Lucky Gal

Another four months in with another update. That’s how life feels at the moment. Everyday feels the same. Well, not for the past two months. Everyday for the past two months felt like swimming against a huge current that only lets you take a moment/breath when your head is a little bit above water. Otherwise, gotta keep swimming. My brain never turned off because I dreamt about my work even as I was snoring my tails off.

I casually posted about this on Instagram in September 2018, and that is, I’m back at AALDEF—the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund. Feels so surreal to be back working on voting rights. Unexpected if you may. It might be fate/perfect timing, as I was fired (for the very first time in my life) from my babysitting gig early September 2018. I was on the hunt for a new job and my only hope was going back to restaurant-work to balance acting. I got a random call one day from Jerry at AALDEF, and I immediately said yes! So I’ve been back ever since. It’s a contracted gig, so whenever funding runs out, I’m gone. I always feel a sense of pressure that I’ll get cut any minute now. It’s a type of weird anxiety, and maybe I should just calm down until they tell me it’s time to go. Trying to work on that now.

My main job centers around the AALDEF exit polls. We conduct the largest AAPI exit poll in the US, this year in 13 states and Washington D.C. It all started in 1988 because mainstream exit polls left us out, or we’re counted as “other.” So this project was created to count us in. I did notice that this year’s NBC exit polls had Asians on there—gasp! We’re at a mere 4% of their total count. I think because our exit poll is so specific to AAPIs, most of whom are bilingual or limited English proficient, we have bilingual folks conducting the survey, so AAPI folks who don’t really speak the language, can at least feel comfortable taking the survey. We are proactive and have some kickass volunteers run after uncles/aunties to fill out the survey. Having been with this project since 2010 in many different capacities, I can confidently say most of our survey responders are older AAPIs, ages 40+. Those who are in their 20s or 30s are always either super enthusiastic and love what we’re doing + fill out the survey on their own, or, are too much in a rush to even look us in the eye to say no. At least in the Chinatown/SoHo area.

I feel extremely proud of what we’ve accomplished this year. Normally, we’d have at least 3-4 in-house interns to help with the project. But this year, because of COVID-19, we did not feel safe to have interns at the office. This means, all the physical and mental labor fell on me this year. I was lucky enough to have staff at AALDEF help me here and there to make the exit poll boxes. But in the end, we ended up going to a lot more poll sites than expected, and everything came crashing down in the last 1.5 weeks leading up to Election Day. Overwhelmed, tired, thirsty, hungry, I’m gonna pass out, am I gonna make it out, will I sleep over tonight, was amongst the feelings I felt. Everyday felt like an uphill battle. Going out to pick up lunch felt like I was taking minutes away from the actual work I could have been doing. I’d be taking a bite and doing work at the same time. Does that count as being a great multi-tasker? All in all, the boxes were shipped, volunteers received their assignments, and we tried our very, very best to communicate all that’s needed to be said. We did. With all the unforeseen circumstances, we made it through. Could it have been better? Hell yeah. But hindsight is 2020. ;)

After the elections, we had to wait to get surveys back from all the states + clean up the surveys: take out all the non-AAPI surveys, make sure all bubbles were filled in correctly, and that all of it, by poll site, is scanned. We have an amazing remote data-scientist in a far away, non-US place (secret!) analyzing it all (hi Nancy! :D). Just finished scanning it all last week. Now everything is quiet, which I’m happy about. I finally have time to breathe and think.

Over the last week + weekend, I reflected a lot: about where I am now, where I want to go. Will I keep working at AALDEF/nonprofits? Move on to something else? Finish the film? Move to LA? Should I go to law school?!?! As my mind spiraled, I cried at the dinner table with my mom present and lied about having something in my eye. Then, I fell asleep. When I woke up, I took 10 LSAT questions just for the heck of it, and it did NOT go well. Oh, the horror!!!!! It’s the world’s way in telling me I should stay in the creative field. Sometimes our minds know something we don’t realize yet.

