International Examiner April 16, 2014

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2 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE OPINION

40 years with CAPAA: APIs flex political muscle for change

By Amy Van and Jintana Lityouvong IE Guest Columnists David Della was a teenager when he began working summers in Alaska at a fishing cannery. The canneries were a livelihood for many Filipino American families at the time, as well as other Asian American families. For Della, it was not only a summer job, but became the place where Della developed his passion for social justice.

Della noticed blatant practices of discrimination at the canneries. “There was segregation in the bunks as well as the cafeteria,” he said of the unfair treatment. “We had separate food, they [white workers] had superior food, and there were no opportunities to move up.

There were a few of us that wanted to work on the fishing side because of the higher pay, but we were stuck in the wet, low-waged segregated jobs.”

These issues eventually made their way into a class action lawsuit known as the 1972 Wards Cove lawsuit. Although the long battle for Della and the 2,000 cannery workers came to a disappointing end, the pursuit for equal treatment eventually propelled Della into public service.

Brazen acts of discrimination were similarly observed within the justice system of which Alan Lai served. Lai got his degree in social work and worked within the Seattle Police Department (SPD) as a crime victim’s advocate.

He worked closely with the immigrant population and noticed a trend of community distrust toward SPD. In an effort to curb the distrust, he helped to establish remedial procedures that introduced cultural competencies into the department’s practices.

By the early ’90s, Della was Executive Director of the Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs (CAPAA). As director, Della had three goals in mind: to focus on emerging communities, including South Asians and Southeast Asians; to mobilize the community; and to diversify the scope of the Commission to include economic development.

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Established in 1974, the International Examiner is the only non-profit pan-Asian American media organization in the country. Named after the International District in Seattle, the “IE” strives to create awareness within and for our APA communities. 622 South Washington Street, Seattle, WA 98104. (206) 6243925. iexaminer@iexaminer.org.

With so much at stake, CAPAA and APIC partnered to coordinate the first APA Legislative Day in 1996. More than 3,000 APAs from across the state descended onto Olympia to speak to elected officials about their concerns. The APA community showed it could flex its political muscle, and the result was bipartisan agreement to support vulnerable and low-income families.

“We cried,” Pritchard said of witnessing the community united in front of the Legislative Building. “You couldn’t help but have tears in your eyes, to see all those A scene from APA Legislative Day 2011. • Courtesy Photo people, especially the elders, being a part of making a difference, changing policy It was then that the Commission also With a background in public welfare on their behalf.” sought a name change to include “Pacific.” and experience in lobbying, Lee teamed up In addition to welfare reform, the “We felt that the original title, with Diane Narasaki, both Commissioners impact of APA Legislative Day allowed ‘Commission on Asian American appointed in 1996, to hold meetings to other matters to be addressed. Matters Affairs,’ did not fully represent the actual educate the community about the changes such as expanding interpreter services, communities we represent,” Lai said, who in the Welfare Reform Act, which made labor issues, and challenges for small was appointed as a Commissioner in 1992. legal immigrants ineligible for many businesses, gaining APA representation federal benefits. After several meetings in According to Della, the vehicle of King County, the duo was able to expand on the Governor’s Council on Health change involves the ability of communities to having meetings with large turnouts in Disparities, and passing a bill outlawing to mobilize themselves. He strategically Pierce County with the help of Pritchard. human trafficking were emphasized. began recruiting individuals to serve on the Nearly two decades have passed since It was from these meetings that the board of commissioners who had similar the first APA Legislative Day and the big-picture goals for the community, but Asian Pacific Islander Coalition (APIC) tradition continues strong. who also had deep ties at the grassroots was formed. From there, eight different APIC Chapters were established to “You don’t get change overnight, but level. promote equitable access to culturally you can get change through persistence,” Lua Pritchard was serving as Executive competent and linguistically accessible Della said of one of his greatest lessons Director at the Korean Women’s services for APA immigrants, refugees, learned throughout his experiences.

Association in Pierce County when she and citizens in Washington State.

While building relationships with key joined the Commission in 2001. As a Former and current CAPAA policy makers is important, relationships Samoan American, she realized that commissioners took the lead in their with community members are important her leadership position was unique and respective counties: individuals like Van as well, according to Pritchard. necessary.

Dinh Kuno began rallying the community “Community members are not blind, “There weren’t that many Pacific in Snohomish; Pritchard in Pierce; Lai, they can see leaders with heart,” Pritchard Islanders around at the time,” Pritchard Lee and Narasaki in King; and Vang said.

“The more they see you in action, the said. However, the population was growing Xiong in Spokane. more they believe in you. When you call and the range of issues continued to widen.

One of the first goals of APIC was to on them, they come and they know that Tony Lee recalls one of the pressing plan a statewide APA legislative day. [change] will happen.” issues emerged from the federal “We wanted to tell [decision-makers] This series of op-eds are written to government’s welfare reform efforts in the that they had to step up and provide state- celebrate, reminisce, and highlight the mid ’90s. funded benefits for these immigrants who Commission on Asian Pacific American “The community was quite concerned,” were going to lose their federally-funded Affairs 40th Anniversary. The anniversary Lee said. “There were a couple of reported benefits,” Lee said. Without the state celebration will take place on May 15, suicides of immigrants [in other states] providing a safety net, many low-income 2014. Please visit http://www.capaa.wa.gov/ who faced the loss of the SSI [supplemental children and seniors and disabled adults about/40.shtml for longer articles and for more information. security income] benefits.” would go hungry or homeless.

