Newsom’s Priority for Hydra Mendoza
November 27, 2006
Could there be a Los Angeles-San Francisco “education” gubernatorial democratic contest in 2010?
Mayor Gavin Newsom’s “first priority” in this November’s voting is to elect his education adviser Hydra Mendoza to the school board, according to Newsom chief strategist Eric Jaye last week. The ex-S.F. Parents for Public Schools executive director has a shot at being the first Filipina American, and the first Filipino American since Dick Cerbatos and Rod McLeod served in the 1980s.
L.A. SCHOOLS: Eric Jaye’s remark came a day after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law giving greater L.A. school system control to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, also a possible gubernatorial candidate like Newsom in 2010.
S.F. SCHOOLS: A Hydra Mendoza loss, combined with losing appointee Heather Hiles in a 2004 school board election, could undermine Newsom’s opportunity to weigh in on education policy. The outcomes of two vacancies (Eddie Chin and Sarah Lipson) and incumbent Dr. Dan Kelly, who is in a tough race, could also determine the ruling majority and future of Interim Superintendent Gwen Chan. The district is nearly one-half Asian American, which is a key Newsom re-election and financial base next year or governor in 2010.
BOND GLUE: Growing support of Prop. A, a $450 million school bond, has been attributed to a less-polarizing superintendent in Chan. Myong Leigh, SFUSD public policy and planning director, said, “The level of acrimony … seems to have died down. … The bond has really been a unifying project for all of us.”
SHHH! MY MOM IS VICE PRINCIPAL: Gwen Chan recalled life as a vice principal: “My oldest son [Darren] didn’t like the fact that I was assigned to Washington after he was assigned to Washington. He wanted a ride to school. But I had to let him off three blocks away. … By junior year, he was coming around to my office, borrowing money, using the phone and getting a hall pass.”
‘K’ FOR KAMALA & KIM: Meanwhile, Chinatown Community Development Center’s Jane Kim — potentially the first Korean American school board member — broadened her base with the support of democrat District Attorney Kamala Harris. Kamala is usually synonymous with democratic establishment liberal politics formerly led by friend Willie Brown, not the Green or progressive democratic anti-establishment politics of Kim’s supporters like Japantown Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi and Public Defender Jeff Adachi. … LET’S PLAY TWO: City College teacher Wilma Pang is now running for two offices — S.F. school board, and also bidding to become the first woman to head the Yeung Wo Association — one of the six associations with the Chinese Six Companies. … THE ROOKIE: Bob Toomey’s wife Cynthia speaks Visayan (Filipino dialect) to their four hapa kids. Toomey impressively has nearly swept all the central committee members for the S.F. Democratic Party endorsement. … POLITICAL GENE POOL: Human Rights Commission staffer and school board candidate Bayard Fong sports colorfully loud neckties and family ties — he’s cousin to ex-California Secretary of State March Fong Eu through his grandfather via Jungshan province in China.
Know the Reel ‘Tokyo Rose’
November 27, 2006
Anyone who says the stereotypical portrayals of Asians in American movies has little impact on the culture at-large needs only to look at the 1946 film Tokyo Rose.
At the time, it helped shape the false image of Iva Toguri, aka Tokyo Rose, as a manipulative traitor to the American cause.
Byron Barr played fictional American GI Pete Sherman, who is captured by the Japanese during World War II. He is made to appear on Tokyo Rose’s radio program to demoralize the American troops, but instead heroically escapes and leads a group of Japanese rebels (veteran actor Keye Luke) to kidnap Tokyo Rose (Japanese-Hawaiian Lotus Long) to stop her broadcasts.
In post-war America, the reel story of Tokyo Rose had a profound influence on the real Iva Toguri.
Although military police had already cleared Toguri of any treason, the pressure to scapegoat became so intense that President Truman made an example of her in 1948. It was the most expensive trial in U.S. history at the time, and it took two decades before she was officially pardoned, and the government admitted a “grave miscarriage of justice.”
Leading the charge to prosecute Toguri was influential columnist Walter Winchell, who made it his mission to attack Toguri and the government for being “lax” on traitors, often citing the film.
This guilt by the media has been perpetuated to this day. I recall when I was working with students in the Asian American studies program. All of the students, including the Asian American ones, believed that Toguri was a traitor.
They didn’t know about her presidential pardon. They didn’t know she was forced to make her broadcasts against her will. They didn’t know that the POWs considered her a hero for taking care of them. They didn’t know that the two main witnesses in her trial later admitted they lied under pressure from the government.