Before Election Day, my colleague, Shirley, and I were invited to be on the Lucky Boys Podcast. I don’t know what it is, but i felt at home being there/talking to them (Will & Norm). It was one of the best podcast experience I’ve been on, and I hope y’all enjoy the episode. Below are the different parts to it via YouTube. I believe they’re also on Spotify if you wanna listen to it. We talk about AAPI voting problems, systemic structures that lead to voting barriers, my neighbors’ + neighborhoods’ obsession over Trump, why the Census matters, getting into acting/the hustle, falling out with my mom after doing the solo show, and how to spot fake people in Hollywood. I promise some of these titles are clickbait, but hey, it gets you hooked. Enjoy~ :)

President Trump Supporters Are Die Hard
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_U7E-vAUFh0

The Problem For Asian Voters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRsiN82rDLM

Why Young Asian Americans Are Coming Out To Vote Like Never Before
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyDJbFr9N94

Why The Census Make Sense
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bi-ldG_G-r8

Why Are Asians Invisible In Covid Cases And Public Health Response
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6gs3U3AOdQ

Why America Is Still GREAT...For Now
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBfjYwUbesI

Rebelling Against Your Tiger Mom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sic2fENX3KI

How I Got MC Jin To Work On My Film Project (Correction: SOLO SHOW)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fSgmhIFogU

Asian Hollywood Full Of Fakes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEQSzrSMyhk

That F Word

It's been a minute. Damn. Seriously, it's been a minute. Okay, yeah, it's been a minute--or two, almost three months. How are things? This is the question I always get, and I never know how to answer it exactly. A lot of things have been happening, so I'll attempt to lay it all out. 

During January, I went to London and Paris. It was my first time in Europe, and it was also the first time in my life where I traveled alone. I was extremely scared at first because I didn't know what to expect. So what brought me to London? I was gonna do my solo show there on January 11. My friend posted on her Facebook in November that her friend works for a theatre and was looking for performers. I jumped at the opportunity and was so excited to be doing it outside of the United States. Man, I was so excited. The only thing was: I had to pay my way there and figure out where to stay. I looked at my bank account and realized I will be spending almost all of my savings towards this trip--will it be worth it? Then I thought, if I skipped out on this opportunity, will I regret it on my death bed (yeah, seriously, I've been thinking that way. As kids these days say: yolo, right?)? And so I leaped! I was so game. I was going to share a NYC story with Londoners. My dream is coming true. Towards Christmas, I found out only a small handful of tickets were sold. The theatre has 120-seats, and only a small handful were sold. I was devastated. I was going through so much emotionally, and so, I decided to cancel the show days before I left for the trip. Now that I look back, I wish I had done the show. But at that moment, I knew I wanted a peace of mind before leaving NYC for the first time by myself. And so I found peace. I spent every moment of the trip absorbing the environment around me, in London, in Paris. I reflected upon life and realized I wanted to live everyday as if it was my last--I wanted to live everyday as if I'm discovering beauty everywhere I go. It was exactly the trip I needed to clear my mind and find myself. Even though I was alone on the trip, I didn't feel lonely. I felt at ease, and I felt comfortable being alone. I felt comfortable in my own skin. You'll quickly realize how much you can learn about yourself just going on a trip by yourself. Seriously, if you're reading this and have "thought" about going on a trip by yourself -- DO IT. It's probably the best gift you can give yourself.

I came back to NYC on Thursday, January 12 and went straight from the airport to The Barrow Group Theatre. I was taking Scene Study III with Seth Barrish again (took the fall session for the same class). I felt exhausted from the trip, but for some reason, I had so much energy--a renewed sense of energy, and love--towards life. And so I went to class for the next 10 weeks. I was extremely dedicated to all my classes, from finding scenes and parts where I can stretch different parts of my acting muscles, to finding scene partners who are down to do whatever. It was so much fun and I didn't want it to end. Well, it's not going to end because I'm doing the Actors Scene Study - Working with Directors class with Eric Paeper. This is the first time at TBG where I'm taking a class with a new teacher aside from Lee or Seth, so I'm really excited. Eric subbed for Seth once during the fall and he legit kicked everyone's ass in the class. I want to keep taking classes where I feel my ass is getting kicked every time I walk out.

And that brings me to this: I'm taking classes at UCB again. WOOO! Yes, I love it. I took Improv 101 and 201 in 2013, but discontinued because I didn't see the longevity in being an improviser. However, I now see it as an opportunity to keep stretching those comedic muscles. I feel like I always get my ass kicked in 201, and that's exactly what I need to light that fire under my ass. If you want to see me get my ass kicked on stage, come to the 201 show on Saturday, April 29 - 4PM - at UCB East -- 153 East 3rd Street, New York, NY 10009.

Speaking of show -- the LA show is one month away. CRAZY I tell ya, crazy. I've been doing outreach to see who wants to be a Community Partner for the show. During the earlier outreach stages, I didn't hear back and felt very very discouraged. But after following up and being persistent, Project by Project and CAPE are now supporting the show and spreading the word. It really means the world to me to see community organizations back this show. It gives me hope that Asian American stories such as The World's Greatest can be told. It's a matter of finding an audience and finding a community that will have your back. I have never felt more hopeful. There's still time, and there's still a lot of seats, and so I would keep hustling to get people to the theatre. I know it'd be difficult, but I will keep hustling and ask over and over again for people to come. It's happening and it's gonna be great. I have high hopes. I can't wait to kick asssss on stage on Sunday, April 23 - 2PM at JANM's Tateuchi Democracy Forum. 