EDITOR IN CHIEF Travis Quezon

IE BOARD OF DIRECTORS Gary Iwamoto, Vice President Arlene Oki Andy Yip Jacqueline Wu Steve Kipp

iexaminer@iexaminer.org

ADVISOR Ron Chew

CREATIVE DIRECTOR Ryan Catabay

DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Kathy Ho

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ARTS EDITOR Alan Chong Lau

ryan@RN2.co

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HERITAGE SPECIALIST Eleanor Boba

BUSINESS MANAGER Ellen Suzuki

VIDEOGRAPHER Tuyen Kim Than

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LOGISTICS COORDINATOR Holly Martinez

INTERN Chelsee Yee EDITORIAL ASSISTANT Vowel Chu PROOFREADER Anna Carriveau CONTRIBUTORS Amy Van Jintana Lityouvong Yale Wong Nina Huang Minh Ngyuen Roxanne Ray Yayoi Winfrey Shirley Qiu

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INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 3

IE OPINION

Rememberance: Community potluck and other acts of resistance

By Bob Shimabukuro IE Columnist “Get up, stand up. Don’t give up the fight.”

—Bob Marley

“Ancestry is not a crime,” said historian Roger Daniels, recalling Gordon Hirabayashi’s succinct criticism of President Franklin Roosevelt’s 1942 Executive Order 9066. The Executive Order established military zones (western halves of the Pacific coast states), and empowered the military to remove children, women, and men from their homes; force them into makeshift housing in the animal stalls at the Puyallup Fairgrounds and other such “assembly centers”; and incarcerate them in concentration camps without being charged or convicted of any crime and simply on the basis of their Japanese ancestry.

Daniels made the comment during a “Day of Remembrance” event on February 22, 2014, at the University of Washington, during which the Hirabayashi family donated to the University Library the personal papers, journals and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian award in the United States, awarded to Hirabayashi in 2012.

Why was Hirabayashi awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom? Because he broke a law (Presidential Order), which was ruled constitutional in 1944. And also because he steadfastly maintained that the law wasn’t constitutional until the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals vacated his conviction in 1987.

The Day of Remembrance (DOR) commemorates February 19, 1942, the date that President Franklin Roosevelt issued his infamous Executive Order 9066. We want people to remember how we were treated back then, and we want people to be aware of what’s happening now.

DOR also is very much in my mind because I am part of a community advisory panel helping to produce an exhibit about Asian American civil disobedience, “In Struggle: Asian American acts of resistance” at the Wing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific American Experience (the Wing). Now a recognized model, a community advisory approach was started to plan and curate E.O. 9066: 50 years before and 50 years after, the first major exhibit at the Wing for then Executive Director Ron Chew.

At the time, attendance was lagging at many museums, and Chew said that the only way to get more people into museums was to open the door and invite people in. Simply put, but very revolutionary in terms of museums. Ask community members to decide what was important historically, he was saying.

And the 50-year-old Executive Order 9066 became the centerpiece of a new

way of developing exhibits and interpreting history.

E.O. 9066 opened on February 19, 1992. It was a huge success, measured in terms of attendance, local and national reviews, and the way the exhibit was curated. Most important was the community participation, with hundreds donating or loaning artifacts, designing and building the exhibit itself, and telling personal stories. Like the original DOR itself, it gave Japanese Americans the opportunity to speak of the way their community grew despite widespread discrimination, was destroyed by presidential edict with Congressional support, and rebuilt despite intense on-going discrimination.

So how does all this relate to the Wing’s exhibit on API civil disobedience? The first DOR, after all, was not on February 19, and was advertised as a “community potluck” to “stand for redress with your family on Saturday, November 25, 1978.” How could a potluck be considered an act of civil disobedience?

At the first meeting of the advisory panel, the question, “What is civil disobedience?” was up for discussion. The quick answer was that it was risking arrest to protest and dramatize an intolerable situation. During that discussion, the question was turned into, “what does civil disobedience do, what is it for?” And then the discussion turned to taking a risk.

Culture plays a huge role in determining how we think and what we do and what meaning we give to our activities.

Being arrested should not be the only criterion for civil disobedience, when people of a targeted ancestry, race, or culture are harassed, even killed, for going out with friends to celebrate an upcoming marriage (Vincent Chin in 1982) or for walking down the street (Travon Martin in 2013).

The main point of civilly disobedient action is to raise public consciousness, so that we all can take a stand against injustice. To stand up, in struggle and in solidarity with others, telling our story, and still not be sure that we won’t be killed or carted off to some place behind bars or barbed wire, that is really what civil disobedience is. People’s fears then and now about incarceration, torture, murder, and, yes, simply assembling are real for some populations.

Some Japanese Americans did not attend the first DOR, fearing what might be done to them. But because it was a community potluck, they sent food.

