Recap: East Meets Words, Jan 2010
On Friday, January 8, the 46th or so East Meets Words Open Mic took place once again at the East Meets West Bookstore. Now, due to general busyness in my non-public life, I had been unable to attend the open mic the last 2 or 3 months. And, in fact, I didn’t really want to go to this open mic simply because in my head, I felt that the vibe was going to be different.
Luckily, I was wrong.
Despite the frigid New England temperatures and light dusting of snowflakes throughout the Boston Metro area, the Open Mic was great. This month, we had an especially great bunch of folks featuring: students from UMass-Boston who had participated in a spoken word poetry and storytelling performance class taught my Giles Li. But they weren’t the only ones who brought energy to the space.
At 8:45pm or so, the show got started. The yellow and orange lantern were all that lit up the eager faces of the attendees. When the host of the night, Dave Kong, stepped up to the mic, it was instant joy. Dave brought a balloon ride full of exuberance and cheerfulness and I was immediately uplifted. That set the tone for the rest of the night. Of the performers during the open mic, I was impressed by Nima, who belted an original song “Cook It Real Slow” in a cool baritone while playing an acoustic-electric guitar. Beat Collective, though not in full force, was nonetheless very entertaining. Amon was at his freestyling best—despite just walking in to the store, he busted out some creative rhymes using words tossed out by devilish members of the audience: “onomatopoeia”, “dentures” and “avocado.”
Next up were the features. I don’t remember what everyone said during their pieces—chalk that up to a failing memory—but I do remember some of the performances. Matt Seto kicked off the feature set by performing a piece about an absent father who had a son who kept waiting for his return. Abel Cano did a performance about a human auction for Latino folks. The piece was comical, yet was also very disturbing due to the use of stereotypical imagery of Latino people. Sonca Lam spit a heart-wrenching, yet very honest piece about being raised by a single mom. Molly Higgins performed a piece about the women in her life who she loves, whose values are still “under construction”. It reminded me that life is a journey often without apparent direction. Finally, to wrap up the night, Laurence Louie, inspired by an experience on the T where a few African American kids pulled the emergency brake to be funny, offered us his opinion about why these kids shouldn’t be blamed for their behaviors.
All in all, the night was truly amazing. Since I had been absent from the scene for so long, I had forgotten how inspiring it can be to just listen to the music and words of people sharing their stories. I encourage any of you who have not attended the open mic recently, to come down and give it a shot. And for those of you old-timers, who haven’t been in the space for awhile, you should check it out too. The names and faces may have changed, but the spark and magic are still there. See you next month!
Last 5 posts by eugene
- Asian American Raffi: Where are you? - January 13th, 2010
- East Meets Words Featuring Fatimah Asghar and Jamilla Woods - November 11th, 2009
- Hip-Hop Values from Oliver Wang - October 29th, 2009
- AARW 30th Anniversary Banquet - October 27th, 2009
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