I don't know why, but for the last week or so, I thought a lot about what kind of actor I want to be: do I belong in drama, or do I belong in comedy? Honestly, I want to do drama; I want to do comedy; I want to do everything! TBG and UCB, and writing and doing my own thing, is a part of my journey in training to do everything. The important part is just to not fuck around too much and move forward--even if shit gets hard along the way. Yes. Keep moving forward. That's the f word.

Otherwise, you're fucked.

Forward!

Solo Show Preview

It's always impossible until it's done, and I did it!

On May 1, 6, and 7, I did a preview of my solo show called THE WORLD'S GREATEST. Words can't really describe what it took for me to write the show or describe what I felt throughout the whole writing / production / actually inviting people process; but I will try to articulate it as much as possible. 

Let me begin by sharing the reason why I wrote the show: I visited my high school in 2009 as an Urban Ed Fellow for a month during January break. I was a sophomore at Smith College at the time, and I was taking a class called "Education in the City." There was a list of high schools for us to choose from for the fellowship program, but because I went to a high school in the city, I thought, why not do the fellowship at my high school? At that point, it was two years after I graduated from Bergtraum. I really didn't think it was a bad school when I was a student there--even though it was constantly being threatened to shut down by the Board of Education because of poor attendance and bad test scores. However, after the first week of the fellowship, I realized Bergtraum might've gotten worse. It might not be the same school that I went to because after Martin Luther King HS got shut down, a lot of kids transferred over to Bergtraum. Fights became more frequent and security was increased as a result of on-going violence. The school might just shut down for good this time.

During that fellowship, I was critically thinking about all the problems at Bergtraum and how it related to education policies aimed at inner city public high schools (The No Child Left Behind Act: standardized testing, demoralizing teaching by teaching for a test, no sense of place at the school for students/faculty/admins, etc.). I thought it was funny how "No Child Left Behind" caused a lot of Bergtraum kids to drop out and legit get left behind--even when I was there. I was pretty much observing just one class for the entire month, and things were going okay for a short while. Then, a week or two before the fellowship ended, shit broke out (a stampede occurred, and because Bergtraum is a triangular school with no dead end on the 1st, 3rd, and 4th floor, kids were stomping around and around. My teacher, at that point, called the school a zoo). I honestly don't know what caused the stampede, but I think it might be the students' way to resist all the added security. The whole situation made the school environment super hostile. Close the last day of the fellowship, a kid cursed my high school history teacher out. I think that was the last draw for me. I felt angry, confused, and frustrated. Since I was a spoken word fiend at the time, I wrote a poem about the whole situation. This poem is the seed / in a way, the heart of the solo show.

As I was writing the solo show, I thought the seed for the show was "too much" or for a lack of a better word preachy, and decided to water down the whole situation by making some stuff up to smooth over the story. And that's the version that was presented for the previews.

Now looking back, I should've written the truth man. What the fuck was I thinking? The truth hurts; but at the same time, there's so much pain/humor that comes from the truth. And that's where I am with the piece right now. Trying to write the truth, and from the heart. I've been getting a lot of feedback from people who came to watch the show. I'm now at a point where I'm reworking and rewriting the whole show. Hoping to write more shit that went down without feeling pressured or wondering if people will like/find these stories funny. Seriously, fuck what people think. Write the damn truth. That's why you started writing this in the first place. Don't think. Just do it.

In terms of production, finding the venue was the easiest because I rented out my acting school's studio theatre (The Barrow Group, wsup?) for two previews on May 6 and 7. Then came time to inviting people. Man, I wanted to make it special and not just a Facebook or email invite. So I brainstormed a list of people who I wanted to come see the show -- it's a list where, if I was to die the day after the previews, and these people saw the show, I would be happy type of situation. I texted/FB/emailed all the people on that list for their mailing addresses. Then I bought some red envelopes from Paper Source and even a golden sharpie to punk them into thinking I'm sending them a wedding invitation. (Wedding? No boo yet. Seriously, not now, not now. Still gotta hustle.) Then in late February/early March, I proceeded to follow-up and ask if people wanna come. Most said yes, some were busy for Mother's Day, and then some I asked over and over again / they still cannot make it. You're not my friend if you didn't come! (just kidding) I then found out that some invites never arrived at their doorsteps / got bounced back to my home -- two months after I sent it out. It broke my heart because I spent so much time writing each and every one of these invitations. USPS, why you gotta fail me for? 

