ARCMAG Fall 2022

A S I A N R E S I L I E N C E C O L L E C T I V E M A G A Z I N E

The Water Tiger Rebecca Duckett Wilkinson

This inaugural edition of ARCMag's cover art has been generously donated by Rebecca Duckett Wilkinson Rebecca is a Malaysian artist and painter working mainly with paint and paper. A weaver and textile print designer by training, Rebecca paints dreamscapes and visual memories that give a sense of place, all influenced by a love for flora, fauna, and cultural heritage. These images fill her thoughts after journeys and travel. Colour, pattern and textures feature in all her nature inspired paintings. More recently Rebecca has used her art to highlight issues that impact on women & children, & the impact of man on the environment & biodiversity. Rebecca works between Penang, Malaysia, and Piemonte, Italy.

E D I T O R ' S &

F O U N D E R S ' N O T E S

This project was one of the biggest dreams I held for the Asian Resilience Collective Canada when the organization was still in its infancy last year What started out as an idea to publish articles to our website turned into a collection of powerful personal essays consolidated into this special magazine. Many of these pieces come from dear friends and peers of mine, and it has been deeply humbling to work as the editor for all contributors to this inaugural edition of ARCMag

I want to thank all the writers and artists who have been a part of this project for their support, enthusiasm, and vulnerability. And to our readers, I hope you'll find the theme of this collection of essays as resounding as I have resilience, after all, is built into this magazine's very name

Caleigh Wong ARCMag Editor in Chief

Hi Friends,

We are excited to present to you ARCMAG 2022! This is ARCC’s first edition of the magazine, and we are honoured to have you join us on this literary and artistic journey!

We share the work of our talented contributors to stay true to what we set out to do back in 2020 when we founded ARCC We strive to unite, uplift and empower Asian cultures and stories through various mediums First, interviews featuring amazing Asian Canadians and various Asian cuisines in the ARCC Series. The second was social media features. And now, art + literature.

We hope that these narratives resonate with you as they have with us.

Lots of love, ARCC Founders April, Aaliah, Caleigh, Christina and Christine

A R C M A

Asians on Vacation (On Being Asian in the Arts) Amreen Kullar

Dear Diary, it's been a while... Amanda Chiu

年糕: Year Cake Charlotte Nip

From the Vaults Audrey Chan

Identity and our Parents: Two Perspectives on the Impacts of Divorce on Mixed-Race Kids Caleigh Wong & Rachel Banks

Finding Solace in Music and Podcasting Andrew Son

Culture V.V: A Love Letter to Those who Grew Alongside Us Jackie Phạm Hoài Thu

Literary Lessons Chiara Ferrero-Wong

Asian Resilience Collective Canada @asianresiliencecc

ASIANS ON VACATION

(ON BEING ASIAN IN THE ARTS)

AMREEN KULLAR

I know I’m supposed to be encouraging. I often am. But there’s so much complexity in diaspora, in Asian identity. I am a tired optimist. Someone who tries to be resilient, to feel resilient, but I often can’t. Though maybe my ability to vocalize my perfectionism and mental illness is resilience. Especially if many of those that came before us could not Maybe being an Asian in therapy with an Asian therapist is resilience

Although, I can never separate my experiences as a South Asian, a woman, a neurodivergent person, or someone who has a mental illness I think about it sometimes, about the hand I was dealt, like is this really who I am out of everything I could be? Will I look into the mirror and see what I’ve always seen? Part of me is always lying when I say I wouldn’t wanna be anybody else.

But it's not just about who I am. The nature of being someone like me means I represent more than myself. That I am perceived as not just an individual, but part of a collective of people who look like me.

I live in constant fear, like our words will be erased like our history in this country has Like our novelty will expire when being a white liberal is no longer cool Or when “too many ” of us enter the spotlight

Like I only get jobs to help hit diversity quotas Like I haven’t actually worked all that hard Like I didn't earn my grades in school but my race made them a given.

Like everyone feels like they know every detail of who I am without asking.

Like I’m vegan for religion. That I’m religious at all. That I couldn’t have been raised in an atheist’s house. Like it goes against anything they've ever read or heard or watched.

Like people like me don’t actually exist.

Like my parents didn’t support me pursuing the arts. Didn’t let me date. Didn’t let me live.

Like when a white girl told me to make the brown parents in my script more strict.

