ARCMag Spring 2024

Dragons & Spices

I often paint still lifes of dragons, palm trees and sunsets, pretty on vintage vases and teapots. They hit us with a nostalgia, however, that is in opposition to the harsh reality that spread precious goods, and people, around the world. Plants, flowers, seeds, goods and people, traded and plied from East to West along the ancient trade routes, inspired the Western taste for things exotic and oriental. Tea, spices, fabrics, designs and ceramics were all precious commodities that played on the fantasy of the East, whilst hiding the violence and pillage from which they came. Today with history often forgotten, everyday lives around the globe are still strongly imbued with that strong flavour of the East.

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.

This Spring 2024 edition of ARCMag is the result of countless hours of writing, emailing, thinking and feeling from all the contributors, community members, retailers, friends and funders who have supported this project. What started out as a half-baked idea to create a space for personal stories about what it means to be Asian in Canada today has become one of the cornerstone activities of the Asian Resilience Collective Canada, and it has been one of my great prides to watch this publication grow

The theme of this edition is movement, and the experienced or inherited stories of diaspora and journeys (physical and otherwise) that shape our lives We are all products of movement Voyages taken, be it as a child or generations back in our bloodline, contextualize the lives we live now For many of us, where we are, what we do and who we are are partial outcomes of the rich lives and journeys that have come before us This edition is a testament to those stories, and a reminder of how beautiful change can be

Thank you to the writers and artists for their work, enthusiasm and vulnerability, and to the Canadian Race Relations Foundation for valuing and supporting our voices.

Caleigh Wong

ARCMag Editor-in-Chief & ARCC Co-Founder

Hi Friends,

We are thrilled to introduce ARCMag 2024! We would like to express our gratitude to the Canadian Race Relations Foundation (CRRF), our contributors, and the community for their generous support in bringing our vision to life. In this edition, we delve into the stories of Asian Canadians from all corners of the country as they navigate their Asian diaspora. Through personal essays, poetry, and artwork, we explore the diverse experiences and perspectives that make up the Asian Canadian community.

Asian Canadians are a vibrant and multifaceted group that contributes significantly to Canadian society. Their diverse backgrounds bring a wealth of perspectives and experiences that enrich our multicultural identity They have played a pivotal role in shaping Canada’s cultural landscape and fostering understanding and appreciation of different cultures

We hope these narratives will enlighten, educate, and inspire you to take a more active role in learning about your community and participating in collective efforts to promote civic engagement

Lots of love, ARCC Founders

April, Aaliah, Caleigh, Christina, and Christine

The Canadian Race Relations Foundation (CRRF) works to strengthen the social fabric of our society by supporting, enabling, and convening community groups and organizations through our grants, services and network of public, research and community partners

Our National Anti-Racism Fund (NARF) supports our commitments to build a national framework for the fight against racism in Canadian society by strengthening the capacity of racialized communities, religious minority groups and Indigenous people to carry out their own work to combat racism and create opportunities for meaningful dialogue, learning and sharing with the broader public

Polished Emeralds

Raushni Abraham

Fog and Sunshine

Hope Moon

Nani

Elena Hoh

Homesickness

Amanda Chiu

Ancestral Dreams

Viola Tian

Waving Goodbye to the Waving Cat

Owen Baker

Bonjour, Hi, Nihao

Eldar Wang

Even in Movement, the Colonizer Follows

Amreen Kullar

The History of my Hand

Caleigh Wong Sze Ting

How are you? 你怎样

Jenna Liang & Bin Wei

White Rice and Wanderlust

Timmons Wong

Metamorphosis

Alex Tran

Flourishing New Spaces: The Intentionality of Pan Asian Collective

Shelly Bahng

Grass to Snow

Vinetha Velautham

POLISHED EMERALDS

RAUSHNI ABRAHAM

My grandfather first had a farm when he was eleven Three acres of emerald paddy that coloured his mind and seeped deep in, He spoke of it when he fed me warm rice and ghee forty years later. Of the harshness of the toil, and the softness of its wet soil

Longing for a distant land shaped by the sweat of his brow,

In a soothing whisper, He told me my first story –Of a grain of rice

Its origin

How it’s cleaned. De-husked.

Separated into brown and white. Separated into intact and broken And polished

When his father died a year later, He traded his farm for a roof big enough for his responsibilities.

No longer an educated man, hungry for knowledge, He set out in our new country, recently freed of its shackles,

And traded his rake for a crisp white shirt, His plow for a pen and a persona that never truly fit him,

The soil for shoes he couldn’t wait to take off at the end of a day,

And the clear blue endless skies for an emerald longing locked deep in his soul.

He was chiseled in the steel mill he worked in, cast and smoothed into a final product used in our nationbuilding

When I was twenty-six, you told me I remind you of my grandfather I never knew what you meant.

If I had a booming laugh, Or a shy smile,

Or if I got angry quick

If my care was wrapped in gruffness,

Or if how you could never doubt if I loved you

Or if I too reminded you of wet clay soil to sink your tired feet in

And steel to help you stand straight and proud.

Or if I too will let my responsibilities shackle my dreams

And so, when I find it hard to tell you my story, I too will opt for whispers that don’t’ ruffle, But soothe and bring you in and ignite, And remind you of how our journeys are the same Of how we are all cleaned, de-husked, separated into brown and white and intact and broken.

And polished.