I think the biggest thing that came out of this solo show preview was the pressure I received from my family. When my bro found out I'm putting a lot of my savings into production, he flipped the shit. He didn't understand why I'm spending so much money when I couldn't even guarantee if people are gonna come or not. He also doubted the fact that I can get 80 people to show up. Then my mom found out and said I should seriously look for a full-time job and stop dreaming about this shit cuz it won't get me anywhere. I felt hurt. These two people mean so much to me, and I felt like they were putting me down. I cried so much. I was so stressed out. I felt so unsupported. I didn't even know what to do and didn't not hang out with people for an entire month.

I eventually did, and I had one or two friends who were doubtful and said maybe I should set a deadline for myself for this whole acting thing. I felt crushed again. However, I have few friends (mainly Jenny) who was super supportive throughout the whole process. Always encouraged me, even when I doubted myself. I was going through so much, and what I really needed was just someone to hear me out, and that's what she did. (Thanks Jenny <3).

With all that said, the first two previews sold out by mid-March and I had people asking me whether tickets were still available. I decided to add another preview to my tech rehearsal on May 1 and 25 people came out for that.  

Now onto the preview itself: the first preview went well, and I measured it based on the amount of laughs. Second preview, I didn't get as many laughs and I was real nervous even as I was performing--like was I doing something wrong? A new friend, whom I met briefly back in the fall, came to watch the show. He's a seasoned comedian and wrote all over his hand and on napkins. I saw that during the show and thought I was in deep shit. He emailed me right after the show and said he got notes for me. I met with him the next day before the third preview for three hours and he told me all the high and low points of the show. I quickly did a rewrite and dropped all that "performing" shit, and presented a semi-more cohesive story to the third preview. People have been good with providing feedback (funnily enough, all the points hit the same mark), so I know for a fact which part I still gotta work on. Time to buckle down again.

I went through so much throughout this writing, producing, and performing process. Honestly, you have to perform it to know where the weak points of the storytelling falls, so I'm so so so glad I did these previews. 

And seriously, half of the battle is just doing it. The second half of the battle is getting wounded and learning how to get back up again. I'm getting back up and I'm for sure gonna keep kicking ass until I get this solo show in shape for the fall. I hope people will come to see it again to see its transformation.

It ain't over 'til it's over. It ain't over yet. Gonna keep trucking along.
THE HUSTLE NEVER SLEEPS, fo'real.

LAAPFF 2016

Got back from LA about a week ago, and boy oh boy did I miss home. There's something about NYC: the smell, the people, that cannot be found anywhere in LA. And no, not the urine smell. 

This trip to LA was ca-razy. Ok, so I booked the trip right before Christmas because I haven't been there since May 2014 and I was low-key missing that place. Every time I go, it's for work -- Kollaboration the first time, then LAAPFF for all the other times. Every time I go, I only stay for a few days; and this time, I stayed for 9 days. It's the longest I've been in El-to-the-Eyyy. I stayed with Ms. Grace Su, whom I met at the fest in 2013. Her crib is in Studio City, and she got a cute dog named Moki. I also met her ex-roomie's cute dog Chewie. Their love for dogs makes me wanna get one. Maybe I'll get a dog--most likely a cat though cuz they're more independent. Someday.

LAAPFF was amazing, as always. I had the pleasure of connecting with Abe again after always calling him frantically for advice on what films to look out for. He's always so real about what's in the pipeline. This year's selection is a bit real hard to choose from. All the good films I've been eyeing on got in more mainstream film festivals in NYC. It makes me so happy to see Asian American filmmakers make it beyond the APA film festivals, but a part of me is selfish. With that, I always secretly hope an APA film will go with AAIFF/LAAPFF/CAAMFest instead. Alas, filmmakers gotta do what they gotta do to keep moving up that ladder. Gotta meet different people and hopefully strike a bigger deal. That's the name of the game. That's real. That's reality, and I'm slowly beginning to accept it.

I had a sobering moment. Wait. I actually had many sobering moments throughout the trip.

Sobering moment # 1: I had the chance to go with Grace to her commercial callback, and when I was in that audition room, I felt something I've never really felt before. I don't know how to describe it. It was this type of hunger everyone has in the room. Everyone in the room is fighting for a few positions, and everybody in town is going for it. It made me realize it's a dog eat dog world out there.

Sobering moment #2: Acting is not acting alone, you must "know" people. I've always had that icky feeling about this fact. Mostly because I think if you're good, you'll eventually make it and compete for the coveted roles everybody else is fighting for. Sometimes your talent takes you in the door, but some/most of the time, it's who you know who can get you into that door. I'm still processing what this means. I guess I'll leave this thought here and revisit this some other time.