It is as if everyone wants to erase me. Like my reality has no semblance to their thoughts, ideas, images of what I am supposed to be what they imagine when they imagine someone that looks like me

Like sometimes I forget I’m real and I no longer create Like I once again lose my agency

Like if I don’t help up other Asians, I’m a gatekeeper

Even when I don’t yet have a gate of my own to keep

Like I give and I give and I try to create within these little gaps of time I’m granted. Until I blink and they vanish.

As if my perfectionism isn’t the reason I feel trapped. As if my over achievement is not self inflicted. The need to be liked and praised. Maybe because I always felt a lack of it.

And so the feelings of inadequacy build and build and you lose track of where it’s all coming from But it’s that elementary school teacher trying to push you by handing you all B’s, insisting that A’s stand for above and beyond, for extra work, a medal for no sleep It’s your parents acting like anything good you ’ ve ever done has been expected Like the bare minimum was never minimal.

Does being Asian mean not knowing what it feels like to be able to relax on a day off?

Like any bit of reframing can't help me escape this chase, because in the meantime I've already constructed another catalyst for it.

And so I dream of a moment free from guilt I dream of Asians on vacation

And I keep on trudging through the labour, the no days off, the American dream, the what I’m supposed to be grateful for But existential dread and emptiness succumbs me even on my better days. And I wish to remember what my dreams were and what my younger self would think of who I am now. So I wait for the fog to clear. I am constantly awaiting the sun.

I can’t break this fear of only living in glimpses of my potential showing an ounce of it to colleagues or on Instagram, never finishing scripts or pieces or edits. So I break every inch of me instead, handing it to them and I’m left as shattered nothings on the floor, so tiny they cannot be swept Basking in defeat, fighting in my head

Do you know what it’s like to feel baffled when someone asks for your thoughts? Because you ’ ve only been heard the times you forcefully push yourself into conversation, yelling between sobs, like you ’ re only cared for if you ’ re giving all of yourself to someone else. Like you can never get it right, like you talk over people at every break in conversation. Like my hands always shake when I raise them. Like my profs hardly ever cared to learn my name. But they knew Katherine’s and Ashley’s. Like the one prof that actually said “Amreen'' had mistaken the other South Asian girl for me

But I don’t know, when people call me Asian, I remember what it’s like to feel included Like I got picked to be on the soccer team Like “ you actually want me?”

Like on a night out in Germany, I missed a beer bottle to the head by an inch and got called an Asian bitch, and I should have been angry but I couldn’t help but smile.

Like a naive girl taking a catcall as a compliment.

Out of every assumption about me, the one that’s true is that I was raised in a perfectionist’s household.

That, because of it, nothing feels like it’s enough And I’m afraid it never will Like my pride is conditional and fleeting So easily carried away And I wonder, do others like me feel joy when we win Oscars? Or do we forget them the next day and remember our ancestry, our parents, who taught us to never be satisfied? Maybe we ’ re like this because they had to be to make it here. For I had to be, to make it here. And to still feel like not enough.

But they won’t tell you that perfectionism leads to will for tragedy. It’s the only break grantor, the only valid reason to slow down. And so I dream of tragedy. For a semblance of peace.

I wish we didn’t have to be resilient Sometimes I wish we could just be

But how could you have remembered to go easy when you weren’t taught how? How could you know how to take a day off? How to call in sick? How to celebrate yourself, order out, spend time at the mall? When your parents hardly did? And so you teach them as you teach yourself, that perfectionism kills true resilience, it’s taught self sabotage, it’s wins gone uncelebrated, it’s no days off, it’s unspent funds. And so I’ll continue to dream of Asians on vacation. I hope one day, we’ll feel like we deserve it.

Amreen Kullar (she/her) is a versatile freelance filmmaker and spoken word poet She’s driven by social causes and strives to create content that leaves audiences questioning preconceived notions Her films have played at numerous festivals, most notably winning Regent Park Film Festival’s audience choice award in 2020 She has since worked on numerous commercial campaigns, indie shorts, and TV shows in documentary, reality, and narrative spaces. Her next vacation dreams include soloing Italy, meeting up with friends in Germany, and attending Sundance.

DEAR DIARY, IT'S BEEN A WHILE...

AMANDA CHIU

In grade 3 I had a diary. It was a little blue butterfly notebook that fit perfectly in my grade 3 sized hand. During recess I would walk around the schoolyard and pretend I was a detective; writing down everything that came to mind, from trivial observations to my deepest secrets.

