boston progress radio

I think this video needs no introduction. Enjoy.

When was a wee boy, I remember sitting around the dinner table with my family. My mom would always have lots to say (she still has lots to say) about many subjects. Oftentimes, the dinner table topics would center around what she read in a Chinese American newspaper. Sometimes, it would be from the World Journal or shì jiè rì bào, a daily Chinese newspaper serving oversea Chinese folks in North America. (A lesser known fact is that this paper is slighted biased in its news content since it is funded by a Taiwanese-based media conglomerate.) But, most often it would be one of those free Chinese newspapers you can get at your local grocery store. Read more

Tags: beauty, Commentary.

This is a pretty cool idea - to use youTube as a way to have dialogue.

I appreciate this introductory clip for really encompassing a diverse group of Asian Americans.

What’s your story?

Tags: APA Heritage Month, youTube.

I remember the piece of Asian American literature that I read. I was probably in 4th or 5th grade when I first read “In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson,” by Betty Bao Lord. In it, a little girl whose American name is Shirley Temple Wong adjusts to life with her family in Brooklyn, NY in the 1940s

Shirley’s first outing in New York by herself was to go to the store to buy “Rucky Strikes.” At that point in my life, I had no idea that native Chinese speakers often mixed up Rs and Ls. And I also had no idea what Rucky Strikes were, nor did I know what Lucky Strikes were. So I was really confused about this for a really really long time.

And at the end of the book, after Shirley has become a die hard Dodgers fan, she gets to meet Jackie Robinson and give him the key to her school. I remember that reading this book, I felt like it was a book that was more about me, than say “Little House on the Prairie” or “Ramona the Pest.” It was cool to read about the Dodgers and Brooklyn - I remember driving by Dodger Stadium when we went to Brooklyn to visit my grandparents. It was so meaningful to me to finally read a story that that resonated so much with my family’s experiences. To recognize the meaning of being an outsider, to have to work extra hard to find your place, and to finally find connections with people who understand that… I can only hope that everyone finds that somewhere - on a blog, in a book, in a song.

with spring fever in full effect, there’s something in the air.

the past two weeks, there has been a jump in violence among the young people here in boston.  not so unusual for this time of year, as the weather gets nicer, people are finally allowed to occupy the public and push beyond their enclosed buildings.

in my neighborhood of jamaica plain alone, there have been 3 shootings, with one being fatal in the course of a few days, leading youth organizers, social justice orgs, city officials, cops, and residents to gather and dialogue.  as usual, it’s a series of rants of progressive neighborhood adults coming to testify on behalf of the youth, how they are misunderstood, how the cops are ineffective, how only now—when the shootings are creeping into the other side of the tracks—are city officials beginning to pay attention… all good points, but never any suggestions or strategies to address the root of this social violence.  and of course, the cops’ and politicians’ strategies are basic: more cops on duty (meaning more overtime, more money spend in the wrong places…)

the young people were straight up.  they said: “WE HAVE THE SOLUTION, we need more jobs for young people in the city of boston.”  simple. they got to the pressure point of the problem before the outcome of violence. their strategy was not reactive, but pro-active and preventative… but how to make this happen, and in a way that reaches a critical mass to alter the system has been a fight organizers have been tackling for a long, long time.

which brings me down a long winding road to this post and its relevancy to the apia community… with jobs being scarce and in dire need, you take what you can get, but when you have the privilege to choose your path, why take the one that’s “expected” or deemed “more valuable?” within the asian immigrant/refugee community there has always been a divide between jobs and professions, physical and mental labor, blue collar and white collar. 

my question is, where do the jobs with no-collar fit?  those jobs that transcend these old socialized notions of value… the type of work where you are engaged creatively, have no direct social structure of hierarchy or power, craft new programs without borders, invent job descriptions along the way… the type of job where you can’t be categorized and have the freedom to explore boundaries.  i’m talking about the community organizers, the freelance dreamers, the artists, poets, musicians, social entrepreneurs, the innovators, that put their nose to the grindstone day in and day out, but work from such a specialized skill set, it takes a lifetime to perfect.  

white collar vs. blue collar. i’ll take no-collar everyday.

Tags: Boston, Community, social expectations, youth.

I bumped into a buddy of mine on the T today and he mentioned to me how recently watching the Karate Kid 2 reminded him of his encounter with a certain Asian American celebrity. That got me thinking. I’m not a huge fan of making lists, but since my mind has been totally frazzled by my day job, I thought I would take a break from bits, bytes, and brain waves and make a list of “Famous Asian Americans I Want to Meet” in honor of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month. I use the term famous somewhat loosely here. Or maybe the people I admire are different from the people you admire.

Yuri Kochiyama. This woman needs no introduction. I have attended various talks where political activists talk about patriarchy, hegemony, colonialism, sexism, but I have never met an Asian American activist of her stature. I would love to be able to sit down and listen to her talk for 30 minutes. Just 30 minutes.
Read more

Tags: famous folks.

Great timing! It’s Asian Pacific American Heritage Month and As I Am, the radio pilot from our friends over at UMass-Boston and the Institute for Asian American Studies, is going to be broadcasting nationwide at a public radio station near you.

Stations in North Carolina, Illinois, and now California will air As I Am this month. As I Am will be airing on none other than KQED, a public radio station in San Francisco. Check out their APAHM schedule if you want to hear it on KQED. I hope you’re as excited as we are because Boston Progress Radio was asked to help out with the music selection for the programming.

As I Am: Asians In America will be airing in the Boston area on May 18, 2008 at 7:30pm on 91.9FM WUMB Public Radio. As I Am can also be heard on 91.9FM WBPR Worcester, 91.9FM WFPB Falmouth, 91.7FM WNEF Newburyport, and 1170AM WFPB Orleans.

Of course, you can go listen to the pilot right now on the As I Am website. Tune in and enjoy the show with your Sunday brunch.

Tags: Boston, News, radio, San Francisco.

Congratulations Erik Spoelstra of the Miami Heat, for being the first-ever API head coach in the NBA!

You have a lot of work to do. Your team sucks dude. Sorry.

But it got me thinking, I know a lot of folks think Yao Ming was the first Asian NBA player, but he was third in a run of three from China, the first of which was Wang Zhi Zhi. The other - Mengke Bateer - ended up the first Asian player to win an NBA championship, when he did so as a member of the San Antonio Spurs. Around this time, there was Japanese-born Yuta Tabuse who played for the Phoenix Suns for about half a dozen games before he was bounced. (Much love to the Milwaukee Bucks’s Yi Jianlian, who was having an inconsistent, but generally ill rookie year before injury took him out for the end of it.

But anyway, many of us don’t realize there was an Asian American in the NBA before all of them. Oh yes!

Say hello Asian America to Rex Walters. Current head coach of the University of San Francisco men’s basketball team, and former Sixer/Heat/Net. But he was also a member of those Japanese American basketball leagues that have been one of the most consistent and constant sources of cultural connection for JAs in California for decades. (In fact, the homie Tad Nakamura made a movie about it…more on that another day.)

So raise your glasses of soju or grass jelly drink or, you know, Johnnie Walker to all the Asian ballers from front to back.

Oh, and I speak for most of us here at Boston Progress Radio when I say: go Celtics!

(And their API strength coach Bryan Doo.)

Tags: basketball.