate in the timbre of her rich and sultry tone. Her career as a vocalist spans over 20 years singing with the the likes of legendary guitar player, Joe Walsh (The Eagles) Ringo Starr, Keith Urban, Vince Gill, Billy Gibbons, Rick Springfield, Zack Brown Band, Gary Clark Jr, Hunter Hayes, Brad Paisley, Luke Bryan, Peaches and Herb, Richard Marx, Paul Rogers (Bad Company) and many more. Ways to Connect with Leslie Page (she/her):Instagram/YouTube/Facebook/etc: @lesliepagemusicHer website: https://www.lesliepage.comWays to connect with Sas (she/her):Instagram: @lori_saseSign up for her newsletter or find out about coaching: https://www.lorisase.comThe Imaginal Podcast - Other Episodes With Leslie Page51: How Your Hard Times Can Help Others66: When You Have Self-Esteem But You Still Have Fear, Part 167: When You Have Self-Esteem But You Still Have Fear, Part 270: How Moving Through Fear Can Be Empowering and Life-Changing71: Moving Through Fear - What's the Worst Thing That Could Happen (Get Ready to Laugh!)?89: How Is People Please Affecting You? 90: The Cost of People Pleasing and How to Avoid It97: Exploring Your Gifts and Contributing Them To The World98: What Might Hold You Back From Sharing Your Gifts? 99: Does Confirmation Bias Play a Role in the Ways You See Yourself? LinksBe The MatchWe Delete Blood CancerStory About Leslie's Friend Donating Stem CellsEp 83: Falling More In Love With Your Body With Alison M. ScottSupport the show

Wow is all I can say about our guest in this episode, Suzanne Jean. Suzanne has spent more than 50 years in the social services arena. Much of that time has been creating and promoting a program called PowerED. She is the Director of Fit4Defense Consulting Ltd which is her springboard for bringing PowerED into schools and classrooms.   As Suzanne will tell us, bullying, especially of children, is significantly on the rise. She has reasons for this increase and will illustrate what is happening in our society that permits this to happen.   I believe this episode of Unstoppable Mindset is one of the most powerful ones I have had the privilege to conduct. Enough from me. I hope you will listen to Suzanne and take her observations and lessons to heart.     About the Guest:   Bullying Stops Here Bullying hurts! It is not merely physical aggression but includes persistent disparaging condescending, demeaning comments and behaviors that cause physical and mental anguish to others. The harm and costs are well documented, examples are illness, addiction, suicide, anxiety, depression, unemployment, and domestic violence. Under the umbrella of Fit4Defense, PowerEd classes work to help children, youth, adults, and seniors build a sense of confidence and self-worth through a variety of discussions, exercises, and self-defense techniques. The 4 in Fit4Defense's name represents "the four As," and this forms the pillars of the program. This training examines how attention, awareness, avoidance, and action can help people to break through self-imposed limitations and habits. Attention: It's about tuning in to the here and now. Observing others and the environment around you. Expanding perception and mindfulness. Awareness: Self-study-discovering what do you believe, feel, need, and want? Gaining skills to effectively communicate this. Feeling seen, heard, valued, and safe. Loving yourself and caring for others. Avoidance: Taking steps to stay safe, not only physically but emotionally. Action: The last resort, is to defend yourself if you are bullied or threatened. How do you stop bullying? You become 100% responsible for your feelings, thoughts, and behaviors and learn how to communicate them assertively   Ways to connect with Milam:   Website and Programs Offered: https://www.fit4defense.ca     About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app.   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.     Transcription Notes Michael Hingson ** 00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.   Michael Hingson ** 01:21 Well, hello once again, and welcome to unstoppable mindset where inclusion diversity in the unexpected meet. And as I always love to say the unexpected is the fun part about it. And I just learned how unexpected this is. I told her I was going to do this. Our guest today is Suzanne Jean who was on vacation in Maui. Can you believe it? Geez. And we didn't get invited along. And neither did any of you. I think that this is something that we need to discuss in some way. But Suzanne, seriously, welcome to unstoppable mindset. We're really glad you're here and that you took the time to do this on a vacation.   Suzanne Jean ** 01:56 Oh, thank you my call and only for you when I get off the beach.   Michael Hingson ** 02:02 You couldn't have to be here. You couldn't have taken the laptop down and done it from the beach. Now there'd be too much surf. Well, well, yeah. Yeah. gotta you gotta do. Got to do what you got to do, right? I think you're the first person that I least recall, who has talked to us from Hawaii. If there's been someone else, I don't recall it. But Well, I'm glad you're having a good vacation over there. And you're in a wonderful place for it. So that's cool. Yeah. Well, tell us a little bit about you kind of as, as I described, I would ask sort of the early Suzanne growing up, what it was like being a kid or what anything like that, that you want to tell us so that we get to know you a little better.   Suzanne Jean ** 02:48 Well, the earliest is and growing up, it was pretty hyperactive, pretty busy girl, always moving. And it was quite interesting. Because I was living in Montreal, I am from Canada, and that's on the east coast of Canada. And I wasn't getting a lot of sleep. And my doctor said you have two choices, you have something called ADHD. And I'm gonna give you two choices. You either go on medication, or you take Tai Chi. And I went no, not Tai Chi, because I had seen people doing this very slow exercise. And I was very hyper. So not wanting to go on medication, I agreed to go down and check it out. And so I went to a Tai Chi class and I hated it. It's the very slow movement. But this woman said to me, Hey, after class, we all go to Chinatown and have a big feast. And it's only like 250 a person don't want to come and I said Now we're talking. So I had some motivation to go back to Tai Chi. And I I found it really did help me and helped me relaxed my metabolism. And it was the first beginnings of being mindful. And fast forward. I came to Vancouver and I went to find a Tai Chi teacher because now this is my, this is my prescription. I and I met this Tai Chi teacher and he said, Why are you doing tai chi? And they said, Because I you know, it's good for me. I'm, it's good for for my well being. And he said, No, you need to come to karate. And I said karate, I don't want to do karate and he said absolutely. You're born to do karate. He said, Come on over. So I said, I'll come to one class. He was also a tai chi. He was a Tai Chi teacher and he was just teaching Tai Chi to to make money to do while he was doing his PhD. So I went to his karate class and I never I walked out the door and bought my GI and I have never stopped. And I am now I just had my 70th birthday. So I've been doing martial arts since I was about 17. When did you move? Oh, go ahead. I continue to do Tai Chi.   