12/5

From Vivian Ng:
How did you choose your show and tell hobby/object for your Telling Your
Story Presentation?

From Sarah Wong:
What did you learn from taking this class? Are you going to take other ICS classes to learn more about Asian Americans?

From Kumi Kirihara:
What did you learn from other people's presentations, telling your story? Did
you find any interests?

11/30

From Bryan Ly:
What was the most interesting and most horrifying thing you have learned about asian
american history in this class? Why?

From Joseph Choe:
In "Getting Real," Paul Kim encounters a person who
brings up the idea that Korean store owners in South Central LA treat
customers as if they were thieves. The store owners were said to watch and
yell at the customers. "There's no recognition of their status as customers
and your status as the merchant trying to sell something." Do you think the
Korean store owners are justified? Consider the circumstances: the
neighborhoods are rough and life is hard for the grocers. They work long
hours and make very little profit if any at all.

11/29

From Aaren Alvaro: Why do you think that some Asian Americans consider light complexion as a factor of superiority?

From RM: How is education important to the Korean merchant, and what are things that Youn Jae Kim is trying to do to help the Korean merchant?

From Aileen: Pages 137-141.  Do you think that discrimination has changed?  What are those changes?

From Jose: Pages 137-141.  Why is there a lot of racial discrimination back then?  What factors add up to the current discrimination in society?

11/25

From Jeanalyn Artajos:
When was the first time you ever encountered racism? Was it racism against you, someone you know, or love? If the racism was towards someone else, how did that person feel and how does it affect them today? If it was towards you, how did you feel and how has it affected you today? What story or reading have we encountered where it is similar to your first encounter of racism?

From Heesook Park:
What do you think about Korean Americans? Do you have any negative or positive image about the Koreans?

11/22

From Fang Chun:
In the poem, "When I was Growing Up," what are the reasons that make Nellie Wong want to be white?

From Erick Tran:
How would you feel if after reading these sets of poems, you found out that the building that held these poems on the walls, on Angel Island was destroyed? What would that tell you about American culture/government?

11/17

From Joshua Wang: Why do you think Edgar Ramirez's peers choose to discriminate against him based on his sexual orientation? Do you think a comparison of gentalia size is an appropriate response?

From Jose Dilig: Where in society does the speaker in Nellie Wong's poem "When I Was Growing Up" (111) belong? Is there anywhere she can fit in?

11/16

From Brian Truong:
Regardless if you are korean or not, how do you feel about the 429 riots in LA. What
if you  were put in that position as a shop keeper and how would you react?  Would
you yourself bring a gun and shoot the shop lifters or figure out a different
solution?

November 8

From Stephen Nguyen:
In 1942 what was the reason for the Japanese American Internment and how did it
work out?

From Manami Sugiyama:
How has learning about the Asian American history so far in this class shaped
the way you see yourself, as well as the Asian American community that surrounds
you?

Yamashita Reading

From Shon Mordo: What would you do if you were in Gerald's position? Would you approach the head of the university? If so, how would you approach him, i.e. passionately and angrily like Gerald, or would you calmly debate him on the merits of your position?

From Aaren Alvaro: How would you interpret Yamashita's actual reading of I-Hotel and the one from the reader?

From Chris Kimma, on page 61 of the reader: "Nick paid our whole month's rent, which was ten dollars for the five of us in the small room. But one night Jose came to our room with a Mexican girl and asked for the rest of Nick's money. 'I would like to have twenty-five dollars.' Jose said to his brother, looking at the girl morosely. 'What for?' Nick asked. 'Lupe wants and abortion,' Jose said."

Twenty-five dollars was two and a half months rent, why would the rest of the
five staying in the room allow Jose to take the money and risk living out on the
streets? Was it Filipino culture to marry someone you got pregnant? They seemed
to be living a pretty rough life, why wouldn't they just leave the Mexican woman
on her own?

November 1

From Jose Dilig: Page 59 of America Is In the Heart, did Luz find out what Jose did to his girl?  Or did the girl tell Luz of what happened?

From RM: "It was cold at night and when morning came the fog was so thick it was tangible.  But it was a safe place and it was far from the surveillance of vigilantes.  Then from nearby El Centro, the center of Filipino population in the Imperial Valley, news came that a Filipino labor organizer had been found dead in a ditch."  Who do you think killed the Filipino labor organizer?

From Tiana Steck: What was the Asiatic Barred Zone?

From Aileen Cabanban: "Living in Delano from the early 1940s on, I discovered that there were all sorts of rackets going on" (73).  What are those rackets?

From Jeanlyn Artajos: What is the significance of the poem "Without Names"?

From Patrick Pham: How would modern YouTube videos help us learn about Asian American Culture?

From Kumi Kirihara: What happened in the event "Third World Student Strike"?  What are the results of the "Third World Student Strike"?

Blog for 10/27

From Fang Chun: Do you think it is a good idea for the US government to compensate certain minority groups who were treated unequally in the past? Why or why not?

From Heesook Park: Why did Carlos decide to go to Imperial Valley?

From Brian Vo: Were the white men jealous of the Filipinos that married caucasian women?

From Danielle Wong: Have you ever been racially discriminated against?

Blog for 10/25, America is in the Heart

From Joseph Choe:  Why did Alfred stop Allos (Reader 67)?