Although everyone from documentary filmmakers (Bill Kurtis was the first) to journalists has stepped up in the past four decades to set the record straight, there hasn’t been a narrative film since 1946 to do the same. But, that may soon change.
Even before Toguri’s death, there were at least two projects in development.
The first is the big-budget Hollywood version by director Frank Darabont (The Shawshank Redemption) with writer Christopher Hampton (Dangerous Liasons) for Paramount Pictures. The other is veteran Japanese American actor George Takei’s own production entitled Tokyo Rose: American Patriot. His version will take the more independent route with a modest $5 million budget.
“It’s a compelling mission for me,” Takei said in 2004. “I met [Iva] back in the ‘70s, and I’ve been kind of nurturing this project for some time. I believe the best way for Iva to clear her name is with a theatrical feature film.”
The film business being what it is, it’s impossible to say when or if these will ever make it to our multiplexes. But here’s hoping for the best. We owe it to Iva Toguri.
Bad Election Year for Vietnamese Politicians
November 24, 2006
Eighteen Vietnamese American candidates ran for office in California this election season, and only three won (all incumbents).
In California, where the largest Vietnamese population outside of Vietnam resides, political participation has long been a nourished dream of Vietnamese. In recent years, Little Saigon in Orange County has successfully elected a handful of Vietnamese city councilmen and a state assemblyman.
Many Vietnamese Americans have been stunned by the defeat this year of so many candidates. They attribute much of the loss to the scandal over congressional candidate Tan Nguyen’s participation in sending out letters to Latino voters discouraging them from casting ballots.
“Nguyen is a popular last name, and although many other candidates had nothing to do with Tan Nguyen’s tactics, they share in the blame,” says Thai Tran, a voter in Orange County. “I’m afraid that some Hispanic voters voted to punish the Vietnamese community as a whole.”
Duc Ha, editor of Oneviet.com, says the friendly relationship that Little Saigon worked hard to build with Hispanic communities in California “is now shattered.”
Tan Nguyen lost to incumbent democratic Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez by 24 points. John Duong, another republican, lost by 20 points in his bid for mayor of Irvine.
Re-elected were Van Tran, for state assembly (61.8%), Lan Quoc Nguyen (36.8%), for Garden Grove Unified School District, and Andy Quach (30%), for Westminster City Council.
Longtime community activist Linh Vu notes that in San Jose, where Vietnamese American voters are a formidable voting bloc, both mayoral candidates — Chuck Reed and Cindy Chavez — courted the community aggressively. “The Vietnamese American community views the two … on their personality and display of loyalty more than on the issues of which they stand.” Reed, a Vietnam vet who understands the political passion of the Vietnamese community, won. Political power is not simply having a Vietnamese face, but access.
In Orange County, incumbent Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez has championed human rights in Vietnam, fighting for the release of political prisoners and earning the trust of Vietnamese Americans over the years.
Newspaperman De Tran, back in San Jose, says that he’s not disappointed with the election results.
“I don’t think this is a setback. You keep having to have more candidates every electoral season. Maybe the new groups will be better prepared next time around, more savvy with coalition building,” Tran says. “The Vietnamese community sees the Cuban community in Florida as a model, one with growing political and economic influences and lobbying power. Eventually there’ll be many Vietnamese American candidates out of Florida, Texas and California.”
Lame Duck Board Snubs APA JROTC Supporters
November 24, 2006
SAN FRANCISCO — A lame duck school board last week voted to phase out the San Francisco Unified School District’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps, a program whose 1,600 cadets are nearly three-quarters Asian American. The packed meeting was closed to hundreds more listening to a live meeting broadcast outside and inside school district headquarters. Read more
Conference Unites Asian Students Nationwide
November 24, 2006
When UC Berkeley student Deoborah Tu thinks about the National Asian American Student Conference, she smiles.
“One of my best memories about NAASCon is just sitting at a table in a restaurant with friends I met through the conference and just talking,” said Tu. “The remarkable thing … is that you feel like you’ve known these people much longer than you actually have.” Read more
Nation Briefs
November 24, 2006
Minn. Asians Nearly Match Whites in Success
MINNEAPOLIS — Asians living in Minnesota, thanks in part to an emerging Hmong middle class, have pulled nearly even with whites in economic success. Read more
Global Briefs
November 24, 2006
Thumb-Thing for The Record Books
SINGAPORE — A Singaporean student broke the Guinness World Record for the shortest time needed to type a 160-character SMS message after whizzing through the task in less than 42 seconds in a competition. Read more
Arts Briefs
November 24, 2006
‘The Cave of the Yellow Dog’
EVENT: The Cave of the Yellow Dog by Byambasuren Davaa
DESCRIPTION: Film set in the Mongolian steppes about a child in a nomadic clan of shepherds who finds a stray dog and tries to hide it from her father.