Michael Hingson ** 05:18 Good for you, you know, stay loyal? Yes. When did you move to Vancouver,   Suzanne Jean ** 05:25 early 70s. So I moved to Vancouver, and I'm in social services. So I have about 5060 years of community based social service background. And I was working with at risk youth. And I was noticing that we were criminalizing their behavior that the caregivers, people working with these kids couldn't deal with the aggression and the anger and some of those behaviors. And rather than learn how to deal with that conflict, they were just, you know, putting them in jail, they were ending up. And then it's a vicious circle. So I began to become interested in how perhaps I could use martial arts and Self Defense in a way to give those workers more a feeling of security around those kinds of behaviors. And so I began to work doing that kind of de escalation training, and it was quite successful. And I, I began to see how I could build confidence quite quickly, through self defense. So that was the first seeds of realizing that there is some real power here. Because with with the dynamics of bullying, and aggression, and any kind of aggression, it's fundamentally a study of power. And when you can teach self defense and the pillars of the program as they evolved, you can see real substantial change in terms of, you know, giving youth and children insights into their strengths, and their unique qualities and their abilities to be safe. And so it kind of grew from there. I have written a book and and the first chapter of the book, there's a very interesting story, because I was teaching self defense to women, as well as and studying martial arts quite seriously. And I got a call one day, and it was from a woman and she said, your name Suzanne. I said, Yes. She said, I heard on the street that you're okay. And I said, really? No. Yeah, I said, and she says, I'm a sixth grade worker, and we're in trouble. There's a serial killer. And two of my friends have been murdered. And we need self defense. And I, and this took really took me aback, right. I was like, what? And she said, Will you teach us and I said, Well, I'll agree to meet with you, and see if that would be viable. I have no idea at this point. And so she set up a meeting and the meeting was at two in the morning at a restaurant, and I arrived, and there were 50 women showed up for the meeting, in the middle of the night. And we chatted and I had no idea if I you know, I've never done anything like this before. They had no idea. But I wanted to help them. Because they were so sincere. And I said, Look, there's we'll give it a go. I said there's three conditions you show up and you're not wasted on drugs and alcohol, you know, you're in good, fairly good shape, you show up, and that you just give it 100% You give it everything you have. So the woman, Rhonda, the the woman who was organizing the whole thing said, I know the minister at the church, and I'm sure he'll let us practice there. And I think the classes should be 730 in the morning before we go to bed after work. So I was like, again, just like okay, so mostly they could meet the condition of giving it everything but you know, they would come off their shifts, or they were and it was amazing. And to see the sentence of To see the change in them to see them grow, to start to recognize the community and support each other. And realize, you know, if a car if if Sunland felt the car was unsafe to get into, they would they wouldn't do it. They started learning the moves. And it was a remarkable learning experience for me, I was just so impressed with that. It's at least   Michael Hingson ** 10:32 good that they, they did it at a fairly decent hour in the morning, but before they went to bed, that's pretty cool. But 730 In the morning, better than 2am Every day, I'll say. But by the same token, I can see what you're saying that you are teaching them self defense. And probably a lot of them, maybe most of them felt somewhat defenseless right from the outset. And so you are instilling a lot of confidence in these women where they didn't have it before.   Suzanne Jean ** 11:07 Mm hmm. Absolutely. And so as my program, my program is called power, and as I said, you know, it is it is a study of power. And there's four pillars to the program. And the first pillar is attention. And that's around tuning into the here and now and really observing yourself observing others observing the environment around you. And the you know, as they say, where your attention goes, your energy flows, so much of, for young people, so much of the world is in this little box, right? It's in social media, it's on telephones, it's gaming, it's on computers. And they're not looking at words, they're not looking at each other. In, in a way, that's when I saw when I do these classes, and we have discussions, they think it's rocket science, Oh, can we do that, again, that was really great. No, we're just we're having a conversation. But if you think about their world, that kind of attention is not something that's, that's common. It's not common. And part of that also, what I teach is being able to recognize LOA allies and people that can support you in your life. The second pillar is really the heart and soul. And that's awareness. And that is building self study, bringing people to recognize what they truly believe and feel and what they want. And then having the skills gaining the skills to be able to communicate it. So in order to force somebody to say no to getting into a car, right, that could be a threat to them to their lives, they have to care about themselves, they have to take that step where I do care about myself, and I'm not going to take that chance. So having that awareness and that self love loving yourself loving others, that piece is all about the self awareness pillar. So this is not, you know, you think of self defense, you just think of the physical, and I take it to a whole different level, I take self defense to a whole different level, a psychological level. The fourth, the third pillar is avoidance. And that's all the things you do to stay safe. And again, it ties into attention, recognizing what those things are, but and not not safety just from a physical but from a most emotional. So kids do learn street smarts, and they learn that sort of thing. But then they learn a little bit more about how to set boundaries for themselves, how to be emotionally safe. And in the way the awareness piece helps them to communicate that to others and set those boundaries with other people. And then the final one is the action piece. So that's where they have the skills to defend themselves physically and emotionally. If they're bullied or they're threatened. And the action piece is doesn't stop again, with just the physical, it moves into being able to make good choices and good decisions for yourself. So all those four pillars kind of are they're interrelated. But they support they support it pretty good mindset. So the program the classes themselves, involve physical self defense. discussions, self awareness exercises, perception exercises mindfulness, and physical, you know, games, they're pretty well rounded, because it has to be fun, I'm not going to get children and youth doing this unless it's really fun.   Michael Hingson ** 15:18 You mentioned before about the fact that a lot of their behaviors, over the years have become more criminalized and so on. Do you think that the behavior of children and younger people has actually grown worse? Or a relatively speaking or that people perceive that it has? Or is that really something that's happening, much less the fact that now we don't want to deal with it, we just send them off to jail?   Suzanne Jean ** 15:50 Yeah, I think there's elements that really, that make it a little more extreme, like get the gang thing. I mean, we all want a sense of belonging. And if kids can, in a really nurturing community and a healthy community, they're going to find a sense of belonging somewhere else, and the gang is a is a perfect place for it. And so, you know, my job is to really try to prevent, to teach them how to how to have that sense of community without needing to go to those places. And we have to talk to kids, we have to talk to her children. And, you know, sometimes I'm criticize, or you're opening these cans of worms, you're talking about these subjects, you know, sexual abuse and these subjects that we shouldn't be talking about suicide, and I said, No, we need to talk about these things. And we need to talk about how we can feel different, like how we can feel better about ourselves. And so those, that's where they really do appreciate those discussions, you know, because they'll say, Oh, I didn't know, anybody else felt like that. Because they're not texting and you feel like, oh, that's how I feel, right? This is important to know that, you know, or if I do this, it hurts. And what does that feel like? And why do you want to hurt somebody? Right?   