I stumbled upon this notepad recently when I visited my childhood home and went through a box of the prized possessions of my youth I remembered the way that diary felt in my hands, the joy it brought me to have all my thoughts immortalized in my cute little tangible object of affection Seeing the notebook for the first time in almost 14 years, I began to flip through the pages and peer into my 8 year old brain.

My favourite food is Mac and Cheese. My best subjects in school are Music and English. I have a crush on TWO boys in my class. I wish I was white.

I stared at the words on the page, written in scratchy children’s handwriting: I wish I was white. I ripped the page out, crumpling it up and throwing it in the recycling I hoped and prayed that my parents had not read through the notebook and been confronted with those words I remembered the resentment I harboured for them throughout my childhood for cursing me with my identity as a Chinese Canadian In grade 3, racism was a term not yet a part of my vocabulary and a concept not yet comprehensible to my psyche. But I still knew what it was I just didn’t have the words to articulate it.

I was Mulan every year for Halloween because all the popular girls, the white girls, were Disney princesses and I wanted to be one too. This was, of course, until a boy in my class stretched his eyes out at me.

People say that Toronto (Tkaronto) is a mixing pot, implying that its diversity signifies a lack of racism or discrimination. Toronto is painted as a utopia of inclusion and a city that celebrates differences. But I grew up in a different Toronto, one that ingrained in my mind at a young age that being Chinese was something to be embarrassed of

In middle school I was told that I was pretty for an Asian girl I began to dye my hair and wear it wavy, thinking that maybe if I looked less Asian, I would be treated less like one too

In high school I was called a Chink Ling Ling “Go back to the ricefields”, they would say. I had people speak to me in Chinese accents, boys tell me that they would never sleep with Asian girls, my friends joking about me eating their dogs. I remember being spat on, being told to kill myself, being physically assaulted. All I could do was laugh along. It doesn’t hurt if you pretend it’s just a joke, right? The only thing worse than being the Asian girl was being the overly sensitive Asian girl.

To survive, I became what I loathed I would make the racist jokes before others had a chance to I would make them about myself, about other Asian kids at school I did everything in my power to create a separation between myself and my identity I lied about my family origins I kept any and all aspects of my culture, from food to traditions, a well kept secret. And in doing so, I severed the relationship I had with my identity in a way that I am still trying to reconcile with.

As we grow older, we mourn what we intentionally lost as children. We try to take back what was surrendered in the process of assimilating in

surviving

We carry the guilt of our actions and our thoughts In resenting ourselves, we resented our families, our communities, our own people In trying so hard to survive, we naively and selfishly deflected our pain and relegated it on others. Without knowing it, we perpetuated the very structures of hate that plagued us.

As a now 21 year old Chinese Canadian woman, writer, and activist, my work lays in this journey of forgiveness and reclamation.

We try to find what was lost in our lifetimes, and those of our PoPos and GungGungs and YeYes and NaiNais and MaMas and BaBas

Resilience can sound intimidating the task of overcoming a history of adversity is no small one In the context of the individual, it seems like an impossible feat But it is on the individualistic level that resilience comes to fruition for Asian Canadians For us, self preservation comes early, and healing much later.

We cannot be resilient without healing. And we must firstly heal ourselves if we are to heal our community. In being resilient, the relationship between the self and the community is one of reciprocity. It is in taking up space in our everyday lives that we can both heal and be healed. It is in the works of diasporic Asian writers, artists, poets, teachers, tattooers, and chefs that we can collectively tackle the monster of resilience It is in our friends and families and communities that we can reverse the fragmentation of our identities

I walked into a bookstore recently and glanced over at the children’s section For Asian Heritage Month, the bookstore displayed a collection of children’s books written by Asian American and Canadian authors. A little Chinese girl was looking at the books with her Mom, wearing her hair in the same way that I used to; bangs and pigtails. I wondered, admittedly with a bit of envy, if my grade 3 wish would have

been different if I had grown up learning to be proud, rather than ashamed, of my culture I wished I was white for a long time It wasn’t until I grew older and learned why I felt this way that I began to heal I now wake up grateful to be a Chinese Canadian, being adorned with artwork done by Asian Canadian tattoo artists, wearing my PoPo’s jade, celebrating Lunar New Year, and indulging in Chinese food whenever given the opportunity. These seemingly minuscule and insignificant routines are just as invaluable to our community as broad stroke actions towards Asian Canadian resilience.

