boston progress radio

There’s a really interesting piece by Jeff Chang on salon.com called, So you think they can break dance?” It’s all about the Korean B-boys a la Planet B-Boy, why hip-hop culture resonates with them, and the evolution of B-boy culture in Korea. It’s pretty interesting, especially considering that there are Korean Americans (the post-Sa-I-Gu generation Chang calls them) who are part of this movement.

Check it out!! (Though, you’ll have to wait through the salon.com ad.)

“I want to tell you how proud I am to be the President of a nation that — in which there’s a lot of Philippine-Americans. They love America and they love their heritage…I am reminded of the great talent of the — of our Philippine-Americans when I eat dinner at the White House.”

- President George W. Bush (June 24, 2008)

AW HELL NO HE DIDN’T!

Whoa…. so I’m reading up on local museums to patronize, and look what I stumbled upon! This sounds kind of trippy, like that thing about that Pink Floyd album and the Wizard of Oz… but this is sounds like it takes it to a new level…

Unfortunately, the host is Mass MoCA, which is in North Adams, MA, not exactly near Boston.

Enter the Dragon with music by Karsh Kale

Saturday, June 28, 2008, 9:00 pm
Pavilion or Hunter Center
$15 in advance/$19 day of show

South Asian DJ, tabla master, and Bruce Lee fanatic Karsh Kale (Listen now!)performs a incendiary new score to history’s greatest martial arts movie. The film has it all: an outrageous plot (insane crime lord holds deadly karate tournament at island fortress!), the best fight scenes ever committed to celluloid (choreographed by Lee!), and, of course, nunchucks (nunchucks!). This is Bruce Lee at his very best, and Kale’s live score will squeeze every last drop of excitement and hilarity out of the onscreen mayhem.

This is kind of amazing… the New York Times homepage has a photo of Asian American activist Helen Zia getting married today in San Francisco.

I think it’s awesome that a lesbian Asian American couple is pictured… and that same-sex couples are getting married in California… (unless you live in Kern County).

Check out the rest of the article here.

Tags: gay marriage, helen zia.

The NYT covered a report last week released by “New York University, the College Board and a commission of mostly Asian-American educators and community leaders” aimed at exposing some of the falsehoods associated with the Model Minority myth—the perception that Asian-Americans are a homogeneous group of college-educated, middle to upper class people flooding America’s best universities and high tech job market.

The crux of the report “pokes holes in stereotypes about Asian-Americans and Pacific Islanders, including the perception that they cluster in science, technology, engineering and math. And it points out that the term “Asian-American” is extraordinarily broad, embracing members of many ethnic groups.”

Read more

A couple of Sunday’s ago, the New York Times published a piece in the Sunday Fashion & Style section entitled “Matchmaking, the Ultimate Government Service.” The gist of the article is that governments such as Taiwan run special abroad programs for the children of emigrants of their native countries.

The main idea of the program is to help educate youth about their heritage and culture. I was fortunate to be able to go on the Overseas Chinese Youth Language Training and Study Tour to the Republic of China back in 1995. It is also known informally as “The Love Boat” since young college students go there to hook up meet with other Chinese folks. Parents don’t really know about this other side of the Study Tour. (Or do they? I mean many Chinese folks would love their kids to marry another Chinese person… Hmm… I have my suspicions.)

Anyhow, you can read more about the Love Boat over at 8Asians.com. John writes an extensive piece about his personal experience there, though he does omit the juicy details. Come on John! Why so prude? [I'm kidding.] Read more

Tags: Chinese Americans, Identity, inter-racial dating, Love, social expectations.

Boston Progress Radio is once again participating in this month’s Youth Media Blog-a-thon spearheaded by Youth Outlook and WireTap Magazine. This month’s topic: sex.

