AA Identity

Asian American Identity.

I was in Taiwan last month and we were eating with my mom's NJ friend who happened to be in Taiwan at the same time. She was saying how she bought so many cheap good-looking clothes in Taiwan, and telling me that I should go shopping too.

I was like: it's okay 
But she kept pushing. She recommended some hair clip as well, that looked really asian.
Eventually, something came out of my mouth that surprised even myself, and a few tears rolled out as well.
I was like: I don't like things that look too Asian
She said: You're just like [my daughter]. She says that too
Then I explained: It's because we're already Asian American. We already don't really fit in with white people and also don't really fit in with Asians, so we don't want to make it worse by looking too fob.

We were waiting for a table at a restaurant, and this family friend was just trying to suggest something simple, like shopping, and then I was like tearing.

Among all the types of identity struggles, that's probably the hardest one for me. Like yea, it's probably my fault for surrounding myself with Asian Americans in college, but like in high school, I didn't have a choice. Everyone in class was Asian American. So I got used to it.

Now what I do enjoy doing is telling people about being Asian American because who doesn't like to talk about themselves? But I got completely shut down by this white person the other day. I was explaining how ABC kids in high school try to stay as far away from Chinese culture as possible because they don't want to be like their parents and "uncool", and the white person was like: yea, like every kid in the world basically doesn't want to be like their old parents.

so yea, my story wasn't very "asian american". It was just a normal story of a kid. like any other kid in the US. So yes. poor us, Asian Americans that have to wrestle with identity. But at the end of the day, not really. It's mostly psychological. We play it up a lot. There's no way we should have a harder time than actual internationals. Yet, they often assimilate better than us, because they try harder and don't get turned off by "where are you from" questions. (which, apparently, this Sunday at Church, I was from Japan. But whatever, it was fine; they were really nice).

I don't want to downplay the struggle either of course.

but yea. Identity in Christ. so important to hold onto. It's who we are. gotta remind ourselves every day. It's who I am. loved by You.

Bubble tea

I think I've been obsessed with Asian food recently, and by "Asian food", I really mean bubble tea and sticky rice. Actually Thai food too. But mostly bubble tea and grass jelly.

The funny thing is when I was in Ann Arbor and bubble tea was accessible at 11am, I didn't get it that much. I got it maybe 3 times the whole year.

But now that I'm in Indiana, I'm like: omg, I need to find a bubble tea place, and I don't care if it's 1 hour away and sort of crappy.

I tried making my own bubbles boiling tapioca balls I bought from Indianapolis but they tasted like chemicals. I also made agar tea jello. Today, I bought a steamer and tried to steam sticky rice. I also made Thai Penang red curry. I think tomorrow I'll make mango sweet sticky rice, or attempt to.

It's like an obsession. Last week, I thought about bubble tea like every day. But it's not really that I love bubble tea THAT much, though I kind of do. I think it represents home or warmth or love or friendship or comfort or something warm and fuzzy that I miss. I'm not sure what it is that I'm missing, or when I lost it, but I want it back.

I miss home/family. I miss Globalfoundries. I miss getting 20 emails an hour, all of them "emergencies". I miss making fun of my coworkers, and sending screenshots in very casual emails. I miss hands-on work and getting thanked for fixing problems that I caused. I miss feeling important, getting things done, being the expert. I miss filling my candy jar, tasting my coworker's homemade lunches and eating 1 hour lunches.

I miss family and home. I miss my dad, my mom, my brother and the dog we borrow. I miss going to the little church in Princeton with all our family friends. I miss random family friends spontaneously coming over to eat and joking about everything under the sun.

I actually really appreciated all my friends in Taiwan that I met at Singing Waters Canada, coming out to see me when I was in Taipei. Even though I only knew them for 2 months, they still were so eager to come see me. That was really a surprise for me, and I hadn't felt that kind of love from non-family members in a while.

It really is those warm moments with friends and family that make you come alive. and help you stop clinging to food and vacations/exploring places and 'exciting new things' and all other entertainment in an attempt to self medicate your pain and misery.

But those things don't last forever. Friends take time to develop and young people move around, and it's hard to quickly get close friends every time you move and settle. Family is great, but they're not always there, and you share different things with family than friends. If I had just kept God as my friend, the past few years would have been better.

But it's never to late to start again and rekindle that first love.

only miss the sun when it starts to snow
it's been snowing for a while, and I just didn't realize

Documentaries and movies

I've been watching a lot of documentaries/movies lately.
On poverty, drugs, prostitution, foster care.