Sobering moment #3: Asian Pacific America is a universe still left to be defined and explored. There's so many different ethnicities and nationalities that make up the APA community. It's hard to define what really unites us. Maybe it's the shared sentiment that we're all here now, and we're all cobbling our lives together in this country. Our struggles may be different, but the experiences we go through might have some similarities. We're still all different though cuz we're all humans with different emotions and experience. What we need to do is: we gotta tell our own stories. We gotta support our filmmakers and storytellers (aka financial support), so that a good product can be made. We gotta start the pipeline now to show that it is possible to work in this industry.  

Sobering moment #4: You have to keep going. No one will be there to cheer you on. You are your own motivator. Create your own thing. You may fall, but you learn from your project. You must know how to stand up and keep going. 

Sobering moment # 5: You might make or be in a shitty film--how you deal with the feedback or the jobs you take after matters more. The key is to keep your craft sharp, so that when better opportunities arise, you step up to the plate.

Sobering moment #6: Miscommunication sucks and will leave you eating alone at the dinner table. Always confirm. 

Sobering moment #7: You don't have to drink to have fun. I stayed sober for most of the trip and I was surviving off adrenaline. I was completely jetlagged, so I still had to have my coffee. Now if only I can kick that addiction...

Sobering moment #8: LA's California produce and their restaurant's dedication to serving salads with every meal is key. Also the Korean food is so good. Also the beach is beautiful. The sun warms your soul. When the night falls, you better have a jacket with you.

All in all, this LA trip taught me so much about the industry--and life! If you don't see what you deserve, you better start making moves cuz nobody in the world is gonna hand you nothing. You gotta work for it. Earn it. Work so hard you cry at night, and the next morning when you wake up, you do it all over again. No shortcuts. 

I had crazy thoughts of giving up after going on this trip. But that thought only lasted for a split second. I guess I realized how hard it really is and was gonna throw in the towel, but I thought about why I stayed for so long. Gotta keep telling stories, cuz boy we got stories. 

DON'T GIVE UP! Gotta move through it. Gotta keep werkin'. Seriously, no shortcuts.

Keep going

Yes, those are tears. So last Thursday, I was washing veggies in prep for dinner and my phone ding'd. I ran over to check, and it was from NY International Fringe Festival. Omg, I thought. The email took a while to load, and I was like please load faster, please. Then it loaded, and I got the notification saying that I didn't make it in, again. 

It burned. I don't know why but it hurts a lot more this time compared to last year's rejection. I think it's because I spent so much time rewriting it and developing it, and I thought it will grow my chances of becoming a part of this Fringe community. Like I wanted to make it so bad. But I fell short. 

But I don't think I fell short though. I wrote a 3-dimensional Chinese American character. I'm sorry I didn't write about struggling with my identity or looking to repair my relationship with my mother/father/family. It seems like those are Asian American themes, and I didn't write within that "Asian American Joy Luck Club" box. Not all of us are going through that shit, ok?

What I have is a badass chick. Like if I didn't tell you she's Asian or Chinese, it could've been anyone (has to be a person of color) from an inner city public high school. Like she talks hood because that's where she's from. She ain't afraid to show it and can seriously fight you if you mess with her. (But trust me, she ain't about to get suspended).

My friend once told me to not pay attention to festivals because those festivals don't define who you are as an artist (thanks E!). You are an artist and you made that piece of art because you want to tell and share that story. Having it in a festival doesn't mean anything.  Just keep hustling. Keep going ~

I'll sign off by saying that I'm still going to put this out in a theatre, open for the public in the Fall. Yassss to self-producing. Gotta believe in yourself before you wreck yourself.

Watch out world! I'm comin for yaaaaa!  :-)

Tears

CAAMFest 2016

Abe Ferrer from LAAPFF, Haisong and I from AAIFF, and Masashi Niwano from CAAMFest. I love these people. <3

First off, welcome to my new website. It took a lot of time to consider switching from Wordpress to SquareSpace. Alas, I did. It is awesome.

I just got back to NYC from CAAMFest around Monday, March 14~ midnight. Ok, now's the real deal: it's hard for me to admit, but CAAMFest saved me in a lot of ways. Before the trip, I kept thinking back on 2014--the first time I was at CAAMFest--about how in awe I was at their production, at their community, and at their mass of folks who came out to attend the festival. In 2014, I attended the festival with Rémy Martin to work with them to follow through on a sponsorship deal. In 2016, I'm thrilled to say that I'm with the Asian American International Film Festival in NYC. I felt like a little girl squealing on the inside being there because there were so many people who are an important part of the Asian Pacific American community, whether in the arts, politics, or plain ol' community organizing.