In living, we embody resilience. Chinese food is inarguably delicious, but it tastes even better when you can appreciate it shamelessly

Amanda Chiu/趙友慧 (she/her) is a third generation Chinese Canadian activist and writer from Tkaronto She currently lives in Tio’tia:ke, where she is finishing her degree in Gender, Sexuality, Feminist, and Social Justice studies at McGill University Amanda is specifically interested in Asian Canadian resilience and its relationship to Indigenous reconciliation. Her work is centered around community organizing, mutual aid, decolonizing education, and grassroots resistance. In her free time she enjoys spending time with her cats, camping with friends, and eating Chinese food.

年糕 YEAR CAKE

CHARLOTTE NIP

年糕 (Nian gao) is a sweet rice cake typically eaten during Chinese New Year for good luck. This auspicious tradition comes from the cake's name itself a homonym for " a higher year " in mandarin

Grandma traded cotton peeling hours, for glutinous rice flour once a year she is greedy for love.

By dawn, she returns brown sugar water overstimulates a blank canvas unfamiliar, golden molecules three little red jujubes placed in the centre wrinkly on our tongues exfoliate our hollow stomachs

Grandma remembers Cold winter preys with its sharp teeth here comes the mountain monsters shaped like dogs growl like leopards to satiate the hungry Gods fatty fumes draw them in like a burst artery.

By the ninth lunar morning ruby red paper embossed with squid ink calligraphy plasters every door keeps the monsters from chewing through our kind

tangerine sunstreams and year cakes cement the valleys between the monsters’ teeth chewy textures like magic epoxy, softens the growls while firecrackers dance in the night

I was born a skeptic of Chinese folklore the witchcraft year cake brings but now, crispy burnt edges scratch my tongue and sugary innocence mellows like a hymn

year cake: brings the start of a new season the start of a promise higher each year superstitions daring our lead our dreams grounded by dirty dishes in the sink.

Charlotte Nip (she/her) is a SFU Master of Publishing graduate and lifestyle marketing assistant at Penguin Random House Canada. She is a diligent social media enthusiast, writer, and poet, who has frequently published on ThoughtCatalog, Spoon University, and Ricepaper Magazine. When she is not working, she likes taking the perfect Instagram shot and going through Vancouver to find it Follow her daily adventures @charlottenip

No Entry

No Exit can tell you that “hell is other people.” Just as this picture inverts expectations of an entrance into a much deeper space, I often find myself inverting Sartre in response to sites of “ no entry” in this foreign country as an Asian settler immigrant (e g , access to services, social and class mobility, coded cultural language): “hell is myself,” or “heaven is other people ” I am responsible for my own hell for not being white enough, not assimilated enough, not "Canadian" enough; to be anything other than myself might just free me from the hell that is racialization The hollow center of the image draws me in further and I imagine what it would be like on the other side of this gated space in a position of greater privilege, authority, and agency From what I can tell, it looks like a jail from the other side, too

Kjipuktuk. Army Museum Halifax Citadel, 2017, taken during my initial tour of the city. Anyone who has read

Busker

Tkaronto Outside the AGO in 2016, my second year living abroad I remember the moment that I took this photograph distinctly because of the same question that confronts me when I look at it all these years later: “Just what is so Canadian about an erhu?” Many tensions arise within this frame: I think about the lack of a visible audience responding to this public display of Chinese culture if I listen hard enough, I can still hear the spinning wheels of cars rushing past, but not the melody that was being played I think about how the musician chose to position themselves, directly facing the doors of this prestigious institution of art as they sat outside of it, making their own. Defiance and worship are always difficult to tease apart. photographer 陳 僡 Audrey Chan (they/them) from Hong Kong and has been living and learning in so called Canada since 2014 Audrey is interested in the formation of migration narratives/questions through images both moving and still, with particular respect to the intersections between race, queerness, translation, and fiction Based in Mi’kma’ki, they are currently pursuing a journalism degree to build on their studies in philosophy and cinema Audrey also loves a good round of table tennis five!) You can find more streams of consciousness on their blog, more visual experiments in their portfolio, and more of both on their Instagram at audrey1.0.