DETAILS: $6.25-$9.50, now playing, call for showtimes, Christopher B. Smith Rafael Film Center, 1118 4th St., San Rafael.
CONTACT: (415) 454-1222, www.cafilm.org
Lewis Suzuki Open Studio
EVENT: Japanese American watercolor artist open studio
DESCRIPTION: Known for watercolors on a wide range of subjects, from seascapes to barns, nudes to abstract flowers. Lewis Suzuki has also done paintings of the Guilin mountains, squatters in Manila and China’s Li river.
DETAILS: Free, Saturdays and Sundays, through Dec. 17, 11 a.m. – 6 p.m., Suzuki Studio, 2240 Grant Street, Berkeley.
CONTACT: (510) 849-1427, mbonzo@earthlink.net
Celebration of Craftswomen
EVENT: The Women’s Building 28th Annual Celebration of Craftswomen
DESCRIPTION: Buy unique handmade crafts and art pieces by over 300 female artists (including 13 APAs) and support programs for women and girls.
DETAILS: $6-8, Dec. 2-3, 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Herbst Pavilion at Fort Mason Center, Buchanan St. and Marina Blvd., San Francisco.
CONTACT: (415) 431-1180 ext. 15, www.celebrationofcraftswomen.org
‘The Blood of Yingzhou District’
EVENT: The Blood of Yingzhou District directed by Ruby Yang
DESCRIPTION: Uncles of an HIV positive orphan in rural China must decide what to do with him after his parents die of AIDS. Features a post-screening discussion with the filmmakers and AIDS activist Humphrey Wou.
DETAILS: $6-8, Nov. 27, 6:30 p.m., Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 701 Mission St., San Francisco.
CONTACT: www.ybca.org
Barangay Dance Workshops
EVENT: Barangay Dance Workshops
DESCRIPTION: Learn fundamental Philippine dance movements with a focus on cordillera (mountain dances).
DETAILS: Free, Fridays through Dec. 15, 7-9:30 p.m., S.F. Dance Center, 26 7th St., San Francisco.
CONTACT: (415) 334-0867, www.barangay.org
Lodestone Presents ‘TeleMongol’
EVENT: TeleMongol
DESCRIPTION: A collaboration of top Asian American comedy groups, this sketch comedy is set at a fictional Asian American cable network, skewering everything from the issues faced by ethnic media to William Hung and Kim Jong-Il.
DETAILS: $11-15, through Dec. 17, Thu. – Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 3 p.m.; GTC Burbank, George Izay Park, 1111-B W. Olive Ave., Burbank.
CONTACT: (323) 993-7245, www.lodestonetheatre.org
Ansel Adams At Manzanar
EVENT: Ansel Adams at Manzanar
DESCRIPTION: Over 50 original prints from one of America’s most famous photographers, documenting life in an American concentration camp in Inyo County, Calif., during World War II. Includes intimate portraits and photographs on inmates working outdoors with the backdrop of the Sierra Nevada Mountains.
DETAILS: $4-8, through Feb. 18, Sun., Tue., Wed., Fri., Sat., 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.; Thu., 11 a.m. – 8 p.m.; Japanese American National Museum, 369 E. 1st St., Los Angeles.
CONTACT: (213) 625-0414, www.janm.org
Yamaguchi Inducted into Culinary Board
Chef Roy Yamaguchi, creator of 33 Roy’s restaurants worldwide, was inducted into the Board of Trustees of The Culinary Institute of America, where he graduated 30 years ago. Yamaguchi is known for his Hawaiian fusion cuisine featuring Asian spices and European sauces with a focus on seafood.
"I’m honored to have the opportunity to give back to the institution that has in so many ways contributed to my success and to the world-class status that American chefs enjoy today," Yamaguchi said.
Yamaguchi has hosted six seasons of the PBS TV show Hawaii Cooks with Roy Yamaguchi, and has published three cookbooks. He is also a frequent guest chef on the Home Shopping Network, where his signature line of cookware is showcased.
‘Velveteen Rabbit’ Features APA Dancers
Three Asian American dancers are featured in ODC/Dance’s annual holiday production, The Velveteen Rabbit, showing through Dec. 10 at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts.
Yayoi Kambarra was born in Tokyo and raised in the Bay Area and England. This is her second season with ODC.
Daniel Santos was born in Manila and grew up in San Jose. He began studying dance at age 18 under Dennis Marshall and attended the San Francisco Ballet School. He joined ODC in 2002.