Haisong and I in front of the Castro Theatre -- CAAMFest's Opening Night venue.

Haisong, the Program Manager for AAIFF, and I saw TYRUS, CAAMFest 2016's Opening Night Presentation. It was such a beautiful and touching film about Tyrus Wong, a painter and all around artist (he worked on Bambi but never got credited). He grew up at a time where not a lot of Asian Americans pursued the arts. He did it anyway because painting was something he loves to do. The crazy thing is: he's more than a hundred years old, and he was alive and there at the theatre! He's definitely an inspiration to all the artists out there because he said "I'm not that talented, but I work hard." Props to that!

Alright, I think now is a good time for me to make a confession. Aside from attending Opening Night, MASTER OF NONE Panel, Festival Social Club, Filmmakers' Brunch, Digital Media Panel, and FAST&FURIOUS TOKYO DRIFT, I completely wrote down the wrong date for the Programmers Meetup. That meeting was key, in that festival folks from SF, LA, Philly, Boston, and San Diego talked about programming and how we can all work together in whatever capacity. I was such a dweeb in that I wrote down the date as Sunday, March 13 at 2:30-3:30pm, but in actuality, it was on Saturday, March 12. That move was a total fail move. Til this day I feel guilty. Because I had so much to ask and so much to soak in. I guess I'll get notes from one of those guys. 

One of the highlights of CAAMFest was attending the MASTER OF NONE panel with Kelvin Yu and Alan Yang. I'm a huge fan of the show, so when news got out that the panel went to rush, and that there's no more industry tickets, I was like nooooo. I died a little on the inside. But luckily, I got in. (Thanks, Kelvin!) Just watching the PARENTS episode again and hearing them talk about their journey into acting/writing was pretty inspiring. Kelvin talked about how he held stereotypical roles and then one day realized the leading man can never be him, so he went into writing. Damn, that was real. Alan talked about his childhood, friendship with Aziz Ansari, shows he worked on over the years, and finally taking two years to craft and execute MASTER OF NONE. All their anecdotes remind me: making art and putting it out is a long and hard process / telling great stories = key.
One little crazy thing on this day: I bumped into Dari from Smith! OMG. Small freakin' world. She lives in SF now. She saw a film at CAAMFest and they announced the party at Slate. She came. We screamed cuz we haven't seen each other in such a long time. (Great seeing you Dari <3 :D)

Aside from CAAMFest, I took time to explore the Mission, the Castro, and revisit Chinatown. I saw Candy and Carmen from Smith, and Sabrina and Paul from UC PPIA. I haven't seen these people in almost two years, and I had a ball catching up with them. Not to mention, we had some great food and conversations. Mainly being almost going into our late twenties, where we're at in our careers right now, and how scary the future may seem.

So in the beginning of this blog post, I said CAAMFest saved me in many ways. I want to take time to write everything out. Before the trip, I had this weight on my shoulders. I don't know what it is, but I was stressed, anxious, and borderline feeling quite empty. What does doing work for Asian CineVision and writing that solo show really mean? I was lost. Really lost. Am I still at the same place I was in 2014? I kept thinking how I'm ever going to make a living doing both of these things I love. How can I explain it to my family and friends, and even if I explain it, will they understand? Everybody around my age, say 26 or 27 or 28, are finally settling into their jobs, traveling the world, or even getting married or at least boo'd up. I feel like I'm trailing so far behind in life. But then CAAMFest reminded me of something: it is the journey that matters. Art is a marathon, not a sprint. Art takes time. Life takes time. Time is now. Live in the present. Take it one day at a time. Ask for help. Stop worrying. Breathe. 

After this trip, I found a new sense of peace within me. The type of peace that allows me to know that everything is going to be okay. Everything, will be okay.

Hanging up the hat

Tonight I had an epiphany. Tonight is the premiere of FRESH OFF THE BOAT on ABC. AB fuckin' C. The network television station with millions of eyeballs--that ABC. It's crazy! There was a huge viewing party at the Circle NYC (typically an exclusive nightclub turned into a viewing room with over 1000 people in the house). It was crazy! There were many moments tonight where the idea of "this is just the beginning" was reiterated. And when Eddie Huang said he hopes this show will inspire others to tell their stories, I lost my shit. I teared up a bit. And when Jeff Yang in the end said that this is not about Eddie's life and about the community, I was like hell to the fuckin yeah!