Michael Hingson ** 17:20 That's so much of we're losing in the whole art of conversation, I've read articles about how we're, even as adults, forgetting the art of conversation, and we go way out on power trips, and other things like that we don't talk, we don't discuss feelings at all. That doesn't mean that every other sentence has to be about how we feel. But we really should do a lot more conversing and interacting and true engaging than we tend to do these days.   Suzanne Jean ** 17:55 And I'll just do simple lead ins to that, like, I have a sheet of all these feelings, and I'll do what I call a parent shear, where I say, Pick somebody you don't know, and, and choose a feeling of fear that you felt recently and tell another person about when you felt it and why. And that's the exercise. And they love it. Because they're talking about themselves. Right. And it's the lead in for me, obviously, to go into anger and teaching them about anger. Which, you know, again, leads into aggression and violence. And understanding that, and so you're right, it's a wonderful opportunity to bring get to and, you know, I think, for sure, Zoom has brought us all together and certainly through the terrible time of COVID. But having face to face having kids face to face, is where it needs to happen. And the physical self defense obviously has to be   Michael Hingson ** 19:00 tastefully physical, right? But even with Zoom, there are a lot of opportunities to augment the process, although it's not quite the same as physically being there, but you can do a lot with Zoom. You certainly can't do with texting.   Suzanne Jean ** 19:18 Yeah, for sure. For sure. But it is, yeah, it's those groups that I can really build the awareness in.   Michael Hingson ** 19:29 Well, age wise, you and I are pretty similar. I'm three years ahead of you. So not much, but we came up in went to school in the same general era. So one of the things that it seems to me we are facing a lot more now is this whole issue of bullying. I don't remember even being a blind kid in school. Ever been a real victim of bullying? I think there was was one time when one kid did but I never really found that was an issue and I never heard about it growing up. And although I wasn't in the big city, but still, I think I hear about it a lot more. Was your experience the same? And if so, why is it that it is so much more an issue? Or why are we seeing so much more bullying today?   Suzanne Jean ** 20:19 I think it's because we don't have healthy, self confident, confident kids who really know who they are. And, you know, they don't, they don't can't describe their values, they they're uncertain about their strengths are so much I, I pick up so much fear, and so much uncertainty and kids today, they don't, they don't believe the world is gonna, you know, they, the climate change, and all of these different things are a major factor for them in terms of their security. And I think that, out of that comes this this easy place to just put down others to feel better, you know, in any kinds of differences.   Michael Hingson ** 21:07 Yeah, because we, we don't have support systems like we used to, I remember growing up talking with, with other kids. And even more important, talking with my parents, and we talked about feelings, we talked about any issues that we felt sometimes we were a little reluctant, as kids are with parents, but still, our parents knew how to bring things out of us and really have those discussions. And there's so many reasons why it doesn't happen today. How do you get parents to deal with that with kids? Because as you said, the problem is all too often now we criminalize things. And parents haven't really learned that they need to deal with creating more self confident kids. How do we deal with that?   Suzanne Jean ** 22:01 Well, we've got to give them more time. I think that one of the things that, you know, if you look at families, and you look at all the commitments, and two working parents and all the pressures, there's a lot of latchkey kids, that are just coming home, and there's nobody there. And they need to be listened to. And often they don't even want you to solve anything, they just want you to listen, right? But if there's nobody there to listen, I'm very adamant that we have to address conflict and bullying in the schools in the communities. And we have to say, Well, why don't you just say, No, we have to take a stance. I mean, it is a World Health Organization, major issue, now they've declared it, it is so prevalent compared to when you and I were were young. And I think if you don't take a stand and you don't deal with it, then it's just gonna continue. And I believe that it has to be everybody on the same page coming together. Because it's so it's so often people don't want to deal with conflict. And if you can teach people how to steps to deal with conflict in a way that's really positive and has an amazing positive outcome, then they're more apt to try to do it the next time. Right? Right. But if everybody just turns their head, I mean, as there's another story in my book, this was in Canada, um, this boy was being seriously bullied at school and the teachers knew the principal's knew. The parents knew, and they did nothing. And he, his mum arrived at school in time to see him being murdered. And everybody went, right. But there was no intervention. And all of those people, including those boys had, that were bullying needed to be part of something to make that difference. Because a life was taken. And yeah, it's pretty that's an extreme case, but it happens in so many ways. One of the things with the kids, I do this exercise, Michael, and it is the most amazing, I do it in the first session. And I divide the group into three, and they have a big piece of paper and they answer the question, what is bullying? Why do kids bully and what can be done about bullying? And they and the papers moved from person to person, right? So all three groups get to answer all the questions and then they choose somebody to report that. Well, this is the first time that the bully and the bullied are sitting side by side and it's all are often the first time that the bully gets to see what other kids think of them. And they're described as weak as having problems. Problems at home, as like, you know, how. And you I, as an instructor, I can just tell which, which kids or which, right that looks on their faces. Because they don't, they've never seen them that other kids saw them that way. So I, my daughter is an instructor in in a middle elementary school. And she said, Mom, I really want you to come and do this program with me because there's a kid in the program, and he's, he's a real bully. And he's a problem. And they're say, he's going to ruin the class. I'm not, and I don't have the skills to deal with his behavior. So I'd love it if you did it with me. And I said, Absolutely, I'll do. So yeah, the principal and all the teachers had nothing but terrible things to say about this kid. I call them Johnny in the book. And we were doing this exercise. What is it really? Why do people believe what can you do bubbling? And little, this other kid, I was in the group with Johnny. And this other kid looked at me, and he said, you know, you're a bully, don't Johnny. And I thought, oh, here we go. He's gonna escalate. You know, we're gonna have a big scene now. And Johnny looked at me said, I know, but I don't want to be. And my heart just broke. And it was like, after this exercise, he made a 360 change. And he was, because he just saw it. He saw how I love   Michael Hingson ** 26:45 me. But why did he bully in the first place? Oh, he had?   Suzanne Jean ** 26:49 Yeah. The usual has, he was beaten? At home. Right? Yeah, that's, that's how you solve problems. You just hit somebody. But he had never, he had never had positive attention. So he happened to be he was a little Irish boy. And he happened to be so good at the techniques. So suddenly, other kids present, Oh, Johnny, you're really good at that. And I always do this, this demo thing like demo, and everybody shows their stuff. And, and he chose stuff. And, and at the end, the principal came in to see a demonstration at the end of the program, and you shouldn't have seen that kid shine. And and the principal is just like, I don't believe this, you know, and I said, Well, that's, that's the power of awareness. That's the power of awareness. That's holding an app and saying this, I don't, I don't want to be this, I want to be something else helped me be that. And for a lot of kids, it's shining the light, it's shining the light for them. Right?   