IDENTITY AND OUR PARENTS: TWO PERSPECTIVES ON THE IMPACTS OF DIVORCE ON MIXEDRACE KIDS

CALEIGH WONG

Whenever I talk to other mixed kids about identity, it almost always comes back to the same starting point: our parents. Every conversation about culture, childhood, nationality, and all other facets of an existence balancing two worlds, is underpinned by this idea that our experience, our life, is a unique product of the anomaly of our parents’ union

Especially for those of us born before the digital age, before the mechanisms of globalization were kicked into high gear, there seems to be this shared sentiment that our parents' chance meeting was something special Something that formed in spite of a world structured for more homogenous forms of love.

My mom was born into a large catholic family in a town of a few thousand on the rocky coast of Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia. My dad, the son of Taoists, was raised in an industrial city along the river, beneath the thunder of Malaysia’s monsoon country. They met as two young university students on a French immersion course in 1984. Around the dinner table, my dad use to share a folklore that said the distance one held their chopsticks from the tip predicted how far from home their spouse would end up being from My mom would quip that they both must have had extremely long chopsticks growing up

I often think of how unlikely it was for them to ever meet. How less likely, still, for them to choose each other, with the expansive gaps in attitudes and beliefs that simply don’t apply to love stories with the girl next door.

RACHEL BANKS

The mixed race/biracial/halfie experience is especially challenging when one half is white. Being too white in non white spaces but not quite white enough in white spaces the incomplete membership, made worse by the overstated and overshadowing presence of whiteness—has left many of us feeling awkward at best and, at worst, unwelcome in our respective communities This dual identity of layered marginality, of fringe whiteness and ‘watered down’ ethnicity, is the complicated product of an interracial romance in our white friendly world

My parents met in 1994 on the very last day of paramedic school in Toronto. My dad, born and raised in the city, was adopted at birth by an older Jewish couple after his Polish biological mother arrived in Canada and almost immediately went into labour. My mom was born in Malawi’s capital to strict Catholic parents, grew up on a small island in Seychelles, and immigrated to Ontario in her early teens.

It is almost bizarre that my parents met and bonded when and how they did My paternal grandparents are racist, privileged white Jews, my maternal grandparents were (one has died, the other has learned) anti Semitic Black immigrants Conflict and tension are old family traditions Yet I did not feel them growing up, not within my household at least, and my parents always made room for celebration and appreciation of both cultural backgrounds. I was not always proud of my unique ancestries though, thanks to internalized beliefs which I am deeply ashamed of now but could not shake off as a kid.

Perhaps the greatest gift my mom and dad ever gave me was an upbringing perfectly split in years between the East and the West How rare and precious it is this gift of a foundation that managed to merge the two very different contexts of who my parents are

My mom often talks about bringing my father home for the first time. I imagine the comments that went around, the cruelty of my mom ’ s former boyfriends who simply could not believe they ‘lost’ to a confident Chinese man from Malaysia, who rarely drank and never smoked, who gave himself the name of Wallace when he moved here. She also talks about visiting my dad’s hometown, as one of the few white women who ever had the nods and smiles between her and her future in laws that filled the linguistic gap dividing people from two distinct worlds

I was 21 when they separated The week my mom told me, I collapsed onto my bed with two friends after a night out and shared the news. I thank the powers that be that these two women also do not walk around the world white, for what ensued was a cathartic conversation on race, culture, and our parents. I wonder do white kids talk about identity when their parents split up? Is it something they mourn?

I can only really speak for myself, but I think there exists an enduring conflict in the ‘halfie’ experience where we find ourselves continuously out of place in both spheres An experience that has partial claims in both founding identities, but without complete membership in either one individually The tragedy is that a more active embrace of one often means a fleeting understanding of the other that this duality is sometimes more a tug of war than a melting pot Perhaps the greatest exception to this delicate, effortful balance is found in the intimate space of family, with the very people who came together to mold and fuse the seemingly opposing cultural components of themselves to produce us. So what does it mean when there is a fracture within this safe

But I was always proud of my parents, and their love and resilience and devotion to one another and us gave me a certainty in myself that has never failed me