Raushni Abraham (she/her) has found writing to be her choice of processing and understanding the world since she was young, but has only recently found the courage to share it wider than her closest circle. She is interested in capturing stories of individual and collective strengths through poetry, prose and short stories, and is currently working on a collection on ‘intergenerational gifts.’

FOG AND SUNSHINE

HOPE MOON

The only Chinese word I’ve known for most of my life is my middle name, yun, as it is my given Chinese name I have been trying to learn Chinese for about 5 months now So far, the only conversing I’m doing is with my phone, which sends me daily reminders to open my language app. While I earnestly would like to try to learn the language, my poor commitment just ends up being a nagging reminder that I am alienated from my cultural heritage

I was born in China in 1999 the height of the OneChild Policy. The policy led to my early abandonment and nine months later I was adopted by a white Canadian family Like many adoptees, I grew up in a predominantly white community. I spent most of my childhood rejecting my Chinese history and heritage, as it was the subject of much unwanted questioning from my peers which teetered between harmless curiosity and blatant racism Did I know any Chinese? Did I know where or who my real mom was? Did I know I would never get a boyfriend because I was Chinese? For all I could tell, if I could alienate myself from my Chinese-ness, it would make the taunts go away If I could belittle myself, then what could they do?

When I was 18, I left my hometown and lived abroad in London (UK), and travelled in South East Asia, for a year. It was the first time I had lived in a place where people hadn’t known me since pre-schoolwhere people didn’t automatically know I was adopted. To any passerby, any local in Europe or Asia, I was Chinese. This shift in external perception of me profoundly altered how I began to see myself. My defences lowered I recognized an innocence rather than teasing behind the questions of my identity, leaving me space to wonder what the answers might be. What does it mean to be a part of

the Chinese diaspora? What claim did I have to being Chinese - especially having denied it for so long? Was it too late to think about the conditions my birth mother was under when she made the decision to leave me, let alone acknowledge her existence at all? The plot unraveled just as I had almost perfected assimilating.

Some adoptees use the term ‘coming out of the fog’ to describe when they begin accepting and processing the inherent loss that comes with the adoption. As a transracial international adoptee, not only did I lose all connection to my biological family and histories, but also access to cultural learnings and teachings The more I try to rediscover, the more it becomes obvious how much I do not know. I feel like a child, trying to pretend like I know more than I do, when I speak with my friends who are also part of the Chinese diaspora I nod along knowingly as they bring up certain pieces of traditional clothing or holiday specific foods, while filing away key words in my head to look up later on my own time. There was about a year or two while I was ‘coming out of the fog’ where I seemed at best a studying anthropologist and at worst someone with a weird Chinese fixation

Food became my entry point of study that bypassed feelings of inauthenticity and voyeurism (I like to think that an alternate version of myself who grew up in China would also love food). Conveniently, food is the bedrock of cultural community With every spice I learned about histories Through every grain I learned about ecological landscapes. By way of every soy product I learned about culture and customs. As I cooked through classic dishes of the country, I began to feel more at home in the grocery aisles of Chinese supermarkets collecting sauces and produce as my rites of passage

I recently submitted information to an organization dedicated to helping adoptees reconnect with their biological families. While I’m keeping my expectations low on the chance of reunion, the process of simply collecting and reading through all of the documents was revealing I confirmed my Chinese name to be 昀 (yún), meaning sun light or sunshine. After so many years shuttering off my identity, it felt fitting to remember my name to be a symbol of enlightenment. Paired with my given English name, ‘hope’ and ‘sunshine’ feel like blessings for a lifelong process of rediscovery and connection, through food, language, and community

Hope Moon is a climate justice organizer, born in China but based in so-called Canada for almost all her life. She is interested in understanding and cultivating resilient and sustainable communities, from the micro level of personally hosting regular dinner parties to the macro level of professionally helping grassroots groups learn to organize for better local climate policies. You can find her work in the Ecology Action Centre Magazine and the recently published Rural and Remote Communities Climate Organizing Toolkit from the Climate Reality Project Canada.

NANI

ELENA HOH

“Nani” expresses the layered feeling of home in Canada for me... fragmented, bittersweet, and incomplete. “Nani”, or “What” in Japanese, is the same character as my last name (which is Chinese), Hoh 何.

Nani 2024

Elena Hoh Digital drawing

Elena Imari Hoh is a multidisciplinary artist from Victoria B.C.. Her work cycles through themes of family, identity, mental health, and landscape. Elena’s family comes from Japan, Malaysia, and Scotland

Visiting these places and piecing the parts of her family history together have greatly contributed to her art practice in the last few years. She is inspired by the many artistic members of her family and the resilience and strength of their stories.

HOMESICKNESS

AMANDA CHIU

Years, months, days, hours, seconds pass

She slips further and further out of my reach

She is fading away.

There is a place somewhere where everyone looks like me, but they speak a language that I do not understand

She exists almost solely in my imagination.

The price of survival is severance, diaspora is a death drive

The death of language, culture, memory, belonging, and everything that I will never know I have even lost

Time and forgetting – these are the enemies. The inheritance of loss is so heavy, in three generations she has vanished without a trace

Glue together the pieces of that porcelain bowl once shattered by my elders for protection. Forget her.

Destroy her.

Abandon her

Her fragments slice my flesh

Holding onto her is world-travelling, a discipline of silence, the ability to shape-shift

Do not be queer

Do not have tattoos.