Michael Hingson ** 27:48 It literally is true that poor Johnny didn't know anything else until you had this, this class in this program.   Suzanne Jean ** 27:57 That's what he knew. That's what he knew. So he was a bully, and he happy and, and, which is another thing they say about, you know, the kids say about bullies as well, they're very unhappy. They're very angry, they're very unhappy. You know, they just want to let they just want to act tough. They just want to, yeah, they're just really weak. It's like, wait a minute, I'm the tough guy. Yeah, so it's, it's, it's the power, it's the power of awareness. So it's changing. It's really, you know, moving those topics through and, and, and then more and more, I've been experimenting with mindfulness, giving them some tools to calm their calm their mind self regulation tools, because there's a lot of anxiety. And I think that also feeds into bullying. And it's, it's that kind of nonspecific, general anxiety. Like, you know, you'd need to be a psychologist, I guess, to get to the bottom of it, but it, it's messy. And it has a lot of weird sorts of characteristics in terms of behavior. But yeah, so I'm doing more of that, like, you know, breathing and slowing it down looking and they really liked those exercises. They liked the body scans and and the little guys will say, Oh, could you do that thing? Suzanne, where you put us to sleep? Yeah, I can do that again. So this program is really eclectic. I mean, it's got all these elements but it as I said, it breaks very nicely into those four pillars of attention, awareness. Avoid Then Senate action and taking a real direct route to trying to put some strategies in place to avoid bullying. So, in the book, in one of the chapters, I talk about how any organization can set up an anti bullying program in school, and the steps to doing that, I have done this. And they can, they can change the culture of their organization, if they put the steps into place. And those steps involve the parents. They involve the teachers, they involve the students, the peers, they involve the bullies. And the administration. So it's, it's a real program.   Michael Hingson ** 30:49 Do the kids oftentimes as they become more aware, how do I put this almost take charge and really deal with the bullies in a in a positive way? And, and become part of the solution? Yeah,   Suzanne Jean ** 31:04 you got it, it changes the culture, they decide what's not okay. And in a really positive way, they they, they start to make that happen? What kind of world do you want to live in? You know, how do you want to feel? Well, and as you   Michael Hingson ** 31:21 said, it's all about belonging, it's about belonging. And certainly, if the, a lot of the kids say this is not good behavior, this is not acceptable. And convey that to the bullies or to the people who continue to behave that way, at some point, they're going to recognize we're being left out.   Suzanne Jean ** 31:45 Yeah. And it's, you know, it's not difficult, it's not difficult to, to put this kind of thing in place. And having fit for defense, having the power ed program in there really takes care of the peer part. Because you can do peer training, you can train those kids to be leaders very easily. I sometimes train them to be navigators to take you know, if kids after they've done the program, they often what happens is, they'll start moving again. And they'll say, ah, you know, I used to play soccer, or I used to dance or I used to, or I want to study a martial art. And it's really hard for them to walk through those doors without somebody helping them. So I will sometimes pay kids on our areas to be navigators and to go with those kids. And go to the first martial arts class, you know, figure out where, what a good place would be sometimes with low income kids, we find funding, and just open those doors and get them moving again. And again, as you say, That's connection back to the community. So that's priceless. In terms of, you know, we're, then then we're at a whole other level in terms of good citizens.   Michael Hingson ** 33:03 Have you can you give us a you know, I love stories, can you give us a couple of stories about bullies who completely turned around and became very successful? And I, you, you gave one, but I'd love to hear, you know, more real success stories and why they're so important, and maybe how that helped other   Suzanne Jean ** 33:25 people? Well, I, I see change often with the, you know, with the really at risk kids, the angry kids who, who kind of, kind of put that down, they they in the course of of this training, they'll they'll put that aside, and they become the ones there's the they're the ones who are in foster care, you know, 13 placements, they're the ones that have have those kind of histories that we would just go, how did they even get here out of the Union survive, right? Yeah. And I have one such girl who I've worked with, who went through the program, and I trained her to be an instructor, and she was very out of control in her youth, and hurt a lot of people and hurt herself and was involved in, you know, addiction and the whole nine yards, and came through it. And she just passed past. She just graduated with her degree in social work. Wow. And about a month ago, I got a call to provide a reference for her for a job. And I was so proud to do that. And it was like that the whole continuum, the whole thrown full circle, right? Because all she wanted to do at that point was to give back to other kids and help help other kids who might have had a life like her. So, at some level,   Michael Hingson ** 35:06 she must have wanted to succeed right from the outset, except just didn't know how to deal with that. And you showed the solution or you showed her away.   Suzanne Jean ** 35:16 And it's not a straight line, obviously. Right? There's, you think it's, you think you're through the woods, and then the next thing, you know, there's something else but but the out the final outcome, and I know that she's, she will just be so wonderful, working with kids, and that's who she's going to work with. So, that's a great story. And then there's, you know, there's, there's the little stories. For, for some kids, it's so normalized to be bullied, they don't realize that they're being bullied. And that's one of the things in terms of the awareness, they realize what it is, you know, they and what their rights are, what they should, should, how they should be treated. And there was this one, I was doing an elementary school, and this little girl came to me and she says, I'm being bullied. And I said, Oh, and she said, It's my, my brother, he's always hitting me, he pulls the chair out from underneath, and I fall, and he hits me, and he slaps me, and he punches me. And he knocks my books out of my hands. And I'm walking to school. And she said, and I'm always scared. And I use bullying me. But she, she had gone to her parents, and they just laughed, and they normalized it oh, oh, he's just a boy. Right? It's just being a brother, right? And it's through the course of of power. He goes, he's I'm being bullied in and I said, Yeah, you are, and what do you want to do about it? And she said, Well, you talk about having a difficult conversation. She said, I want to have a difficult conversation. And I want to tell him what he's doing. And I want to tell him how I feel, and that he has to stop. And so I worked with her. We did, we wrote a script, we went through the steps. She practiced it several times. But I was a little worried that he would get really angry and hurt her. So it would they were in the cafeteria for the difficult conversation. And I was kind of just outside. You know, he couldn't see me, but I could hear it. And she went in there. And she told him and I thought, you know, he's gonna get super angry, he did get angry. But she continued, and she continued to give him as met the message, I love you, you're my brother, but you can't hurt me anymore. This is not okay. And I thought for sure that he was gonna lose it. But he started to cry. And he, he started to cry. And he said, I am so sorry. And then she cried. And they both cried, and they hugged and changed the game. changed the game. Yeah. And that was that would have gone on probably into adulthood. That pain that she was carrying, not only physically but mentally, right.   