I felt that solid foundation fragment for the first time, quite recently, when my parents’ marriage ended (with a bang!) in a way that was as devastating as it was predictable. For a brief but significant time I no longer wanted to be Jewish. I feel irreparable heartbreak, directly and indirectly, from the uniquely racist and misogynist harm that my mother has suffered. I resent that, as Black women, our choices for security and well being are often made for us. Underlying all of it is a profound grief that the union which gave me such beautiful gifts, including not one but two distinct sets of community, collective cultural pride, values, and ancestors, could be broken so carelessly

I used to feel that I could attribute the interesting parts of myself only to my parents and their combined force. I’m not quite sure where to ground my sense of self anymore. Lately, however, I have been feeling more at home in my Blackness and in my Jewishness than I ever have before. I owe much of this to a few dear friends (and a dear therapist) who all understand what it means to exist just outside the margins of whiteness. We grieve together, taking breaks to embrace it all again.

One comforting part of being a halfie, in literal terms, is that no matter what happens with parents you can never truly lose those ties to two unique sets of community, culture, and ancestors By virtue of existing you are a living continuation of two bloodlines that carry the twists and turns of a group marked in a particular way throughout the centuries I cannot shed either half of my identity even if I wanted to, and I know deep down that somewhere within both communities there is room for me. This reality may not feel like much when we are mourning the tremendous loss of our comfortable footing in our parents’ union, but it is a whole lot more than we would have if our parents had

space? Where do we find our footing now? For mixed kids, our parents’ union contextualizes who we are

I get this all down on paper now, with the content knowledge that I theorize all this on the other end of the story For when my parents met, identity, culture and the ways in which these factors dance with divorce were probably the last things on their minds. Instead, I imagine them in their youth in 1980s Canada, in awe at their luck of having found each other at all.

never met

Rachel Banks (she/her) is a recently graduated, newly unemployed, and currently optimistic 20 something year old from Ontario She spent half of the last decade living in Halifax, NS, where she developed a lifelong penchant for the east coast and the deepest love for her friends. Rachel is Black, Jewish, and queer. She is also a tree planter, an amateur surfer, and an aspiring polyglot. She is honoured to have contributed to this edition of ARCMag and thanks the editor in chief for the opportunity and for her exceptional friendship.

Caleigh Wong (she/her) is the editor and co founder of the Asian Resilience Collective Canada. Born and raised in Malaysia, she is passionate about issues around the immigrant experience, migrant labour rights and racism in Canada. Currently, she works as a surf instructor in Tofino, BC (Tla o qui aht terrority).

FINDING SOLACE IN MUSIC AND PODCASTING

ANDREW SON

As a Korean Canadian born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, I feel proud of both my Korean heritage and Canadian identity, but coming to this point in my life took time. Although Halifax has become a diverse city throughout the years, it was predominantly white when I first started elementary school I realized that I stood out like a sore thumb, along with a few other kids who were of visible minority I was often reminded that compared to my peers, my skin colour was ‘different’, my eyes were ‘smaller’, and packed lunches ‘smelled weird’ But the most confusing thing I had to overcome was with my name

In elementary school, my peers often asked me, “What really is your name?”. They were referring to my Korean name. When I told them, they often mocked how it sounded. This was confusing because my Korean name meant a lot to me. My Korean name, ‘Hyunsuk’ (현석), was given to me by my grandfather and means “growing with wisdom”. Such experiences of discrimination made me question my identity As a young person, I wanted to ‘fit in’ I desired the sense of belonging and acceptance among my peers And so during my young years, my solution was to hide my Korean heritage to cope with my identity crisis Often, this meant eating my packed lunch alone in the school bathroom stalls My mom was and is an amazing cook, and she would pack these delicious lunches for me when I was a child. But I was embarrassed to eat in front of my peers because of fear of judgment. I had already experienced various descriptions of my lunches: ‘stinky’, ‘nasty’, ‘weird’, ‘ gross ’ . I also couldn’t tell my mom to stop packing those lunches because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings either; she packed those lunches out of love. And so I ate alone, in the privacy of those bathroom stall walls. Looking back, I wish I

had never done this, but at that young age, this was the only solution I had.