Do not be a feminist.

Do not become what she fears.

I am afraid it is too late

Appease your elders – they stand guard at her entrance. That is all that is left.

It is the never-ending breakup, lingering heartache

Grief, yearning, desire, despair, loss, love.

She is the big ex; the one I will never forget no matter how foreign or antiquated she may become

I cannot take on new lovers when she is unshakable from my existence, I try to speak of her but I choke on my words.

Resemblance is a trick-mirror, movement lives in flesh and in blood, she lives only in my mind

Move between a duality of worlds: old and new, traditional and modern, resentful and prideful

Self-sacrifice is the only remedy, looking forward is hard when there is nowhere to look back to.

I miss her, I want her, but I have never met her.

Her name is China.

I don’t know her, but sometimes I dream that she knows me

Amanda Chiu/趙友慧 (she/her) is a third-generation Chinese-Canadian activist and writer from Tkaronto. She currently lives in Oxfordshire, England where she is finishing her Master’s degree in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at the University of Oxford. Amanda is specifically interested in Asian-Canadian resilience and diasporic feminism Her work is centered around community organizing, marginalized visibility, decolonizing education, and grassroots resistance

ANCESTRAL DREAMS

VIOLA TIAN

From the bottom of the hill, I climb I see them, but they don't see me I hope I am not too late to catch up to our time when the destination seems to run away, everytime I come close.

Mirages or not, I decide: Let's chase after it

Sharp inhales send wasabi right up the nose, lead on my tongue sinks into my mouth into the sweetness of tears. The winding road, the steep incline

Everything we hope for starts from here: hopeful eyes, ardent dreams, moon waxing, shadows growing, marching bands ahead. Whispers among the mountains, in between the tree branches, falling on the wind of passion, and into the soil of perseverance. A lifted heart in air, lightened footsteps, and the craters my ancestors once landed on, still glowing, under the moon

Footprints are the love letters I never sent out

At the top of the hill, they stand. They don't see anyone else, but themselves. They hope they are not the only ones in their times, and the times after to make silence move and spirits stay.

Hail has just passed, and everywhere wind goes left no trace of existence

Oxygen thins by the second Altitude high, air chill, land bare, and hands bony – one can easily mistake this for a cemetery.

Everything we have was built from here: tired eyes, worn-out dreams, moon waning, outcries rising, collective memories behind Restless spirits tell generational stories under a sky where our voices echo in the hollow graves of the past. Stronger, louder, carried into the watery scrolls of the future

On the untrodden path, I see many hearts that have endured, outlived, and won against those odds stacked against them.

They will not be forgotten, not now, not ever They are in our brothers, sisters, fathers and mothers. You and I will keep climbing, one wave after another. Please keep looking over us, and keep passing your baton to us

My dear dear ancestors

Viola Tian (she/her), a fervent advocate for social justice with a rich Chinese Korean heritage, has made significant strides in bridging communities and fostering understanding. Her academic journey took her from Canada to the U.S., where she completed her Masters in Public Policy, further fueling her commitment to equity and inclusion Viola’s leadership within the National Coalition Against Anti-Asian Racism Canada (CAAARC) highlights her dedication to combating discrimination as part of a federal initiative. Her poetic work, deeply rooted in themes of identity, connection, and resilience, speaks volumes of her passion for uplifting marginalized voices and celebrating the beauty of diversity

WAVING GOODBYE TO THE WAVING CAT

OWEN BAKER

There’s nothing quite like the aesthetic of an old-school Chinese restaurant Growing up in Ottawa, I had the privilege of my Por Por and Ah Kong taking us to their favourite spots There, I found a great appreciation for the style and decor of each place we would go to. Dragons, waving cats, that classic “Chinese” font – even the pink liquid soap in the bathrooms. These style choices were all used to attract Canadians to this ‘foreign’ cuisine and gave them a first glimpse into the Chinese-Canadian world

While lots of restaurants are constantly updating their menus and decors, I truly find these classic Chinese restaurants to be comforting and endearing. It makes me sad to see some of them empty or closed, slowly decaying I often think about what these places looked like at their peaks, filled with family members laughing and enjoying comfort food.

As more modern Chinese and Asian Fusion restaurants open, it’s important to remember these mom and pop restaurants. These spaces were an introduction for many Canadians to a lot of Asian cultures and their importance is often understated. You can feel the hard work and sacrifice these people made to open these spaces Keep these places alive and keep them in our communities

Owen Baker (皇⿓) is a half Chinese Singaporean 23 year old from Ottawa He loves talking about growing up Wasian (White and Asian) and is super interested in other’s experiences playing hockey as a visible minority in Canada. Some of his Asian inspirations include Wong Karwai, Bong Joon-ho and Hayao Miyazaki. He hopes to explore and create more in film and photography.