Quilet Rarang began ballet training in the Philippines at age 11. In the U.S., she has worked with Jigsaw Dance Collective and Redlands Ballet. She joined ODC in 2005.
George Takei Visits ‘Art of Gaman’
Actor George Takei visited the Art of Gaman exhibit at San Francisco’s Museum of Craft and Folk Art. The exhibit chronicles the artistic expressions made by Japanese American internees forced into camps by the U.S. government following the Pearl Harbor attack.
Takei, known for his role as Sulu in Star Trek, was interned as a child along with his family in two camps. Takei will return to the Bay Area in February when he will star in the Philip Kan Gotanda play, Yankee Dawg You Die, presented by the Asian American Theatre Company.
Murakami Receives Franz Kafka Literary Prize
PRAGUE, Czech Republic — Japanese author Haruki Murakami received the prestigious Franz Kafka Prize, awarded to authors whose works of exceptional artistic qualities are found to appeal to readers regardless of their origin, nationality and culture, just as the works of Franz Kafka.
Murakami was chosen by an international jury to win the 6th annual Kafka prize, given by the Franz Kafka Society. Murakami will receive a small statue of Kafka by Czech artist Jaroslav Rona and $10,000.
A former jazz bar manager, Murakami burst onto Japan’s literary scene in 1987 with a hugely popular experiment with realism, Norwegian Wood. Since then, he has won acclaim, as well as a huge literary following, both in Japan and abroad. His works have been translated into some 35 languages.
Past winners of the Kafka prize include Philip Roth, and Nobelists Elfriede Jelinek and Harold Pinter.
Bay Briefs
November 24, 2006
Transition Forum For Neighborhood Schools
EVENT: For parents with children starting kindergarten or 6th grade in fall 2007, sponsored by Wu Yee Children’s Services and Chinatown Beacon Center
DESCRIPTION: Learn how to choose your child’s school and meet principals and teachers from Chinatown neighborhood schools.
DETAILS: Free, Nov. 27, 6 p.m., Gordon J. Lau Elementary School Auditorium, 950 Clay St.; Dec. 4, 6 p.m.; Spring Valley Elementary School Cafeteria, 1451 Jackson St., San Francisco.
CONTACT: (415) 354-0187 (English/Spanish) or (415) 391-4890 ext. 28 (Chinese)
Computer Classes At JCCCNC
EVENT: Two 3-week-long computer classes in Japanese
DESCRIPTION: Graphics file management: learn to manage photos, change file names and resize photos, basic Internet (course prerequisites: PC basics or equivalent): web surfing, search engines and e-mail accounts.
DETAILS: $70-80, Graphics File Management: Tue. and Thu., 1-3 p.m., through Dec. 7; basic Internet: Wed., 1-4 p.m., through Dec. 6; JCCCNC, 1840 Sutter St., San Francisco.
CONTACT: (415) 567-5505
APA Groups Monitor 200 Calif. Polls
Chinese for Affirmative Action and the Asian Pacific American Legal Center led an unprecedented coordinated effort to monitor nearly 200 polling places in the Bay Area and Southern California during the Nov. 7 general election.
Observations by trained poll monitors indicate polling sites failed to provide translated voting materials and bilingual poll workers as required by law.
"For many limited English proficient voters, access to language assistance is the determining factor in whether they can cast a ballot," said Luna Yasui, CAA policy director.
Some preliminary findings from San Francisco reveal that 44 of 96 polling sites monitored did not have Chinese and Spanish multilingual voter guides. Monitors also observed poll workers who indicated they would simply "speak very slowly" to voters in need of language assistance.
Statewide Poll of APA Voter Opinion
The Asian Pacific American Legal Center of South California and the Asian Law Caucus announced the results of one of the largest multilingual surveys of voter opinion conducted in California.
The poll found broad support in the state’s two most populous regions for Prop. 1C, the housing bond, and Prop. 1D, to increase school spending. Asian Americans also strongly supported increasing tobacco taxes to fund health care. A majority of Los Angeles Asian Americans voted in favor of Prop. 85, requiring parental notification of abortions, but only a minority of Asian American voters in San Francisco and Oakland.
In Los Angeles, Asian Americans were divided over the governor’s race, but in San Francisco and Oakland, Asian American voters favored Phil Angelides.
On immigration, 68% of Asian American voters expressed support for a legalization program for undocumented immigrants.
Asian Voters Used Ranked Choice Voting Extensively
A District 4 exit poll by the Asian Law Caucus showed that Asian voters favored, understood and used ranked choice voting in the Nov. 7 election.