From Joshua Wang: What did you think of Olivia's presentation?

From Susan Nguyen: How would you feel if you had to go door to door to find a job?

From Sarah Wong: Why did they take Estevan in (Reader 61)?

From Brian Ly: "I will never let them touch me with their filthy hands!  I will never let them make a domestic animal out of me" (Reader 63)!  What does he mean by a domestic animal?

October 13 - October 18

From Brian Truong: How do you feel about the quiz?

From James McDonald: How is Lynda Barry an Asian American author?

From Erick Tran: How does Li-Young Lee's approach in telling his poems affect your take on it?

From Patrick Pham: How would the new quiz experiment help us learn, or not learn?

"The sickness took away the strength of one of Dawb's legs, as well as her obedience. I know that high on her thigh there is a scar, a curve on her skin like the face of a silent moon--a sad, hidden moon. She played outside after dark. She stopped listening to my parents. Whenever we passed the small noodle shop on the red dirt road that cut across the camp, she would ask for food. I never asked, because I knew that if my parents bought Dawb noodles, they would buy me a bowl, too." (pg 60)

In the last sentence "I never asked, because i knew that if my parents bought Dawb noodles, they would buy me a bowl , too ." Does Kao Kalia Yang sound selfish of herself?

The Latehomecomer (continued)

From Christine Hirose:

"My father's voice, usually deep and even, sounded strange to my ears.  In English, his voice lost its strength.  The steadiness was gone; it was quiet and hesitant.  Did all Hmong voices lose the strength of their voices in English?  I hoped not.  I noticed that the people, even the women, were taller than my father.  In the camps, he had been a good height for a man.  In that hallway, he said the words again and again and the people didn't seem to notice he was speaking to them.  We stood there trying." (118)

What was your experience like speaking another language (in the USA or travels)?  How did it make you feel? (Voice)

The Latehomecomer, Parts I, II and III

From Shon Mordo:

"We are so fortunate to be young, new lives opening before us, they believed.  And yet the life in school that opened before me made me feel old in a world that was struggling to be young.  A silence grew inside of me because I couldn't say that it was sometimes sad to be Hmong, even in America." (151)

Compare Kao Kalia Yang's experiences with immigration to the US with her grandmother's experiences.

From Brian Truong, in reference to Part II, pages 84-85:

How would you feel about your father looking for another wife?

From Vivian Ng, in reference to page 36, the scene of crossing the river:

Why didn't the brothers give money to Yang's father?

From Patrick Bacungan:

"I was feeling a strong push to reinvent myself.  Without my realizing, by the time high school began, I had a feeling in the pit of my stomach that I had been on simmer for too long" (197).

Why did Kao want to suddenly reinvent herself?  What was she describing when she talked about the pit in her stomach?

From Sherwin Mendoza:

What makes education hard for Kao Kalia Yang?

The Latehomecomer, Part I (continued)

From Christina Dao:

"When they reached the compound, they noticed the wire fence, as tall as two men standing on each other's shoulders.  They were told to get out of the bus and enter the gates.  My family hesitated before the entrance; they had escaped from one country and had not expected to be captives in the next.  My father's feet stilled.  A Thai soldier punched him and he fell to the ground.  The man kicked him.  My father got up as fast as he could.  Not to hit the man back, but because he did not want my mother and grandmother to see him on the ground.  My father looked at the man and did nothing." (44)

Why did he punch him?

From Christen Kinsman:

"On March 5, 1979, in the early morning hours, my mother gave birth to my sister Dawb, the Hmong word for white.  To have pale skin in a life lived outside was a valuable quality then, a sign of beauty in a culture dominated by sun-tarnished skin.  An aunt said that Dawb would be a good name for a little girl who was born beautiful in an enemy camp.  It did not cross any of their minds that dawb was also the color of surrender.  If anyone had remembered that white was the color of the flag that had danced in my grandmother's hands, maybe my sister would have received a name that she would have liked better.  When Dawb was born, my mother did not receive the friend she had wanted, but someone who needed her love desperately." (30)

What does this passage say about what colors mean?

From Joshua Bendanillo:

"An expression on one man's face is the memory my mother and father both carry, even twenty-five years after the fact: it was only a look, but it said that we were not human, too poor to walk on the earth.  It was in that image of that Thai man with his red-and-white turban wrapped around his head, looking at them making their way into his country, that my mother and father learned what it meant to be poor, to be without a home or clothing to hide in." (43)

What was the significance of that glance at that moment that they realized they were poor?  The power behind a look or glance?

The Latehomecomer, Prologue and Part I

From Janice Sapigao:

This question refers to the following quotation:  "As they approached the outskirts of the village, my mother started to worry.  She wanted her pack back.  What if there were Hmong people inside the camp?  What if people started thinking bad things about her character?  She was a prisoner but also a married woman.  She knew why he was carrying her bag" (24-25).

Why did she know why he was carrying her bag?

From Jenny Kim:

"The young woman slowly unleashed the flood of Hmong into language, seeking refuge not for a name or a gender, but a people" (4).

What does this quotation from the end of the prologue mean?

Introductions

Please write a few sentences in the comments section below to introduce yourself to the class.

Kelly Zen-Yie Tsai's "Making Guacamole"

What are three words in the poem that jump out at you? - Sherwin