BONJOUR, HI, NIHAO

ELDAR WANG

The best thing about working as a Chinese language teacher is you no longer feel racism. When crossing a dark block, a drunk man approached me, yelling “Nihao, nihao” to my face in a provocative tune I didn’t feel offended at all, I felt quite satisfied, I said you have a beautiful pronunciation! Next time, just make sure that your lips are moderately grinned when phonating “hao” to make your performance even better; just believe in yourself, you are very talented The first job I got after landing in Canada was teaching Chinese to college students, and Nihao is the first word all Chinese classes offer. The literal translation of Nihao is “ you good” – it’s a greeting, it’s a blessing. Hearing it brings me amusement. We encourage students to practice greeting, so every week as I enter the classroom, 50 people yell Nihao to me as loud as they can I never expected this tedious phrase to be this energetic and enthusiastic. The guard on the ground floor smilingly witnesses clusters of Nihao encircling me, with his lips flexing, practicing, preparing, ready to pronounce the syllables himself one day He thinks my name is Nihao. Other than that, Nihao can arrive at any unexpected time. One day, I was in the bathroom, a student recognized my boots, excitedly shouting Nihao to me through the stall door The echo lingered in the giant lavatory for a very long while

In fact, for a fairly long time, the Chinese classroom echoing Nihao was the only place I felt safe, confident, and useful. When I step into it, I know I will be able to answer all the questions that come to me, while outside of the classroom I just can’t It’s my first time living in Canada, or being anywhere all alone. I feel like a duck in a thunderstorm it’s not easy to reestablish one ’ s order of life in North America, after years and years in Asia. In formal academic language, you might call it “losing cultural capital,” and in my language, I call it feeling like an

infant. It’s time to relearn everything. For my first weeks in Quebec, I felt illiterate, because everything was in French. I stood still in the middle of a road, trying to google translate the bolded lines on the guideboard The connection was bad, but I was patient, confidently standing there, seconds after seconds. A century later Google Translate responded. It says “Leave right away, here’s dangerous as fuck, things fall off the top of your head at any second ”

Out of a weariness for political realities, I went on the journey of escaping from my previous life. Strangely, as everything unfolded in a language unfamiliar to me, I developed a longed-for insensitivity to the surroundings News no longer hurt me; I calmly watch it playing How long will this insensitivity last? My immigrant friends tell me to cherish it, for when my French is good enough to understand the news, I will lose this tranquility it’s a precious experience, like being a baby in a womb. In an unacquainted environment, reality continues, while I no longer notice every part of it When I was living in China, I hardly realized that I could speak Chinese. There were a billion people speaking it. The day I landed in Montreal, an airport coordinator asked me in French if it was my first time entering this country I realized that now I am here, and this is here, the journey I chose

Eldar Wang is a master’s student at McGill interested in literature and culture studies She was born and raised in China, currently living in Montreal, Canada. She writes, translates, and practices stand-up comedy and performance art. You can find her at www.eldarwang.com, or catch her petting corgis at dog cafés

EVEN IN MOVEMENT, THE COLONIZER FOLLOWS

AMREEN KULLAR

I remember during Canada 150, immigrants were confused on what the issue was, not knowing the country they escaped to was a product of genocidal massacres. They had only wanted to escape the results of their own. Unable to reckon with aiding colonialism as settlers implicating themselves in violence after fleeing it From one country to another, both with schools and houses built on graves Even in movement, the colonizer follows trailing blood, reeking of murder.

When they suggest “two state solutions”, I think about the partition of India I think about my Pakistani friend who tells me that when he talks to other South Asians in Canada, they ask questions, one after the other, in an attempt to narrow down where he comes from from country to religion to wealth, trying to find the difference somewhere. The way the colonizer taught us, so we’d get into mindless conversations and quarrels without looking their way. 300 years of British rule, they left once they split us in two. Bleeding hearts, families torn apart, hundreds of thousands that never made it.

So many of us had to go to the colonizers' feet, looking for a new place to call home In the imperialist countries you’ll find all the places they’ve etched out apologies, quietly dissuading the diaspora, attempting to nationalize us with our gratitude. A photograph titled Stockholm syndrome Much like the dueling identities of the right wing South Asian politician

When I hear “two state solution”, I think about how partition’s violence still exists in Kashmir, wreaking havoc on our sisters Stolen the same way they are here The Indian army suppresses activists and journalists the way zionists do, they expect us to not

speak out of fear. They know that if we saw the pain they inflict, we’d look away from the flags and see that borders are man-made illusions, colonial, heinous, fake. In South Asia, or East Asia, or West Asia they even call it the Middle East to try and keep us separate.

If I tell you “West Asia is being bombed”, you must feel differently than when I say “The Middle East” I remember reading of the hate crimes, the discrimination post 9/11 the countless times they couldn’t tell the differences between us. Intentional programming had me silently blaming religion for how I felt visible A newfound atheist with the need to blend in, offended when anyone thought I was Muslim. Years later, I redirected my rage the right way. To the imperialists responsible for the loss of life. Unimaginable pain in the dancing pixels, from Iraq, to Afghanistan, to Palestine

The way they tell lies to create hate and segregate, both sides fuelled by the assumption of the other’s distaste. The British helped partition India, the same way they broke Palestine in two Self-proclaimed seculars using religion to divide Now India buys the most weapons from “Israel”, using them on another state that wants to be free. There is an Indian soldier for every seven Kashmiri. It’s the most militarized place you ’ ve never heard of. All the ways they subtly attempt to prevent our revolts Divide and conquer, but you can’t do that to our souls In the South Asian future, we’ll band together, call each other siblings, and heal our mirrored pain with love.

If they had time between their jobs, their trauma, their belief that they moved to a better place, I think our parents would want to take to the streets to protest but they could barely make a living, so their

children went instead, carrying the rage of their bloodlines In the winter as we gather in public spaces, my grandfather wants to join us but it’s too cold for him to march, so his grandchildren go instead. I think about him the whole time. He tells me how beautiful it is that even though he was on the other side of the world for most of our lives, we still came out so much alike.