Michael Hingson ** 38:33 It's still all about having a conversation.   Suzanne Jean ** 38:37 It's about having a conversation. And having the skills and having the support behind you. Like she knew I was behind her to like, so she gave her that little bit of extra. She got to practice, you know, she got to know be clear on what she wanted to say. So that's what are saying, knowing what what it is you believe what it is you want. You have to know that before you can express it to somebody else. Before you can have that conversation in the power elite. These are all really, really I think, Barry's important tools.   Michael Hingson ** 39:17 You sort of talked about a little bit, but why self defense as part of the whole process? And is that a regular part of all the power ed programs?   Suzanne Jean ** 39:28 Absolutely. Because you can learn something in your body much faster than you can learn it in your head. So I can teach a boundary, a physical boundary and then move that to a psychological emotional boundary and have the kids get it faster. From having that feeling. I can teach defense position and build more confidence in kids being able to step back and protect their vital points than I could for in a month a Sunday. is talking about it. Because they can feel what defense is. They can feel their strength, when they hit a focus pad, they can feel how strong they are. They can let that out that energy out. That pent up anxiety. And I can move them into the parasympathetic nervous system. So they start to let go of all that. And, and get rid of the crazy the crazy head stuff, right? Yeah. So it is, yeah. It's a direct route. And if when we're talking adolescents cognitive is not, it's not the best starting point. I mean, their brains aren't even developed for the, you know, by the time until they're 2627. So yeah, I kind of short circuit it, I go into the body into the strength into the temple. And, yeah, that's where it's, it's fast. I can teach lessons fast. And I've just kind of, I'm just kind of put this together as I go along, right? I mean, I didn't have a manual, I wrote the manual. But trying stuff, seeing how it works, evolving it. And I'm still I'm still evolving. As I told you, I'm now I'm adding much more around self regulation and mindfulness and into the program.   Michael Hingson ** 41:32 Have you ever had a situation where you've gone through and done a lot of the teaching that you've done, and someone feels now that I've learned to defend myself and so on that my only way to deal with the bully is through strengthen, go off and deck them or something like that? Or do you find that people really get it and don't need to go that way?   Suzanne Jean ** 41:55 No, it's, it's, it's not   Michael Hingson ** 41:59 acceptable. But I'm just curious, we have found that that happened throughout   Suzanne Jean ** 42:02 now. It's mastery over yourself is true power. Right? If you can master yourself, you don't need to duck the person. You know, there's no need, you can handle it so much. It just takes care of itself when you have that confidence and that strength and that strength. Over You know, your own emotion. Yeah, it just, it takes that response out of out of the mix. And I've never had it happen. And it's also I teach, you know, lots of schools, and it's something that teachers worry about, and I have never had any buddy use the physical techniques outside of the classroom. Even bullies? Yeah, never. And I my deal to is, the instructors say this is, you know, this is really, this is special stuff, and you, you use it wrong, no more, you know, you want to learn this, you gotta, you gotta follow the discipline. So there is a, there is a lot of that martial arts discipline that I bring in their, that they respect each other, they show that respect, they understand what hurting is, pain is. Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 43:30 And they, and they learn to feel why all this is important. And I'm thinking especially of the bullies who catch on, and realize what they've done or should do. And they, of course, as everyone does, but they especially it seems to me, become all the better for it.   Suzanne Jean ** 43:52 That's right. And it's always a new day, they can leave it behind, like it's a new day, they're gonna learn new things, this is it, you know, this is how we are we become powerful and how we become happy, and how we make good choices for ourselves and good decisions in our lives and how we get the things that we want. And so, yeah, I have not had I have not had an incident of that.   Michael Hingson ** 44:18 And that is that is wonderful in such testimony are testament to the success of the program by any standard, which is which is really great. And it is so unfortunate that we have to encounter so many bullies, and we live in a world where it's it's so hard because we've got I mean all of our politicians who clearly demonstrate absolutely no respect for each other and are not acting as role models at all. It really makes it hard to view them as leaders because they're certainly not leading by example other than being jerks a lot of the time.   Suzanne Jean ** 44:58 Yeah, And the thing about the the thing about power as well is, and that power of awareness isn't so many of our behaviors and our patterns and our habits, like they're, they're really unconscious, right? They're, they're learned, we learn to be a bully. But they're not, it's not their habits. And when you kind of shine the light with like, with Johnny, that's the beginning of making a positive change. That's the beginning of change. And I think the main success of this program is that I'm super non judgmental in that, like, we're not judging, we're not judging it, we're together, and we're where we're at. And there's not this, you need to be like this, or that, you know, it's just, you know, let's just look at ourselves. Let's look at why we do things and how we do things. And, and let's be curious. And so when the light is shone, it's in that nonjudgmental and the the positive change can happen. Yeah, it just frees it up. It's I don't know, it's it's the magic to me.   Michael Hingson ** 46:18 I think one of the biggest blessings that I got growing up was that my parents, really in cure encouraged a curious mind and encouraged me to be curious, of course, for me, it was more of a challenge, I guess, in one sense, or more of a necessity, maybe as a better way to put it because being blind, I didn't necessarily see things the way other kids did. But my parents really encouraged me to explore, and, and ask questions. And as a blind person growing up much before GPS, and a lot of the technologies we had today, asking questions, was the chief way that I would get information. And I wish more people would do that today. And one of the things I say about blindness, people are always thinking they are experts on blindness. And what I tell people all the time is the biggest problem with blind people or people who say they're experts about blindness is I've never tried it. You know, the reality is, it's, there's, there's a lot to learn, it's not something you're going to learn overnight, but know, or understand or understand. But the reality is that you can learn to be a very curious person you can learn to explore, and good teachers understand the value of, of exploring and talking and, and truly mentally growing to understand as you go along.   Suzanne Jean ** 47:51 Yeah, I think that's really critical. And I think it's, it's where that kind of development can happen. That personal development and growth is through that is through that curiosity and that willingness to kind of, you know, suspend judgment. And kids are so critical of themselves. I mean, you know, it's just everything is like, Oh, this is no good. That's no good. I can't I can't, I can't, I can't. Yeah, you can. You can, you can. Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 48:31 You may not be able to do it yet, or you may not know the right way to do it. But you can and yeah, that's the biggest issue. When I was born, my parents were told to send me off to a home for handicapped children, because no blind person could ever grow up to do anything in society. And my parents playing out now disagreed with that. And that started the, the pathway that they they and I went on, and I think yes, yeah, absolutely.   Suzanne Jean ** 49:06 Yeah. It's very special parents, because at that time, you know, there wasn't, there wasn't an open mindedness around any disabilities.   Michael Hingson ** 49:20 It goes back to the basic though philosophy of whether it's disability or not, it still goes back to the basic philosophy of dealing with with kids from a parent's standpoint. It's harder today because there are so many things that can get a kid in jeopardy. And I don't mean that in a negative way, or like bullying, but just in general, and it is so hard to I think it's really hard to be a kid today because there's so many dangerous things that you have to deal with. And it's hard for your parents to deal with, but at the same time, we've got to let our kids explore and grow and We have to figure out or learn ways to help them with doing that. And allow them to grow and ask questions and maybe make mistakes and help them, but be part of their lives all the way around. And I know it's hard, especially with families where you have both parents earning incomes to support the family. But at some point, you got to do some of that.   Suzanne Jean ** 50:25 Yes, you do. And that's what I'm trying to do. With my program, and the program is for all ages, children and mainstream youth, my particular niche is the more at risk kids and those kids don't have families. So I tried to work with teaching them how to create a family of choice. Right. Right. And, but yes, for sure. It's so important. And so that that's being available. I mean, I was talking about these busy lives, right, being just being around just being available for your kids to talk to you. I mean, if you're not there, you're not there. Yeah, yeah. And   Michael Hingson ** 51:17 bottom line is you chose to be parents, mostly. There are some who probably didn't expect it, but it did happen. And if you keep the child, there are all the responsibilities that go with it. And so at some point, you've got to be able to make the time available to, to talk with them and to interact with them and make them feel wanted. And I know that's a lot of what happens to so many kids, they just really feel they're not wanted because the parents aren't around. And maybe they don't know how to express that to the parents to get the parents to understand why they have to do things a little differently, either.   Suzanne Jean ** 51:55 Yeah, they don't show important. They're not a priority.   Michael Hingson ** 52:00 And don't know how to say that.   Suzanne Jean ** 52:02 Yeah. Don't know how they don't know how to express it. But the thing when, when you when I was talking about the anti bullying strategy, when you get kind of everybody in the conversation, it's a great, it's, it's amazing how much people can bring to the table in terms of ideas, right, and commitment. And then nobody's nobody's feeling alone, right? Because they're actually doing something about it. And they're establishing some guidelines, and they're there. They're building an intervention, you have to I said that before you have to intervene, you have to be can't be afraid of conflict.   Michael Hingson ** 52:52 And you have to be very important. Yeah.   Suzanne Jean ** 52:55 Yeah. But having said talked about all of these things, as I said, this program is super fun. Like, it's, there's a lot of play in it, I add a lot of games, and a lot of play. We do. You know, they do slow motion fights, they're 10 feet away from each other, and they do the slow motion fights, and they do, you know, all kinds of tank games and all kinds of building agility and, and strength, then there's, they work with focus pads and full noodles. And there's all kinds of all kinds of things going on. So it's really it is really fun.   Michael Hingson ** 53:39 What is the focus pad?   Suzanne Jean ** 53:42 A focus pad is a hard, well, it's not that hard. It's a target that you use that you hit. Okay, so you learn punches, and but you actually get to snack something. So you get to feel your strength, you get to feel your strength, right, you get to follow through, and you get to exhale and focus your technique on focus, Pat, Better that than on a person. And it's a great feeling.   Michael Hingson ** 54:09 There you go. Yeah, we've, we've talked about parents a lot and so on. What do you say to parents who say, Well, I just don't have any time because we're both working all the time. You know, we've talked about those double income parents, but what what do you say to them?   Suzanne Jean ** 54:24 Create, Create some opportunities, create some special special time? Right? If you're both working like take make Saturday. Family time? Yeah. Where everybody you know, every week you get different person gets to choose what you do, but you do something together every week, right? You have to set you have to make it happen. You have   Michael Hingson ** 54:49 to make it happen. And that's the real issue, isn't it?   Suzanne Jean ** 54:52 Yeah. Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 54:55 It's it's got to be a priority. To keep the family together, and I think that's also partly something that a lot of parents haven't learned. And, you know, you said there's no manual for a lot of this, there isn't necessarily a great manual for, for being parents, or at least parents don't seem to want to read the manuals that might help them a lot or, or haven't found them.   Suzanne Jean ** 55:23 Yeah, so one of the manuals for parenting that I got being a parent is that the best form of discipline is natural consequences. Yeah, that if there is a punishment of some kind, it has to be a consequence of that particular behavior. And it has to be within a short timeframe. And it has to be, it has to make sense. And it has to be consistent. Yeah. And so that's with what I teach in terms of setting up interventions with bullying, that there's a natural consequence to things. And that the person that's been harmed and the person that's harming figure that out together, yeah, there you go. And it's a natural consequence. So if you, you know, if you ripped up my scribblers or they still called scrollers.   Michael Hingson ** 56:25 If you punched a hole in my, my mat,   Suzanne Jean ** 56:29 you broke if you broke my earbuds,   Michael Hingson ** 56:36 there has to be a consequence. And   Suzanne Jean ** 56:38 yeah, you're gonna, you know, you're gonna save up your money and buy new some new ear buds. And say, sorry,   Michael Hingson ** 56:46 right, and that saying, Sorry, is a significant part of it, it isn't just replacing the ear buds. It's very being sorry, 21. and a half years ago, I worked in the World Trade Center and an escaped, and for for all the time, since then, I have talked a lot about not being really afraid. And there were reasons I wasn't afraid. But the the biggest reason was that I had created a mindset by learning a lot of things like what to do in an emergency in the World Trade Center. Also, having at that time worked with five guide dogs, I learned a lot of the same kinds of concepts that we're talking about here. There's a consequence for bad behavior. And it's not just when the dog behaves badly. But if I don't handle things in the right way, then I have to make amends and deal with the two because we as a team have to respect each other and make no mistake about it. It is a two creature team, both of whom have feelings. And both of whom might sense when the other does something that isn't supposed to be done. And you do you do have to fix it. But during the during the pandemic, I've realized that we don't talk about how to control fear or anything like that. So we're actually writing a new book called A Guide Dogs Guide to Being brave. And the idea is to teach people also about the fact that fear is not something that as I put it needs to blind you, you can use it as a very positive powerful thing. There's a lot of physical, physiological natural reactions, but you can learn to use fear in a very positive way. And that's, in part the kinds of things you're saying as well.   