To put everything into perspective, this is the 2nd time in American history where an Asian American family is featured. The first time was 20 years ago with Margaret Cho's ALL AMERICAN GIRL. 20 fuckin' years ago. That's a really long time. And for this show to come on, the term historic is an underestimated statement.

In a day and age when multi-culti or colorblindness is constantly preached, people need to realize this is a HUGE deal for the Asian American community. And hopefully this is only the beginning.

A lot of thoughts passed through my mind tonight. Most of it was damn; but a lot of other times was: how can I get there? This is and has always been in the back of my mind. I need to re-evaluate what I do, and I've been thinking about this for quite some time, but I'm seriously thinking about discontinuing the  Cantonese Lessons part of the YouTube channel. Maybe it'd be a space where I reflect about my acting career (yes, career!).

I need to focus and not let the outside noise drown out what I really want. I really want to fuckin tell stories through acting and write more stories about the Asian American experience. I really want to tell stories I can be proud of. So this means, I do less of other stuff. And I am cool with that.

I guess my whole intention with starting the channel is to be able to express myself and do something that can benefit others. But the hardest part is to find people who are interested in Cantonese Lessons. Has it been done before? Maybe. With a fuckin gong sound that gets my blood boiling out of the left field. I was trying hard to make it cool and to find people who will care.

Maybe it was the wrong platform. I tried many times, and this time, I'm finally hanging up the hat. I can't say that I never tried. I'll take a moment to take in all this and realize it's okay to try and fall. The only thing is, now when I stand up, I know what I want more than I did before. And that makes it all worth it. I learned a lot about myself through doing this YouTube thing. And I can say that I'm fuckin proud of myself. That's always been the hardest for me, to be at peace with myself. Heck, I still didn't show #mommalei the video, so shit. I'll show her tomorrow morning when she is at work. When she doesn't have to confront me and my decisions of what I want to do with my life. Someday she will come around.

So I'll be blogging once a week instead about acting. I hope you'll still continue to support this journey.

The takeaway: never stop the hustle or never stop dreaming.

Keep fighting

Today was an amazing day. Finished the short film we've been working on since the summer, and boy, that was an amazing fuckin' experience. Been through thick and thin with this project, and I'm so glad we finished the shooting part. Now the fun part begins--sound & editing. Can't wait for it to come together.

But first, on the experience. Met with the director a few times, rewrote the piece for a gazillion times over the past few months since May.. and still, there needs to be a final touch. Still trying to figure it out. And that's the fun part. The imagination, the point where can translate something we have in our minds into something on screen, and I think that's amazing. I didn't really know what it takes to make something like this, but this experience definitely taught me patience, and the fact that I still have a lot to learn.

Compared to everybody else that's in it right now, I'm still a young and hungry cat looking to see what's out there. I'm constantly searching, maybe soul-searching, to see what's the right fit. Sometimes I think to myself whether what I'm doing now is going to be worth it, but then again, I'm like fuck it, don't think, just do.

A part of me is still stuck between the community vs art route because the community gave me perspective, and I want to be a part of it. I spend a lot of my time thinking about these things because I try to latch on to something of value, and in the end, I don't think I've gained anything. It's terrible and sometimes it eats me up. I always question whether or not the community will be there in the end. I have a deep fear that the answer might not be what I want to hear.

But like my friend said, only you can take you far; only you know what you want most. I didn't even have words to respond to that in the morning. I was just processing his words, like damn, that motherfucker is right. (Excuse the language, been rererereading THE MOTHERFUCKER WITH THE HAT).

Out of all this, I asked myself throughout the day, what makes me come alive, and guess what? The crazy answer, to do art, to tell stories, and to act. Fuckin' crazy I tell ya, but if that's my short answer, that should be something I need to do for myself. Like right now. So I signed my ass up for an acting class in January. I can't fuckin' wait.

What are you most afraid of? What are you doing to conquer that fear?

That thread

It has been 3 years and some change since graduating from college. Time flies. I remember before I graduated from college, I had hopes of working in DC or going straight on to grad school. If you tell me back then I'll have a chance to work in government, I'll say, hey why not. If you tell me back then I'll end up shifting from gig to gig, I'll laugh. Everything I do now is considered a gig, not long term, and I can't really tell you what will happen next year during this time. Sometimes this uncertainty eats me up on the inside, but I know this is the path I took. I have to hold some sort of responsibility for it.

I'm back to working for the community. A nine-month gig doing voting rights. It started out real slow, and now, things are moving at the speed of light. Election Day cannot come sooner. I feel an obligation to do my best because I don't know if they will hire again.