Jew came in first in the first round of vote tabulating, and won a majority as subsequent rounds were counted.
The poll showed that Asians overwhelmingly favored ranked choice voting, with 66% of Asian voters finding it helpful, compared to just 57% of non-Asian voters. Eighty-two percent of Asians had taken advantage of ranked choice voting.
Malcolm Yeung, staff attorney at the Asian Law Caucus, suggested that Jew’s success showed possible backlash by Asian voters against negative campaigning. "Doug Chan and Jaynry Mak supporters avoided the other candidate as their second choice and went for Jew instead," Yeung said.
Creating Masculinity
November 24, 2006
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From prizefighting to flashy wardrobes, Filipino men in Los Angeles found their own ways to masculinize themselves while faced with an emasculating mainstream white culture.
Linda Espana-Miram’s new book, Creating Masculinity in Los Angeles’s Little Manila: Working-Class Filipinos and Popular Culture, 1920s-1950s, documents how Filipinos first hung out in the gambling dens of Chinatown to both erect a stronger masculine sense of themselves, as well as to find a way to make money when racist economies forced them out of the workforce.
"Because gambling held possibilities of winning supplemental funds, [it] became one way of redefining the American dream," writes Espana-Miram.
Half the combined wages of all Filipinos in California in the 1930s were lost in the gambling dens and most arrests by police were for gambling.
But after Chinatown was demolished, a new source of betting arose with the emergence of the prizefight.
Boxing matches allowed Filipinos to bet on other Filipino fighters who emerged as champions. "Unlike fan-tan and lotteries, boxing highlighted the brown male body by giving it the pivotal role.
"As athletes, [fighters like the Bolo Puncher] challenged the stereotype of the ‘little brown brother’ uttered by the colonizers in their homeland, and the image of the dirty, lazy ‘brown monkey’ deployed in the racist language of their adopted country," says Espana-Miram.
Even reading about the fights became a source of morale among Filipino men. "Through [their] narratives, Filipino workers codified ideals of Filipino masculinity. [For example,] Garcia, outnumbered 50 to 1, relying on his wits and raw muscle, fought undaunted and emerged victorious," writes Espana-Miram.
While throwing punches might appear to be a reductive way of achieving masculinity, these men didn’t live in a theoretical world. Their American world fought to diminish them in every way. And their attempt to fight back was real and practical. "Because validation by, and comparison with other men is salient in defining potency, confronting challenges was crucial," says Espana-Miram.
The taxi dance halls assembled such a collective memory; though not through physical ferocity, but through a highly individualized and communally hipster style.
According to Espana-Miram, these dance halls weren’t just about Filipino working men squandering their wages to dance with white women. The dance halls were also places where Filipinos could define and reclaim their own bodies. "In the dance halls, Filipino workers developed a dynamic alternative subculture where they celebrated the body attired in McIntosh suits, expensive formal attire with padded shoulders and wide lapels worn by some of Hollywood’s most famous leading men, such as William Powell."
Elements of style became a signpost of masculinity, as if a hyper-masculine drive drove so far that it became fashionista femme.
The Filipino men were flashy and wore flamboyant colors to express "passion, arousal, and sexual bravado," Espana-Miram writes. They were well-groomed, polite and knew how to entertain the women who were paid to entertain them. There were instances of mutual attraction, and dates were made. Of course, taxi dancers who dated Filipino men were called "nigger lovers." Oh, how threatening a sense of style can be.
Creating Masculinity gives a whole new meaning to the saying, "Clothes make the man." While whites addressed men of color as "boy," zoot-suiters addressed each other as "man." This term, of course, has been appropriated into common slang, and its historical reasons forgotten.
For immigrants who were perceived to be poor and "dirty," dressing up in ultra-clean, neat clothes was an act of subversion. Just like a prizefighter with a killer hook, nothing could touch you if you were wearing a snazzy tie that no woman could resist complimenting, or so the logic must have gone.
Campaign 2006 In Review
November 24, 2006
Campaign 2006 was a good one overall for Asian Pacific Americans. Here is a quick overview of what happened:
The APA contingent in Congress grew. Sen. Daniel Akaka was re-elected in the Senate, as were members of Congress Honda, Jindal, Matsui and Wu. While Tammy Duckworth narrowly lost the chance to represent the people of Illinois’ 6th Congressional District, former Lt. Governor Mazie Hirono won Patsy Mink’s former seat. Read more
Proof That Whites Inherently Hate Us
November 24, 2006
White people hate us and will always hate us. Here is a simple list of evidence, going from the most obvious down to the least obvious: Read more