Freedom fighters through bloodlines, that’s our birth right During partition, my family helped hide their Muslim friends, and decades later I scream in the streets for one state If that’s not movement, I don't know what is. If being Asian doesn’t mean fighting to be free, I don’t know what it is. If being Asian doesn’t mean dropping walls and dropping borders, dreaming to cross, I don’t know what it is

Atop the apartheid wall we see each other Even when they fall, the colonizer follows. May secondgen kids turn around, pull the curtain back, and stick in the knife. May we redistribute and heal. For it’s not just our implication in settler colonialism that has been uncovered, but our responsibility to stand up, fight back. Healing the generations before usthe martyrs of colonial violence, survivors of partition, and grandfathers that say we fight like they did

Amreen Kullar is a freelance filmmaker and writer primarily driven by the will to alter preconceived notions, create political awareness, and allow fellow QBIPOC artists to feel seen and validated Their films have played at numerous festivals, most recently DPing a short at Fantasia International Film Festival in 2023. Most of their time off-set is spent writing film inspired prose on Letterboxd, managing existential crises, ranting/learning about geopolitical issues, and sipping iced soy chai.

THE HISTORY OF MY HAND

CALEIGH WONG SZE TING

This collective diary entry is made up of musings, insecurities, heartbreak and hopes committed to paper from 2010-2023, spanning the ages 11-24 These diary cut-outs are glimpses into a number of formative emotional and physical journeys undertaken from childhood, to adolescence, into the early years of adulthood. These include my mother and I’s move to Canada from Malaysia, and the changes in racial consciousness that accompanied that. This summative entry explores ideas of whiteness, internalized racism, assimilation and queerness, while also chronicling the development of one ’ s handwriting over a 13-year period Told in piecemeal through a child’s, teenager’s and young adult’s mind, this work aims to document the way things change – understandings of self, sexuality, and the physical imprint of penmanship – but, importantly, it is a testament to the feelings of longing and uncertainty that endure.

Sometimes I wish I was blond + blue eyed

I feel like everyone is worried about me

Which leads me to believe I must actually be quite sad

I wish I was pretty and blond with blue eyes

I am really homesick

I am often homesick

You have a weird name

Do you know that feeling you get I think somethings broken

I catch her looking at me sometimes

I hope that you are accepted

I hope this is all just a phase

girls are just friends

There is no running away from this

It’s the bravest thing I’ve ever done

I haven’t talked to god in months

She’s the love of my life

I feel like I could write about her forever

I think she likes me too

Sometimes I wonder why I write

There’s a lot I seem to not know these days

I barely recognize home

We call love elusive

It’s hard to stay present

Is it enough to know you’d miss them?

I think I just need to start heading down a different path

But I am realizing that there’s no place all roads lead

I wish I had a sense of patience + direction

A seemingly endless youth It will go by so fast Sometimes being

Caleigh Wong Sze Ting is a 20-something-year-old writer currently residing in Montreal. She was born and raised in Malaysia, and has been finding her way in Canada since 2011. Caleigh comes from a long bloodline of romantics - this complicated inheritance has been a subject of curiosity and exploration in her writing and life.

HOW ARE YOU?

你怎样

JENNA LIANG & BIN WEI

This interview celebrates what our relationship has been able to evolve into, to be able to answer and speak freely of the past and our future, of each other and oneself

1. What defines your identity as a mother/daughter?

是什么决定了你作为⺟亲/⼥⼉的⾝份？

BW: As soon as a woman has a child, she naturally and unquestionably establishes her identity as a mother This identity of motherhood is universally known, yet this also does not mean that all women are fit to be mothers or that all women should be mothers. When a woman is not adequately prepared to be a mother, it often leads to problems in society, culturally, and with family.

JL: Despite being born from her flesh and blood, I've struggled with the perception of myself in relation to my mom and to identify as her daughter In so many ways, the generational and cultural differences were so vast that I thought that I would never be seen, understood, or even loved when we were going through the hardest moments. The years I spent distancing myself from her warped my sense of self and have become the instances where I've felt truly and deeply alone I've made choices that have led me to sacrifice parts of myself in exchange for our relationship to heal As I grow from what, at the time, was forcibly cut off, I've found myself able to truly accept not only her but myself as well I am proud to be my mother's daughter

BW: 当 个⼥⼈ 但她有了孩⼦， 她⾃然⽽然，毫⽆疑问地就确定了她作为⺟亲的⾝份。 这种⺟亲的⾝份具有天然 的正确性。然⽽这也并不意味着所有的⼥性都适合做⺟亲，也不是所有的⼥性都应该做⺟亲。因为当 个⼥性还 没有充分的准备好做⺟亲，就往往会带来很多教育，家庭等社会问题。

JL: 虽然我是她的亲⽣⻣⾁，但我 直在挣扎如何看待⾃⼰与⺟亲的关系，如何认同⾃⼰是她的⼥⼉。在许多⽅⾯， 代沟和⽂化差异是如此巨⼤，以⾄于我认为在我们经历最艰难的时刻，我永远不会被看到、理解或爱。我与她保 持距离的这些年扭曲了我的⾃我意识，让我感到真正的、深深的孤独。我所做的选择让我牺牲了⾃⼰的 部分， 换来了我们关系的愈合。随着我的成⻓，我意识到我不仅能真正接受她，也能真正接受我⾃⼰。作为⺟亲的⼥ ⼉，我深感⾃豪。