Suzanne Jean ** 58:30 Absolutely, it is very much the same. And when, when you're doing physical techniques together, and you're practicing those things, you come face to face with, you know, your own protection. And it's an interesting thing, to believe in yourself, you have to trust yourself, you have to trust yourself, and you had to trust your dog as well, right. And it definitely, the fight or flight response is in that limbic brain it's in and it has to, in order to come out of that and be able to think, move breve function. These are the skills that you're building.   Michael Hingson ** 59:31 But it is a two way, but it is a two way street. So the dog has to trust me as well. You know, the purpose of the dog is to make sure that we walk safely, not to know where to go and how to get there and there are a lot of reasons for that. But the dog has to trust me as well. And one of the things that I have said many times is while dogs love unconditionally, they don't trust unconditionally but the difference between dogs or most dogs unless they're really abused But the difference basically between dogs and people is, dogs are at least open to trust and they're at least open to trying to develop a trusting relationship. And we've been taught in so many ways, not to trust, to be fearful to be fearful.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:00:17 And and when you were coming out of the Trade Center were you confident that you were going to make it I was confident   Michael Hingson ** 1:00:27 I was going to make it. But at the same time, I kept an ear open like listening for the first sounds of the building groaning or something like that. So I, I stayed observant. But what happened for us was that the airplane struck 18 floors above us on the other side of the building, so neither I nor anyone else in my office or around me, or as we were going down the stairs, any of the people near me on the stairs, knew what had happened, we figured out an aeroplane must have hit the building, because we smelled in the stairwell, the fumes from burning jet fuel. But we didn't really think, well, most of us didn't really think that we would perish. There were a couple of times that some people started to panic. And we we worked on that all of us knew we had to keep everyone focused and going down the stairs. And we did that. And one of the people who at one point, Panic was my colleague, David Frank, who was in our office that day from our corporate office in California, because he was going to be talking about pricing. We were doing sales seminars for 50 people. They hadn't arrived yet. But David was there because he was responsible for a lot of the distribution and reseller pricing. And David on the 50th floor, said, Mike, we're gonna die. We're not going to make it out of here. And I just snapped at him very deliberately, David, stop at a for sale, and I can go down the stairs, so can you. And what David then did was, he said, I want to walk a floor below you, and shout up to you what I see on the stairs, because I gotta take my mind off of thinking about what might happen. And he and he did that all the way down the stairs. Did I need him to do it? I didn't need him to do it. But when Gates did it, he needed to do it. But you know, what was even better about it was that he became a beacon for anyone within the sound of his voice. Mike, I'm on the 44th floor. This is where the Port Authority cafeteria is going on down, not stopping. And so anyone who heard him knew there was someone on the stairs, who was okay. Now to David, think about that going down the stairs. I've never heard him say that he did. But still, he had to keep 1000s of people focused just by his shouting, as we went down the stairs, which I think is incredibly cool. Because he needed to do it for himself. And it turns out helped so many other people along the way as well.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:02:54 Amazing. Yeah, wonderful story.   Michael Hingson ** 1:02:58 It is it is one of those things that, you know, doesn't get talked about much. But it but it did happen. But for me, I didn't worry about it. And as I would tell people now one of our biggest problems in the world is we worry about so many things, rather than just worrying about what we can control, we stop worrying about all the things we can control and just worry about what we can, we would be much less stressed, and much better off.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:03:22 And that's why I'm working hard to build confident, healthy kids. So we can control that we can give them those skills, we can give them the ability to make choices and to feel strong, and to be an entity and deal with their fears. And they have a lot of fears. Like I was saying, you know they're, they're pretty discouraged. Yeah.   Michael Hingson ** 1:03:52 And, and advice aren't helping.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:03:55 And when I first when I first started working in the field, kids, this kind of kids at risk kids, they were much more scrappy, they had more energy, they were you know, they had more resilience, I guess, is what I'm trying to say. And now there's this sense of defeat, depress there. I was I had a recent class and we were talking about anger and triggers what like what, what makes you what pisses you off? What makes you angry? You know, what makes you go from zero to 10 in terms of a trigger, and all all 10 of them, there's 10 of them in the group and they want to Oh, nothing nothing bothers me. Nothing makes me mad and, and oh, no, I don't have any triggers. And we went around the group and there was this one guy was an athlete. He was a rugby player and he says, Come on, man. Like, you know, you're on the field and someone just says you you don't get pissed off, like in the sport. No, I expect that that's just part of the game. So we went all around the group, and in this program, staff bring their dogs to work. And the kids love the dogs. And the dogs come in the classroom all the time. And they love the dogs. So they got that we got back to the to me. And I said, Okay, that's amazing. None of you have any triggers. So it's like, perfectly okay for someone to kick a dog. And they just went ballistic. They were like, No, you can't kick a dog. What did the dog ever do to you? And oh, wow. And I, you know, and they were all 10 of them were chirping away. They were like, Yeah, bla bla bla bla. And I said, I think I, I think you have a trigger. And then some of them were took that and they said, and it's the same with people. Like it's not okay to diss people. It's not okay to just like, you know, just put them down for no reason. And suddenly, this whole discussion was happening with this, but prior to me provoking them, it was like, No, everything's cool now. Everything's cool. Everything's cool. Yeah, no, it's not. No, it's   Michael Hingson ** 1:06:13 not. You just aren't ready to admit it yet. You're just not ready to acknowledge it. But and it's to use the same terminology, sometimes a challenge, but you found the trigger?   Suzanne Jean ** 1:06:27 Yes, I certainly did. Which is, which is great. Which is really kind of funny is when we're, yeah. Anyway, that's a cute story that happened very recently.   Michael Hingson ** 1:06:38 What do you do when you're not doing Power ed, and teaching and so on?   Suzanne Jean ** 1:06:43 I worked in social services. For many years, I ran a couple of agencies and mental health agency and an addiction agency. I built them from scratch and ran them. I then went on to work in quality assurance, which is kind of seeing that organizations maintain a really high level of standards around service delivery, and business standards in social services.   