Watched a really good movie today called Short Term 12. Man, it was really good. I haven't watched movies by myself in a while because I haven't had the patience to watch them. (maybe because I'm not looking for entertainment. I'm looking for answers). So I've been watching documentaries. Watched like 7 episodes of Drugs Inc, learned about the supply chain of different drugs and how each of them are different. Watched 'Tricked', a documentary about how girls get tricked into prostitution. Watched 'The House I Live in', a documentary about poverty and drugs, and how drug dealers were the role models and the Santa Clauses in the poor neighborhood.

And today I watched a movie. Short Term 12. It's about foster kids in a foster care group home. It was so real. so real. Not like one of those BS inspiring movies. This was like the real thing, the real struggle. Really powerful movie. I also googled it later and found that a group-home veteran also blogged about how it was very realistic and brought back a lot of memories and really hit home for him. Highly recommended.

Anyway. Why am I watching this stuff? I don't know. Maybe I'm looking for answers. for a greater understanding of people. people and their pain.

There should be more testimonies. Testimonies of Jesus healing deep deep hurts. And there should be documentaries on those. And Netflix should carry them. And the Church should have a culture of openness. And. And. many things.

Back from Chile

There's something about going some place beautiful that is also not super touristy. You just stand there and look at the scenery and go: wow. is this real? Am I here? That was Iceland for me, and also again, the southern parts of Chile. There were no tourists because we were going for business, to see salmon farms.

The people in Chile are really warm and hospitable, and the men are chivalrous. When I attempted to draw a comparison between the US's southern hospitality and Chilean hospitality, one of my white team members from the midwest was like: 'Southern hospitality is selective. Basically they're only hospitable to white people.' I heard another white American from the northeast say that he was fine with the southern friendliness in the US because it's "fake friendliness", but he thought the midwest genuine friendliness was creepy, since he was uncomfortable with random strangers really wanting to know how he was doing. Interesting right? Maybe the midwest isn't so bad after all

Hospitality. The Kosher Jewish guy on my team decided to visit a synagogue in Chile, and a family invited him over for dinner. He said that in every country where he has visited synagogues, he always gets invited to someone's house for dinner. I asked if that was the case in the US--if Americans would invite foreigners who came to their synagogues for dinner, and he said that was less likely, but it almost always happens in a foreign country. Interesting right? US isn't so great at hospitality, but the bible places a huge emphasis on we should be hospitable.

Chilean men greet women with a cheek-to-cheek air kiss. Women also greet women the same. Men just shake hands with each other. A guy on my team from California said that it wasn't that different from the US, because he shakes his guy-friends' hands first, and then it turns into a hug after that if they're close, but he would never shake a girl's hand if they're friends; he only gives girls hugs. I thought about my interactions/observations with guys at Ross, and I realized that it was true. Pretty interesting. After being in Chile and getting a lot of cheek kisses, I understood more of the heart of what the verses in the bible mean when it says to "greet one another with a holy kiss". It's a genuine friendly warm gesture. In the US, it's like a hug.

Anyway, the Chile trip was great for its breath-taking scenery, as well as reminder of the genuine warm hospitality/love that should be more prevalent in Church.

Missing home?

I miss spring break and being home with our neighbor's dog that we borrow, doing math homework with my brother, taking pictures of him and his friends, and cutting his hair...

MBA has been great, but I'm not really close with that many people, or maybe even no one at all depending on the standard of closeness. Not surprising. It's common among those who aren't hardcore party-people who get close real quick from alcohol and late nights. I mean I love all my classmates and always enjoy the camaraderie in group projects and I light up when I see people I know. But sometimes at night, I just miss home, miss my brother, this cute fuzzy hyper dog, ...

Icy is our neighbor's 2 yr old dog, half pomeranian, half husky. Very hyperactive, but at night she's calm and sprawls over the floor and sleeps





In college I never missed home, so I didn't really get it when others did. And I never had a dog that I missed either, but I've heard that before too. To be honest, I don't think I actually miss the dog that I don't own. I just miss seeing the cute fuzzball sleep. I miss the dog because I miss the cuteness and perhaps I miss what it represents when it's sleeping vulnerably like that. It's so pure, simple and cute. Hates being alone--keeps barking until you let her sit next to you; then she's fine. I looked up dog personalities for each breed. Pomeranian scores very low on "tolerates being alone". You don't need to play with her, you just need to put her right next to you. Dogs are like little kids. It's amazing how much they are driven by good food and play and proximity.