I really like interacting with other folks who works for the community, in NY or elsewhere. I guess that's the thing college really taught me--it taught me how to think critically about the society we live in and how we can work to make it better. It's that thread, that sense of hope that things will get better if we work for it.

I still want to do acting and writing. It's just that I gotta save up enough money to survive when I don't work anymore. I write at night and on the train. I miss that part of me.

I don't know what will happen in a year from now, but all I know is that I still want to work in the community someway, somehow and do art. None of these pay well, but it's good for the soul.

Gotta keep trekking.

Monologue 8: Searching for My Mother

Whao, I totally forgot to post a blog entry for this monologue when I was done one and a half week ago.  This monologue is super special to me because I used it for college acting auditions.  When I was 17 and working with this monologue, I felt I had to be big in my breath and movement.  I had to "act" older and pretend to be a valley girl.  I definitely see some diva in her that i really liked. After working on my craft for a few months, I just look back at how silly I was to do it the way I did in 2006.  I definitely over exaggerated every line.  As I grow as a performer, I realized less is more -- this is a philosophy taught at The Barrow Group.

The City of Angels - Life Lesson: Nostalgia

For almost 5 years, i always wondered: when will i be able to visit LA?  After taking many risks this past year, I finally decided to book a trip to the city of angels. It will be my sixth time in California--I have been to San Francisco three times, San Diego & Santa Barbara once--but it'd be my first time in lala land!  I began to research different places to visit, or people I'd like to see/meet, especially those who have been influential to the Asian American community, for CineVue. In the end, I had the pleasure to speak with Abe & Anderson at Visual Communications, UCLA Professor Emeritus Robert Nakamura, and Giant Robot founder/owner Eric Nakamura. Though most of the interviews were for work, it didn't feel like i was working. It felt more like i was just speaking with friends who are passionate about the same things i do: APA identity formation, cinema, and the arts. We spoke about a lot of things, but some topics that stuck out to me was: how things have been done in the past, how technolgy changes the dynamics of storytelling, and how only true dedication and motivation can help you succeed--even if you have very little money.

In one instance, I asked the interviewee about the past and future, and he said he doesn't want to think about what was, or how it would be in the future; he just wants to focus on the present and do the best he can now. He also mentioned it is not good to be nostalgic because we have to move on forward and do things even better than what we have done in the past.  I consider this piece of advice a life lesson.

This life lesson still keeps me thinking because i am pretty nostalgic when it comes to a lot of things--especially when it comes to the APA community.  I always  geek out and go googoogaga over archival materials at work (stuff that happened almost 40 years ago!) and I think about what it was like back then.  I always compare the good ol' times and forget to look at what we have or can do now to make it as good as it was years ago.  From listening to those who have been working in the community for a long time, and how they work to accomplish smaller goals now instead of looking back, it really inspires me to do the same.

I need to start changing my mindset and focus more on the present & live in the moment.  I need to look in the past only for a point of reference, and not grow nostalgic over everything. Afterall, it's about pushing boundaries and forging forward.  So to nostalgia, so long!

My heart is in the arts.

I remember last year around this time, I had a mental breakdown because I couldn't figure out what I wanted to do with my life.  Maybe I was so anxious to know because in college, everything was so structured with a given deadline, that I, for one, thought there was a deadline to this thing called life.  So I went around and asked for advice in areas that strikes my interest.  It started with all professions deemed worthy, ranging from lawyers, to business folks, to professors/phd students from well known companies and institutions. I always ask about their journey:  how they got where they are today, if it was their passion, and if they were happy.  Most of the time, people tell me they are happy with their profession, but it took a long time to get there. One person, in particular, asked me what field i am interested in.  I said, "I don't know. A lawyer? A politician? I really want to work for the community."

Looking back now, it is a quite funny how i associate community work with being a lawyer or politician. Is that a default answer for all aspiring organizers? When I said, "I don't know," I actually did know what I wanted to do, but was always afraid to say or admit it. What if others laugh at my dreams? My dream is always to work for the community, and become an actor and writer. I rarely tell anyone though because what if I fail?  I struggled from within tremendously while working for Congresswoman Velazquez with this question; but after being surrounded with older co-workers and listening to stories of constituents' lives, I began to realize life is too short to live up to someone else's expectations.  And so, I worked up the courage to admit to myself that being an organizer and artist is what I want to do for the rest of my life.

At this point, when I compare myself now to who I was one year ago, I see a huge gap. I see myself grow in ways I never imagined. I am still shocked at how I made these decisions without worrying about consequences.  I am not making any kind of big bucks or rocking brand names, but I am at a really happy place right.  I cannot wait to see what is in store for the next year, and many more to come.  And I hope to use this blog as a way to document the journey along the way.