2. Where do you think the difficulties in our relationship have stemmed from?

你认为我们关系中的困难源于何处？

BW: This is a bit of a harsh question and it's hard to put into words For me, I started out enjoying both loving and being loved and trying to be as good a mother as I could be Slowly, I realized that there were many differences between us I believe that I have the responsibility and obligation to fulfill my daughter's needs which are the things that help her to grow up, to learn, and to live. Of course, I was happy to fulfill some things she wanted within reason. For example,

she wanted to play video games, clothes, and other fun things However, her "wants" became most of her needs, and these "wants" were unacceptable to me As a result, there was a lot of tension and hurt between us, so we spent those years in a balance between love and hurt.

JL: I don’t want to write too much about this. Our relationship faced a lot of the challenges of many children of first-generation immigrants To be honest, I posed this question for my mom to be able to speak candidly about her perspective I/ we are in a place to be able to ask these questions but for much of my young adulthood, I couldn’t understand why she couldn’t answer me.

BW: 这个问题说起来有点残酷，⽽且很难说的请楚。对我来说，开始我享受爱与被爱，想尽我可能作 个合格的⺟ 亲。慢慢发现我们之间渐渐出现许多差别。我认为我有责任⽽且应该满⾜⼥⼉的：需要 “ ，所谓需要是有助于她

能键康成⻓，学习， ⽣活等事务。 当然也会适当地满⾜ 些她：想要“的。⽐如：游戏机， ⼥孩的打扮等等。 然⽽ 事情恰恰相反，她的“ 想要”成了绝⼤部份，⽽这些：想要“甚⾄是我完全不能接受的。结果就是我们之间产 ⽣了巨⼤的⽭盾和伤害。所以在那⼏年我们是在爱与伤害中渡过的。

JL: 我不想就此写太多。我们的关系⾯临着许多第 代移⺠⼦⼥所⾯临的挑战。⽼实说，我提出这个问题是为了让我 妈妈能够坦率地说出她的观点。我/我们处在 个能够提出这些问题的位置上，但在我年轻时的⼤部分时间⾥， 我不明⽩她为什么不能回答我。

3. If you could do something differently as a mother/daughter, what would it be? 如果你可以在⺟⼥关系中做 些不同的事情，你会怎么做

BW: To be honest, I've never really thought about it Since I only have this one chance in my life to be a mother, I don't have the opportunity to repeat the same failures. When I think about it now, I should have given her more encouragement, praise, trust, and companionship. At the time, I spent most of my time working to make ends meet and I rarely spent time with my daughter I am ashamed to say that and that I still can't say what she likes to do in her free time I've rarely encouraged her which is also a form of hurting her as she’s never gotten affirmation from her mom

JL: I wish I was a bit nicer, more patient, kinder, more accepting of her, that I had worked harder in school, be able to help her retire, that I should have chosen to live closer, to help her with errands, to have shared more dinners, to not have hurt her as I have, to take back all the hurtful words, to have not said that I hated her, to be able to say that I love her without choking still, to call her more, spend more time her, travel together, let her experience new things, to take care of her, to not be afraid if the last day we ever spend together passes by. BW: 说⽼实话，我真没想过这个问题。因为我 ⽣只有这 次做⺟亲的机

，所

我没有

会重复同样的失败。现在 想想，我应该给她多 些⿎励，称赞，信任和陪伴吧。那时为了⽣活，⼤部份时间⽤去⼯作。很少花时间陪⼥ ⼉。说起来很惭愧，⾄今我都说不出⼥⼉喜欢玩什么。给⼥⼉的⿎励也少的可怜。这对她来说也是 种伤害。不 能得到来⾃妈妈的肯定。

JL: 我希望我对她更好 点，更有耐⼼，更善良，更能接受她

4. How will you remember her?

你会如何记住我？

BW: I have always chosen my path in both the past and the future That is what I have told myself time and time again. Since I make my own choices, I have to do it myself, take responsibility for it, and carry the burden of it myself. No matter what situation I am in, I will never ask anyone for help or to confide in anyone. I will always be the woman who is fragile on the inside but strong on the outside For my daughter, there is no power that can make me forget her Every moment, from the time I was conceived to eternity, she is the only person in this world I will never forget

JL: She is the woman that has given everything to me. She has moulded me from her body and has carried me in her arms until I could walk. She is the person that would give me her last heartbeat and breath I will love her until my last step and even further

BW: 对我过去已及今后的路，我觉得基本上由⾃⼰选择的。所以我 再对⾃⼰说既然是⾃⼰选择的， 就要⾃⼰做， ⾃⼰负责， ⾃⼰承担。⽆论处在什么处境，从不向任何⼈请求帮助，也不向任何⼈倾诉。永远做 个内⼼有时 会脆弱但外表永远坚强的⼥⼈。对于我的⼥⼉没有任何⼒量能使我忘记她，每时每刻，从⼗⽉怀胎到永远。她是 我在这个世界上唯 永远不能忘记的⼈。

JL: 她为我付出了 切。她⽤⾃⼰的⾝体塑造了我，把我抱在怀⾥直到我能⾛路。她愿意为我付出最后的⼼跳和呼 吸。我会爱她，直到我⾛完最后 步，甚⾄更远。

Jenna Liang was born in Vancouver and currently lives in Montréal as a scientist with a love for the arts. She is the daughter of Bin Wei, a mechanical engineer in Harbin, China who left her career and immigrated for her family to Vancouver in 1996. Together, they enter a new era of their relationship and have plans to enjoy each other’s company for many years to come.