Bias against uneducated people

Finally done with internship interviews.

The whole interview process was both traumatizing and a great learning experience. During the midst of it, a brother told me that it's a great experience, because you realize that even though you get rejected by 10+ companies, you are still okay. However, it took me a few times for me to get over the grief of getting so many rejections, because I was reluctant to admit even to myself that I was not okay. That I was disappointed. Because I'm always calm and okay. and chill. And that's been my identity, my thing. My mom had to call me out on my disappointment a couple times. Each time it took a couple days to get over a new layer of disappointment and grief. And it's normal to be disappointed since we spent months networking and preparing for interviews.

Anyway, everything was pretty much over a week or two ago. I just visited Cummins yesterday. I was excited for the visit. First time in Indianapolis. The people are truly amazing. Indianapolis is pretty cool. We visited an assembly plant for medium volume diesel engines, which was cool, but I had this instinctive negative reaction towards the plant and became quite sad without knowing why. Everyone else said the assembly plant improved their impression of Cummins, but for me it didn't. Suddenly, random memories of Globalfoundries flooded my memory. Of mormons in the town saying things like: "your English is so good" and people asking what MIT stand for. The assembly plant didn't have technicans; it had operators with high school education. They had 70 seconds to screw certain things on the engine before the engine went to the next station. It was that low-end. Having worked in a super high tech semiconductor manufacturing plant that had no operators, this was super eye opening for me. And I realized that I have very extreme and very strong biases against uneducated people. I've always had these biases. I wanted to get away from manufacturing because I perceived manufacturing as a low-end job even though it was high-tech semiconductor manufacturing. Such pride.

My problem is probably that I rarely admit to myself that I am offended or hurt. I just excuse it as living in the wrong place. So when that stranger said my English is so good, I was like: man, I'm living in the wrong place. If I lived in Boston, I would never have this problem. But really the problem is me. I am offended and hurt, but I don't want to admit that I am. That I'm so prideful and so biased. No one ever has any control of their privileged or unprivileged family upbringing or their 'smart genes' or whatever allowed them to have a higher chance of getting exposed to other cultures and good education. And it's actually our fault as Asian Americans that people ask us where we are really from. It's because Asian Americans don't live in the mid-west and they don't live in the middle of nowhere. You can't blame people in the middle of nowhere for not understanding you if you choose never to live there and expose those people to yourself.

Anyway, that's all talk. Biases take a long time to get rid of. You need to know those people and love them and hang out with them and be best friends with them to get rid of the bias.

Presence

MBA's are now in the heart of recruiting/networking season. For those going into consulting, this is when some people are getting invited to "invite-only" events by certain prestigious companies (and possibly having their egos inflated), and everyone else not invited is having FOMO (fear of missing out) about not getting invited.

A consulting firm held a "how to case interview" session today, where they gave tips, a live example, and then also general comments about what they are looking for. Besides great experiences, analytical abilities and creativity, they are also looking for "presence".

I've actually heard other companies talk about this quality too. That they want people who have "presence". And they try to describe "presence" as confidence, excitement, polish, etc. It's one of those qualities that is really hard to describe, but everyone kinda has a sense of what it means.

And that's probably the scariest part about recruiting for consulting. You never really know if you have what they want, because not everything is practice-able or quantifiable. No one ever thinks of themselves as insecure and awkward, or as arrogant and unperceptive. But we can all sense if others are insecure, awkward, arrogant, etc.

Anyway, a lot of craziness going on. It's good to step back, not become arrogant or insecure (those two characteristics usually go together ironically), and to remember that even if you get an interview spot, you only have a 10-15% chance of getting an offer. And whether or not you are invited to these exclusive events, to remember that your value and worth is not based on how the companies see you.

It's good to step back, and remember
1) who you are--you're a child of God; God's beloved. you are loved
2) who you trust-- you've got family and close friends whom you can depend on, whose interactions are strictly "non-evaluative" unlike those of recruiters and colleagues. (aka, you can cry in front of them without being judged as emotional or weak, and you can appear dumb, awkward and not-knowledgeable without being judged, because they either know you too well already and nothing you do can surprise them, or they are so full of love that they don't do the judging thing--aka what the church should be, but most of the time isn't)
3) what's important -- life's not about prestige, and it's not about money. And it's surely not about starwood and airline flight points. Be true to what's important. And that usually links back to #1 and #2, along with whatever you are passionate or compassionate about, relating to humanity and the gospel