Fall of the I Hotel and Apature

The movie in that we watched during classes was pretty touching. It found it interesting that even though it was hard for the immigrants to come to America, they eventually ended up in a hotel. The interview with the senior citizens gave me a relief that living in such a hotel wasn't so bad, they lots activities in and out of the hotel. It made me happy to see some senior having fun just playing cards, talking, and all those good things. Then came the scene where I hotel was bought and was going to be demolished, but the people stood up against this and protected their only home. That's what everyone should do, even though those people failed to defend their home. they did their best trying to protect it. This movie had lots of racism, and even though there was racism the people tried to adapt and make the best they can to live with others. I believe that this movie has the power to inspire others of what really is going around the world, that people of other color are be segregated, and we as human beings should stop it.
I have to say that looked forward to going to Apature, but the irony is that I sprained my ankle really bad the day before Apature was going to start. Man I have to tell you that really really sucks, and i hoped that it would heal fast so i could go, but you can't really rush the helaing process, so i ended up unable to go. The details of my sparin is pretty grusome, first there was the sound of muscles tearing, ex: riping a piece of steak with your bare hands, then there was the swelling which was pretty big, and all the brusies over my foot was pretty gross. So, instead of going to a regular american doctor I went to one of those Chinese doctors, who uses massages and chinese herbs to help hell my ankle. I recommend that going to one of these guys is good, but only if you taking pain because he was massaging my sprained ankle, and I was pretty much yelling inside of myself pretty bad. Oh the pain. My Grandpa had a weird saying that having pain and using pain to heal the pain is a good way to heal it, I say it was partially true if you can take that pain. So hear I am now on monday typing this journal, about how I couldn't go to Apature and was disabled for a couple of weeks plus days, hopefully i can find a video of Apature and watch it.
That's all I have to report ^_^! Benson Lee

APAture: Comic and Zine Expo

Today, I went to Kearny Street Workshop's Comic and Zine Expo which is part of their annual APAture. At the first glance, the place looked a lot like one of those "Hole in the Wall" sort of places but I guess you can't just a book by its cover.

I went in there and was greeted by hallways with hung pieces of art that gave me the whole "art gallery" vibe.

One of the first things that caught my eye was this promotional poster of a developed CGI/Live Action movie called Eve: Beauty and the Blade. I had forgottten the name of the developer but it was created by Redcape Cinema. I tried to look for info on them online but...no luck.

Despite that, the developer showed us a trailer to the movie and it was spectacular! These were effects that would probably make my HDTV look PIMP!

Plug: The first three episodes of this action packed cinematic thriller is available on a single DVD for only $15 but for that one limited time offer, you can get ALL the episodes on a single DVD and be automatically entered into a raffle where you can win one of the new 4th generation iPod Nanos!

It wouldn't be a comic and zine expo without the actual comics!
This piece of work is featured in Kid Robot? (or something similar)
Looking at it, the style of this comic drawing looks vaguely familiar from those of the early pre-detailed Japanese manga of the 70's that my uncle is fond of.
One thing I REALLY noticed in these comics were the length of detail they put into a single scene, every brick is detailed! It's phenomenal!

I ended my visit with a look at "upstairs" which happened to be a ladder. Ascending this climb, I saw an artificial grass land with the top surrounded by mirrors. It fell a bit short of my expectations...I knocked over that sign by the way ->

Overall, I had a great time. Now, I guess the big question in regards to Asian American Culture did I grab and digest out of this experience?

I saw a more artistic side of MODERN Asian Americans. There is much more that we as a whole can do to express ourselves not only as a collection of ethnicities but as individuals as well. Every piece of work I saw, I saw the perspectives of individuals and when I saw them all displayed in a single room, that is a definition of modernized Asian Americans.

<- P.S. That wasn't a display item -.-"

- Terence Nip

Letter to the Hyphen Editor

Dear Harry,

I’m very impressed with Hyphen Magazine, you and the entire team really did an outstanding job on this and I’m looking forward to more in the future. I just finished Alex Jong-Seok Lee’s “Commercial Success” article from the “Road Trip” issue and I can totally agree with a lot of the points highlighted. Yes, Asian Americans have been appearing in more commercials nowadays than in he past when everything was “black and white” (so-to-speak). I’ve been impressed to see less accents and stereotype-reinforced commercials and wish nothing but the best for the future recognition of Asian Americans. Although I can still see a few random commercials that lightly reinforce Asian stereotypes (ex. Popeye’s Chicken price calculator commercial), I can agree with Daniel Cho that if we just stop analyzing these commercials and appreciate the fact that we (Asian Americans) don’t look stupid on the television, Asian Americans will be able to garner more “Commercial Success”. Keep up with the awesome work, Hyphen!

From, Terence Nip
SF State University, Asian American Culture (ETHS 210)

EDIT: P.S, I hope y'all like the new layout =]

Letter to Editor at Hyphen

Dear Harry,

I really enjoyed reading my two issues of Hyphen magazine. I never knew that there was a magazine that was just focused on Asian Americans. I thought it was a little bit weird that in our class and the day you came to it, no one explained to us why the name of the magazine was called Hyphen. This is just an educated guess i am making about the origins of the magazine's name, but would it happen to be called this because of the "hyphen" in the word "Asian - American", "Chinese - American", "Japanese - American", "Korean - American, and etc. This magazine is a way to show everyone that we are more than just one label such as "Asian" or "American", but rather a mix of the two. Many people in society tend to just group people all together into one category, but we have to enforce the "hyphen" to let people know that we just don't fall into the "Asian" category.

I really enjoyed the article called "Good Asian Drivers". This article really caught my attention because I myself am part of a Queer Asian club on campus. I was not expecting for there to be an article about Queer Asians, seeing as Queer Asian community is practically non- existent. I really enjoyed how the two artists in the article used humor to help combat negative stereotypes. This is a really good idea and I will use it to help my group's cause on campus. I am really glad to see that there are other Queer Asians trying to create awareness for themselves and others around them. I found the article to be very inspiring, it serves as a reminder to keep fighting for my groups cause.

Sincerely,
Albert Dang

Team Kamikaze is in the BUILDINNN!

Remember, 'if it ain't rice, it ain't nice'