WHITE RICE AND WANDERLUST

TIMMONS WONG

ORIGINS

There’s a baby in the belly aboard a junk off Kowloon

Across, the father, sits smiling in silent swoon

The expecting mother, a gwei·lo (⻤佬), holds parasol in hand

Seeking refuge from the sun above in this foreign land

The father points his lens to capture the scenery

This picture, he knows, is of more than the city

Rather, his world, their future – our family.

WEST

I was made from this east-westerly collision

A migration physical and mental - a swing from local to foreigner

I’m not from here nor there, but feel at home everywhere

Like fusion dinners, a smorgasbord of culture

Nourishment for the soul and fuel for the wonder

EAST

When we moved to the Orient, I’d learn of my origins

Latitude lines I traced in that green Philip’s Atlas

I’d cross coastlines, scale mountains, and take flight in the trade winds

Close eyes and imagine far places beyond the pages

Now I see tall cedars, snowy peaks, and smell crisp PNW air

With appreciation for the moment and an appetite for the future

Remember where you came from, but look where you ’ re going

BEARINGS

Raised on white rice and wanderlust

These staples for me are a must

The 饭 for the body

The road for the soul

So continue to seek

For what exactly

I do not yet know

Born to a Scottish-white Canadian mother and a Hokkien-speaking Malaysian father, Timmons is a self-described ‘cultural chameleon’. He enjoys navigating the nuances of food, language, and culture (usually in that order) He’s carved out a life that lets him work remotely to chase waves, seek novelty, and find shared connections in unfamiliar places. When not on the road, he divides his time between the islands of Haida Gwaii and Penang, Malaysia

METAMORPHOSIS

ALEX TRAN

From humble beginnings, an earthbound caterpillar blooms into a beautiful, dazzling moth, capable of flight. Between those stages, a cocoon, where a dramatic and profound transformation takes place.

Metamorphosis is a miracle of adaptability and resilience.

This project is an homage to my mother’s odyssey In the chaos of the Vietnam War, her family ushered her, aged 16, onto a fishing boat crowded with strangers. Survival at any cost was the goal. Through the unforgiving seas, she and many other boat people found their way to Pulau Tengah, one of several Malaysian islands that became refugee camps Miraculously, her sisters managed to track her down from Canada. She later found her way to Montreal, where she was reunited with her family.

Metamorphosis is a book of paper moths that represents my mother’s harrowing escape from her home. Each moth wing was cut into the shape of a coastline that was part of her journey.

A caterpillar in war-torn Vietnam. A cocoon on the Pulau Tengah refugee camp

A moth reunited with her family and ready to start anew in Montreal

Metamorphosis is a miracle of adaptability and resilience

Alex Tran is a Montreal-based visual artist and photographer After a few years of chasing tropical fish in Panama for his M Sc in Biology, he turned to photography to express his curiosity for people and for the natural world. In his personal projects, he explores the confluence of art and science. In his commercial work, his humanistic approach to photography is sought after by clients, who include Amazon, BMO, Etsy, Frank + Oak, le Grand Costumier, le Jardin Botanique de Montréal, McGill University, Services Canada, l’École Nationale de l’Humour, Zara, and varied creatives and entrepreneurs

FLOURISHING NEW SPACES: THE INTENTIONALITY OF PAN ASIAN COLLECTIVE SHELLY BAHNG

In March 2024, I interviewed two of our new and old members of Pan Asian Collective, a community project serving the Pan-Asian community in Tiohtiá:ke, colonially known as Montreal. I have been involved with PAC since 2020. In the university context, I found it limiting that all of the Korean community spaces on campus seemed to exist only to drink soju together, and were heteronormative and centred on capitalism. There also seemed to exist a separation between people who were international students like me, first generation immigrants, and Korean-Canadians One of the reasons I joined PAC, like many others, is that all of our different backgrounds in nationality, ethnicity, diaspora and immigration histories can exist altogether in a space in solidarity with one another.

I interviewed Zoe and Lee, wanting to hear about their varying relationship with PAC and their diasporic experiences and histories. Over coffee, we had a chat. Zoë Sarkar (she/her) identifies as a mixed Asian cis woman: half Filipino, Indian and Chinese, and half French Zoë had a filtered coffee and met with me at a bustling cafe in the lower plateau Zoë is a newer member to PAC, having joined in November of last year. She really enjoys that, as a collective, PAC has members with diverse backgrounds and stories. It is not limited to any individual nationality or ethnicity She often found that she struggled to find her place in other Asian community spaces in Montreal as a mixed Asian person “At PAC, it’s great that people are gathering not only for their similarities but also for their differences,” she told me, saying that it was nice to see PAC’s inclusivity of different ethnicities, histories and identities within the Asian experience She also finds it valuable that PAC has a space for political discussions and

acknowledging colonial histories, including how some Asian countries have colonized others, as well as organizing group participation in local mobilization work for Pan-Asians in the city who want to be involved in activism. “There seems to never be a ‘stop’ in conversations, it is always continuing without blockage,” she said Simultaneously, PAC also focuses on solidarity, uplifting each other, and creating fun. Colonial histories in the past and present are acknowledged, but there is a primary focus on building solidarity against white supremacy in North America, as well as celebrating individuals and the wider community Zoë has witnessed PAC's potential as a warm and wholesome community space since joining the group last Fall.