Michael Hingson ** 1:07:11 But what do you do today to relax to get away from all of this, other than making a trip to Hawaii?   Suzanne Jean ** 1:07:16 Can I continue to do martial arts? I'm working on my third degree black belt. And I'd like to achieve this year I still do Tai Chi, I do yoga. I said before, I'm very hyper, I have a lot of energy. I wrote my book. And so I've been promoting the book I've been teaching developing instructors. So my program is that it's a train the trainer, so I trained instructors to run the program. So I've been doing lots of that. I have some grandbabies. I have three grandkids, here you go. And they are joy, a total joy. I'm loving that. And yeah, I think life is good. Life is great.   Michael Hingson ** 1:08:03 I mean, that's that's the way it should be, you know, you can always find negative things, but you can always find positive things. And there's, you know, there's no reason to consider life in a negative way of their lives. It's too much of an adventure, not to want to be part of it.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:08:18 And like you said, Michael, so much to be curious about, even ourselves learning about ourselves still. There's so much it's just I No two days are ever the same. Which is great. Yeah. So Well,   Michael Hingson ** 1:08:36 this has been fun. And we need to let you go back to your vacation. And remember, I told you, we might go more than an hour, we have now gone 67 minutes. So we're doing well. We could probably keep going and you're very generous and kind of your with your time.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:08:53 Well, it's wonderful talking to you. You're amazing. If people want to   Michael Hingson ** 1:08:57 reach out to you learn more about the program or whatever. How do they do that?   Suzanne Jean ** 1:09:00 They can go to my website, it's fit4defense.com, and it's fit with a 4 pillars and defenses spelt with an S. So it's fit for defense.com and they can go on the website and learn all about it. Reach out to me. And if anybody is interested in starting an anti bullying program, I'd be happy to to guide them in that process.   Michael Hingson ** 1:09:29 I need to have you have a conversation with my cat. Oh, she's a wonderful kitty. She likes to get petted while she eats. Literally, she won't eat unless I'm in there petting her and she yells at me until I come in there and then pet her while she eats and she'll wake me up during the night. I've mostly got a little bit of a detente whether she can only do that once during the night and occasionally she tries to do it more than once and I'll wake up enough to say Ah, we didn't once but can't She's acuity and wouldn't have it any other way. It's great to have a cat that's engaged in Alamo who is my ace guide dog. And she get along. So that works out well.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:10:12 That's wonderful.   Michael Hingson ** 1:10:13 But I want to thank Oh, go ahead.   Suzanne Jean ** 1:10:15 It's been a pleasure talking to you. Well, I   Michael Hingson ** 1:10:17 want to thank you again. And I'd like to thank you for listening. Please give us a five star rating wherever you're listening to us. We really appreciate those ratings. And also, feel free to give us comments, you can reach out to me via email by going out emailing Michaelhi at accessibe A C C E S S I B E.com. And AccessiBe is a company that makes products that help make websites more usable for a lot of different kinds of persons with disabilities. You can also go to our podcast page, which is www dot Michaelhingson h i n g s o n.com/podcast. But wherever you are, please give us a rating of five star rating. We always love those. And also your comments. And Suzanne, for you or anyone listening if you know of anyone else who we ought to have as a guest, I would sure appreciate you letting us know and giving us an introduction. We're always looking for people who want to come on and tell their stories like like you Suzanne did today. So hopefully, you might think of other folks. But one last time again, thank you very much for being with us and giving us all your time today. Back to the beach. Back to the beach.   **Michael Hingson ** 1:11:35 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com. accessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.

Featured Stories - Toshie Gets a Threatening Letter, and Zhan covers the Kalimdor Cup from Thousand Needles Sponsors: Red Crane Society, Halfhill Market, Stormstout Brewery Recorded live at The Lazy Turnip Inn in the village of Halfhill, the Valley of the Four Winds in beautiful Pandaria! Reach us on Twitter @HalfhillReport, @PTaliep, @Toshmifune1, by email at halfhillreport@yahoo.com or on in the Discord channel. Find Toshmifune and Professor Taliep on the Wyrmrest Accord server! Find branded Halfhill Report and Halfhill Ag Alumni Merchandise at https://www.zazzle.com/store/halfhill_report Show Credits and Acknowledgements Opening Music and bumpers: China Town by Audiobbinger Productions http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Audiobinger/Audiobinger_-_Singles_1776/China_Town_1874 Copyright: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0: Pandaren Inn Music - Mists Of Pandaria https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9l7Zm3Mo8Q Website Banner Art by  Sandra Schnell https://sanii.artstation.com   Logo Art by Toshmifune based on photo by imagesthai.com from Pexels https://www.pexels.com/photo/landscape-photography-of-cliff-with-sea-of-clouds-during-golden-hour-733172/  All place names, character names and music from World of Warcraft used in the Halfhill Report are the exclusive property of Blizzard Entertainment.  World of Warcraft is a trademark or registered trademark of Blizzard Entertainment Inc in the US and other countries. No copyright or trademark infringement is intended by The Halfhill Report.

Mike Bonin of What’s Next, Los Angeles joins us to talk about the impending eviction of at least 500 renters at the Barrington Plaza in West Los Angeles this September. We also discuss the expiration of affordable housing at the Hillside Villa in Chinatown and its implications for L.A.’s affordable housing supply overall, and howContinue reading LARGEST-EVER EVICTION IN L.A. (SINCE CHAVEZ RAVINE) →

As of posting time, SAG/AFTRA (actors) and WGA (writers) were still on strike. Our guest Hawk Koch has been through a few strikes in his six decades in the entertainment industry, on both sides of the table. The studios have their offer on the table, so do the writers and actors, and talks continue. Hawk has been heartened by the Barbenheimer phenomenon with people returning to the theaters after the isolation of the pandemic. A key issue is the strange new world of streaming services, where no one knows how many people are seeing the shows, or how much revenue they are generating, thanks to the opaque nature of big tech companies like Netflix, Max, Amazon and Apple. Hawk has produced more than 60 films (from Wayne's World to Chinatown) and was head of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science. He is the one half of the only father-son duo to head the Academy (Howard Koch Sr.) When he was head of the Producers Guild of America, he worked with partner Mark Gordon to professionalize the craft and instituted the Producers Mark. Koch serves on the board of directors for AMC Entertainment, the Motion Picture and Television Fund, the Producers Guild of America, and the National Film Preservation Foundation. He lives with wife Molly in Ojai but still keeps himself busy with new projects. We talked about the accelerating rate of change in the business, and whether the studios and creative talents are worried about each other, when the looming threat of Big Tech threatens their entire way of life, through Artificial Generated Intelligence and their general disregard and lack of love for the magic of films. Hawk is a return guest from 2020 when he published "Magic Time," his memoir about growing up on movie sets and his distinguished career. We did not talk about Mack Sennett, the Lumiére Brothers or magic lantern shows.