As one of those awkward, socially quiet kids growing up, I never really developed an interest in dating, sex, and all that until an abnormally older age. I would say that I was pretty academically oriented back when I was in elementary and middle school. As a heterosexual man, I was surprisingly not interested in women (well… that’s probably a lie, maybe I was too shy.) A large part of that can be attributed to my “traditional Confucian” upbringing—my parents emphasized book smarts education to no end. That left little time to hone my suave pick-up skillz. (Or again, maybe I was just too shy.)

One area of education in which my parents offered no guidance was the topic of sex. Sexual intercourse was never discussed in the household. Sex is taboo. I’m not sure whether the whole “sex is taboo” attitude was a result of my parents’ conservative ways or because they were “Chinese” or simply because they have lived a large part of their lives in a Puritanical society where sex is still quite taboo.

Given the fact that I have no point of reference, I could easily point the finger at the Chinese factor. As I’ve grown older, I’ve quickly realized that this factor is indefensible. (My parents often say: “Chinese people don’t do that, or Chinese people are like this or like that… but in reality, it is just their view of what Chinese people do.) I think the more important factor is the Puritanical society thing. My mother actually listens to Dr. Laura Schlessinger for advice on relationships and sex and all that. That might tell you something.

Luckily for me, I was able to learn about the “birds and bees” through some decent sex education offered by my public school in elementary school. Though, I would say that resources at the middle school and high school level were somewhat lacking. Nonetheless, I am glad for such resources, but somehow I think parents should be partly responsible for passing on knowledge about sex.

I’m not a father yet, but if I’m one day blessed with children, personally, I think it is my responsibility to teach my children about sex: the reproductive process, safe sex, sexual orientation, and gross anatomy. Granted, I’m not saying it will be easy, but wouldn’t you rather have your children ask you about sex than go off and try it on their own? (On the other hand, maybe I trust those teachers to be able to get through to my kids. But if they are ordered to teach them about abstinence only, well, then I’d have a problem.) There are of course things I haven’t quite figured out like: (a) what age is the right age to start? 5? 10? 13? I’m not sure exactly what age one should broach that subject. (b) I’d like to impart the notion that sex is not only a reproductive tool (as the Catholic church would have you believe), but in many instances is used to convey love. But I don’t want my kid thinking that if you love someone, you have to have sex with them. Eh.

These days my parents still don’t even use the word sex around me. Maybe when I’m older, I’ll understand that mentality, but damn, you’d think that at my age, they would finally be able to use words like that around me. Maybe it is a generational thing that I just have to accept. Or maybe it is just part of being a parent.

Tags: Sex, Youth Media Blog-A-Thon.

Yes, this post is about earwax. Because it’s the end of the month, and we’ve covered everything else from eyelids to the Jets, from Bi to Malcolm X.

So yes, this post is about earwax.

A couple of months ago, I took my daughter in to the doctor for a check up. When he looked in her ear, he told me that she had lots and lots of wax built up in there. But that it was something that was common for Asians.

I was like, huh? Why would Asians have more ear wax in their ears? What kind of racist generalization is that?

And so I sat and stewed. But then recently, another parent blogged about her daughter’s ear wax, and linked to an article in the NYT about ear wax.

Earwax comes in two types, wet and dry. The wet form predominates in Africa and Europe, where 97 percent or more of the people have it, and the dry form among East Asians, while populations of Southern and Central Asia are roughly half and half.

Ok. Well, firstly, I had no idea that there were two kinds of ear wax. I mean, I really only have experience with one kind of ear wax, and that is my own. But, apparently, the wet ear wax is easier to clean with a cotton swab, and the dry ear wax is easier to clean with a little tiny teeny spoon thing. I never saw those spoon things until I went to college.

But anyway, apparently, some scientists have found a gene that controls the kind of ear wax you have, and have linked it to genes that cause sweat (dry ear wax = low odor sweat). I think it’s pretty crazy.

I guess this is one of those times when we truly to have to celebrate our dry ear wax heritage. Because even if we are Asian Americans living in America, a lot of us still have that dry ear wax that links us back to our heritage. And those funny little spoons.

Tags: ear wax.