This all changed when I joined the Nova Scotia Youth Orchestra (NSYO) during my teenage years. I met people from diverse backgrounds who came together for a single purpose: to create beautiful music together Music helped us bridge different cultures and perspectives In this diverse group, I felt accepted and proud of who I was I learned the importance of active listening to build trust among one another, and I carried this lesson into my later role as a podcast host

When COVID hit, I started a podcast with my fellow co host, Shikha, to connect with young BIPOC and immigrant Canadians. It was so empowering to discuss their lives and dreams, issues of inclusivity, and the unique challenge of bridging cultures while growing up. Between my experiences with the NSYO and my podcast, I learned that continuous discussion and active listening between different groups can help foster understanding and trust Ultimately, trust builds cultural competence and sensitivity between diverse peoples I hope to honour the name my grandfather gave me by opening myself to the needs and diverse backgrounds of those I serve Through this process, I hope to continually grow with wisdom

Andrew Son (he/him) is an incoming medical student at the University of Toronto. Andrew has his undergraduate degree in Neuroscience and Music from Dalhousie University. He can be found volunteering and leading social advocacy projects that promote the improvement of social connection and wellbeing, such as Memory Cafe Nova Scotia and the Music and Healing Society of Dalhousie In his spare time, he loves to stay active, and he co hosts the “Banana and Coconut Experience” podcast

CULTURE V.V: A LOVE LETTER TO THOSE WHO GREW ALONGSIDE US

JACKIE PHẠM HOÀI THU

In Vietnamese, vân vân (abbreviated as, v.v) is synonymous with et cetera (abbreviated as, etc.) meaning “of like things”, or “and so forth”.

Our early days at the University of Toronto St. George Vietnamese Students’ Association (UTVSA) could only be described as being in the right place at the right time with the right people It was 2018 when Khoa and I, along with a cohort of other undergraduates, joined as part of the new executive board Though initially strangers, we grew to see that our awkward team of ten had more in common than what we’d initially thought All of us brought questions about our Vietnamese identities doubts and contradictions that were then intensified by these new leadership positions. Specifically, the sense of duty to other (insecure) youth. The need to untangle ‘Vietnamese ness ’ loomed heavier over us the more our personal journeys intersected with visions for UTVSA’s growth. On paper, we were a Vietnamese organisation with Vietnamese members, meant to support, celebrate, and embody Vietnamese culture. But what makes something or someone Vietnamese in the first place? How does ‘Vietnamese ness ’ differ across people and place? Where and why, despite these differences, do our histories align? Questions like these often found their ways in our conversations, whether just hanging out or planning an event It didn’t feel right to go on without addressing these abstractions somehow

In addition to individual motivations, we saw this endeavour as something much needed for our community. After all, one must understand those they wish to serve where they come from and what ongoing conflicts or challenges they face. Insiders already to the Vietnamese community, we had some insight on where to at least start. Curiouser and

curiouser, we crawled down the rabbithole through what felt like an endless hallway of doors into Vietnamese identity, history and culture. This took the form of extensive research and many debates amongst our own team. Our work centered around creating activities for our members that would be as entertaining as they were educational and, above all, welcoming to any newcomers who wished to join our inquiry into ‘Vietnamese ness ’

Our unofficial catchphrase is, “ we have no answers, only questions” through our work, we want to inspire wonder and appreciation for the known and unknown.

This venture didn’t come without concern. There were times where we wondered if we were doing too much or going too far. The Vietnamese community, especially our diasporic one , rings of a silence going back to the Vietnam American War.

Intergenerational trauma raised many children to believe that “I don’t want to talk about it”, and “ you’ll never understand” were impassable dead ends. Even if they searched for these stories on their own, these children quickly learned that entertaining the existence of histories and politics alternative to what was fed to them was incorrect, betrayal and taboo This is exactly why giving Vietnamese youth the resources and safe spaces to begin asking questions is so fundamental There are too few opportunities where Vietnamese youth of different and shared experiences are able to come together. These opportunities can and should be used to uplift each other; to voice our anger and confusion, to interrogate what we once thought, to redefine our histories.

As children of immigrants, or young immigrants ourselves, we are constantly in opposition to the

elders that came before us And, as Vietnamese in Canada, we often must negotiate our own identities alongside the very large and very documented populations of Vietnamese Americans and Boat Peoples in the United States Over time, it can be easy to internalise this sense of inferiority and feel like we don’t have much to offer because we “didn’t go through the same things they did”. There may not be a clear answer to what we are really searching for, or a remedy to our traumas, but believe me when I say that an environment of genuine respect and an openness to listen can build assurance that we are enough and that we matter. I had the privilege to find a family of friends that gave me confidence and purpose in my healing as a Canadian born Vietnamese CULTURE V V is very much a love letter to those who grew alongside us, and a promise to continue what we started together it would not be without the potential we were able to see in ourselves, others, and our Vietnamese community that Khoa and I would be doing what we are now