Leighetta (Lee) Kim (they/them) identifies as a mixed Cambodian nonbinary lesbian We both joined PAC around 2020 where we met over Zoom long before we met in person. They ordered a flat white with oat milk. “For me, PAC is a creative outlet to explore not only culture and politics, but the framework of diversity at PAC pushes you to think about what being Asian means, ” Lee started the conversation off. In mainstream media, when people talk about “Asians”, they often mean “East Asians”. At Pan Asian Collective, we seek to create a space that recognizes the diversity of Asian experiences, including, but not limited to, Asians from North America, Asians who grew up in Asia, mixed-race Asians, LBGTQ2IA+ Asians, first/second/eighth generation Asians, adopted Asians, Asians that have strong ties to their cultural heritage and Asians that, for various reasons, do not “PAC keeps me wanting to learn about different histories and cultures,” Lee continued, “Even when I’m just compiling a playlist

to turn on in the background during our events, I always try to include songs from different cultures, countries and eras Often, I see people recognize a song from their home and start to sing along or dance. Sometimes people even come up to me and ask how I know this song from their childhood. I find that when I insert a piece of people’s home in the space, it can become more welcoming and familiar ”

Lee also pointed out that PAC is a unique organization in that it is non-hierarchical. This is not limited to its internal team structure, but also in terms of age differences between members Most Asian community spaces that Lee and many others have been to, such as cultural centre events and events in Chinatown, have a separation between age groups. Lee described how “the Elders’ table, Adults’ tables and Kids’ table” arrangement limits any communication between the age groups Because of this, and the hierarchical traditions in the culture, “elders tend not to be open to learning from the young. ” Lee found that it’s different at the events at PAC. Everyone is talking to each other because of the circular nature of the space Those who are older are open to learning from those who are younger, and vice versa “PAC has also helped me unlearn activist perfectionism because of the way that the collective respects everyone ’ s varying capacities. There is a lot of pressure that comes with being a community organizer, but I don’t feel that I have to be a figure like an angel or a martyr I don’t feel that I have to be perfect to be involved in social change.”

“Queerness is the norm in PAC.” Lee pointed out this other way that PAC is unique as an Asian community space: “Although not all of our members or participants are queer, ” queerness is talked about and exists in the space naturally. The space itself naturally becomes radical and makes it possible for other radical discussions to be started and flourish out of the space I am always thinking about the definition of “being Asian” and what it really means Pan-Asian people who find themselves countercultural in various ways can find PAC to be a

space for them in Montreal, and to find like-minded people to be in community with

Pan Asian Collective is a community project serving the Pan-Asian community in Tiohtiá:ke, colonially known as Montreal. PAC aims to fill a gap in the Montreal community by creating a space meant for Pan-Asian support, education and solidarity. We have a mandate that is anti-patriarchal and intersectionally feminist, antiracist, anti-colourist, anti-colonial, anti-ableist, anticlassist, body-positive, queer-positive and trans-positive. We are not bound by a national identity but rather a common experience that comes with being racialized as Asian and recognize the diversity and multiplicities of the experience and histories of being Asian The collective started in 2019 by Chris Lau, Yuan Kelly, Lavanya Huria, Serene Mitchell, Amandri Dahanayake, Laura Mota, Rachel Takasaki, and Cynthia Feng.

shelly seo bang is a Korean cis queer woman poet, podcaster and community builder based in Tio'Tia: Ke (Montréal) She is committed to exploring togetherness and aloneness She has been a part of Pan Asian Collective since 2020.

GRASS TO SNOW

VINETHA VELAUTHAM

You lick pistachio ice cream under the porch, dry, soul-happy, watching monsoon rain plough soil.

I salivate for a pistachio flavor I have never known

The year is 1983 You hide inside bunkers from Sinhalese air strikes The year is 2013. Terror clutches my chest and crawls up my throat.

You step foot on Western land. Wide-eyed at downtown skyscrapers, you weather your first winter storm

I am in your boot-clad shoes How strange it must have been to go from grass to snow

How brave

To you, every packaged good is a personal affront. You lecture on microplastics and chemicals, canned jackfruit deemed worse than Cheetos.

I throw my hands up in defeat, chomp on Cheetos at parties and tell my friends of your anachronistic ways.

You crave fresh coconut water straight from palm trees overhead. You claim the air is cleaner, the cows are holier, the weather less mercurial And I, with an exasperated sigh, tell you the grass is greener across the ocean. But you are tired of shoveling snow. Are tired of stringing together broken English

I soften

As we stand by the kitchen counter and steep Ceylon tea, we revisit your sepia memories that seep into my own

Vinetha is a 20-something year old based in Montreal. She is passionate about understanding the second generation immigrant experience and decolonization, and loves reading and writing about these topics. She is also an avid dancer/choreographer and enjoys different styles, from Indian classical to heels dance and more! When she’s not penning verses or dancing, you can find her café-hopping for the best matcha in the city