Jackie Phạm Hoài Thu (they/she) is the co founder of CULTURE V V an organization that seeks to build accessible spaces for community learning and growth for young Vietnamese in Canada

LITERARY LESSONS

CHIARA FERRERO WONG

When I started reading Asian diaspora literature in high school, there came with it a long (and not yet over) period of growth, self discovery, and grappling with my identity This period began when I read On the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford I read this novel for my grade 9 English culminating project I don’t remember much from the book, but I do vividly remember sobbing in the hallway at school as I read the ending Though I didn’t necessarily resonate with the characters’ experiences (the novel is about Japanese Americans living through World War II, compared to me, a half Chinese 20 something living in the 21st century), the themes of staying connected to culture and tradition in a changing world were familiar to me, and I was intrigued. After reading Ford’s novel, I remember thinking for the first time, “huh, maybe I should read more books from Asian authors.”

A few years later I read two autobiographies by Chinese authors they were My Year of Finding Memory by Judy Fong Bates, and Wild Swans by Jung Chang I read both of these books within 6 months of each other, and left both feeling overwhelmed by this need to explore my family history in the ways that Fong Bates and Chang did Both authors did a deep dive into their family’s history, their connections to their homeland, and how the lives of their parents and grandparents shaped their own lives and identities. That summer I went back to Singapore with my family, and for the first time I saw it as a return to a place rather than a destination. I remember being so much more aware of how my own history lived there, how it was in the streets, the sounds, the smells, the food. Eating itself took on a different meaning for me it became a way to re visit my dad’s childhood, connect with the generations before me who perfected these dishes, and see how these tastes now lived in my own home

It was around this time that my mixed identity began to grow from being just another fact about myself to a key component of who I am

A few years later, I read another two books that continued shaping my identity, and these were The Gift of Rain by Tan Twan Eng, and On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong These were the first books I can remember reading that centred half Asian protagonists, and the first time I felt like my own experiences were being talked about. I felt the rush that comes from recognizing yourself in a story, the validation that comes with it because it says “I see you. ” Though both of the novels’ storylines were very different from my life, witnessing these characters live and grapple with some of the same questions of identity that I had was so validating. I was encouraged to continue to question and evaluate what my heritage means to me and how it impacts the way I move through the world

It wasn’t until last year when I read Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner that I felt my life and experiences truly reflected on the pages of a book Zauner’s memoir documents her experience caring for her sick mother who eventually passes away from cancer. Zauner also reflects on her experiences growing up in the US with her Korean mother and American father. Throughout, Zauner reflects on how her mother expressed love, how she connected with her overseas family across language barriers, and how food served as this cross generational, cross cultural bridge. Zauner perfectly described my own relationship with food, how it has always been my way of connecting with my family who I only see every few years at most She mirrored my own need to find a balance between life in western society while still remembering and upholding tradition And most of all, she put into words the sense of

displacement that comes from not knowing where you truly belong, and the frustration of knowing that no such place really exists I cried tears of gratitude (in between tears of anguish at the hardship Zauner endured) throughout the book that someone had found the words to describe the complex relationship with identity that I have talked about with my brothers for my whole life. Immediately after finishing, I even bought a copy for my brother to read, because I knew that he would find the same comfort and validation in the pages that I did.

Reading has always been a crucial part of my life. Little else says as much about who I was at any given point than what I was reading at the time, especially the books that I’ve mentioned I am so grateful to have read these books, and to have had this space to reflect and ruminate on my life and my experiences I’m still grappling with my identity, and so I continue to read and listen to others who have lived different and similar lives to me Stories are powerful they have the capacity to inspire tremendous growth and breakthroughs in ways I’m still discovering. I know that my journey is far from over, and I am ecstatic at the thought of all the books I have yet to read.

Chiara Ferrero Wong (she/her) is 24, half Chinese and half Italian, and currently lives in Halifax, NS She graduated in May 2021 from Dalhousie University with a BSc in environmental science and English, and has been working in the renewable energy industry since. In her spare time, she enjoys a good game of ultimate frisbee, hanging out with her friends, and of course, reading, talking about reading, and updating her Storygraph and bookstagram (catch her @goose friends on both platforms).

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