Others were going back to Camp Harmony at Puyallup Fairgrounds, which had been home for 7,200 Japanese Americans, for the first time since they were shipped out to Minidoka or other concentration camps. Some were apprehensive about what would happen to

them. In fact, when they were allowed out of the concentration camps, officials told them to, “for their own safety,” not assemble with more than four at a time.

When some organizers first suggested folks chain themselves to the fences of the Fairgrounds, local community organizers Henry Miyatake and Shosuke Sasaki nixed it, saying nobody would come. They proposed the potluck, along with “art from the camps” on display, and a talent show. And to make sure nobody forgot, some even cooked “camp food” for the potluck.

With that change they got more favorable press, followed by support for redress from Governor Dan Evans, Seattle Mayor Charles Royer, and the entire Seattle City Council.

More than 2,000 Japanese Americans showed up at the event. As poet Lawson Inada observed, “It was the largest gathering of Japanese Americans since the camps.” It became a joyous and powerful community rebirth and call for action.

That call for action is still needed by all of America. Ancestry is still treated as if it is a crime in this country. We

need to stand up together, using whatever means we can, whether it be a community potluck, a silent vigil, a loud in-your-face street demonstration, or quietly passing out leaflets. In struggle and in solidarity, whenever we can, we must reach out to those who need help getting their stories heard and demand rights and respect for all.

Just as the first DOR broke open internally blocked doors for the Japanese American community, the E.O: 9066 exhibit showed a new way to document our experience and link the past with the present by using community advisory committees to help curate the show.

Other museum exhibitions, such as the Museum of History and Industry’s (MOHAI) Revealing Queer, have since followed the same process. Check out these exhibits when you can:

Revealing Queer at MOHAI, runs to July 6, 2014. The Wing’s In Struggle: Asian American acts of resistance will open May 1, 2014.

Bob Shimabukuro is the author of Born in Seattle: The Campaign for Japanese American Redress.

4 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE OPINION

Superintendent urged to include Chinese Exclusion Act in curriculum them his own knowledge about immigration and bullying issues. It was a good discussion.”

The following column was written by The Seattle Chapter of the Chinese American Citizens: On March 26, the Seattle Chapter of the Chinese American Citizens Alliance’s (CACA) Youth-in-Action visited Washington Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn in Olympia. Youth-in-Action includes students from various schools in the Greater Seattle Area. The students met with Dorn to discuss having the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act added to the Washington State public school curriculum. Students shared their knowledge about how this important historical legislation affected thousands of Chinese Americans, had long-term repercussions to the community and to this day, provides a lesson that is especially applicable with the current issues on immigration reform.

CACA hopes to continue raising funds and awareness about the Chinese Exclusion Act.

“If we can raise enough funding, the Washington State Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction can make curriculum materials about the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act available to any district interested in adding it to their social studies curriculum,” said Ming-Ming Tung-Edelman, president of CACA’s Seattle Chapter.

Students speak with WA Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn in Olympia. • Courtesy Photo “We are also thinking of taking this to the of the Chinese Exclusion Act. Many of Act but if we forget what happened in the Legislature. Apparently the only way to be the Chinese who built the railroad settled past, how are we going to keep it from hap- sure this is added to the Washington State Public School Curriculum is for the state on the West Coast. Communities in and pening again?”

Legislature to mandate its teaching in our around Seattle tried to send them to PortCACA’s national work on raising aware- schools.” land or San Francisco. It’s an ugly piece of ness about the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act history but it’s important.” led to the passing of Congressional resoluCACA’s mission is to promote and protect Middle school student Madeleine Lee tions in 2011 and 2012 that condemned the civil rights, develop leadership in Chinese said: “It seems as though we are repeating Chinese Exclusion Law. The same national youth, and provide community service. The what we did to the Chinese with the way energy continues in different state and local Seattle Chapter will celebrate its third anniverwe treat our migrant workers coming from efforts to broaden awareness and gain support sary on April 27 from 5:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

Mexico.” for public programs about the history and sig- at the Four Seas Restaurant, 714 S. King St., Seattle, WA 98104. Davace Chin from the NaEmma Ottensen, another middle school nificance of the Chinese Exclusion Laws. tional CACA. will be speaking and the winner

“I was surprised when some of the judges for the contest said they had never heard of the Chinese Exclusion Act,” said high school freshman Jack Holbrook, who won first place in the Regional 2013 National History Day Contest for his documentary Freedom Denied: The Unconstitutionality of the Chinese Exclusion Act. “It made me realize that a lot of people have no idea how student, added: “It’s a lot like bullying. No the civil rights of thousands of Chinese one likes to be bullied. It’s not right to bully a group of people out of fear or using their were violated in our country’s history.” race as a scapegoat. Our country knows we Student Anna Edelman added: “Wash- made a mistake with the Chinese Exclusion ington was directly affected as a result

“Mr. Dorn was receptive to what the students had to say,” said retired Seattle schoolteacher Maxine Loo, who helped develop a pilot curriculum about the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act. “He shared with

of the CACA sponsored local essay competition recently held in March will be announced. Tickets are $12 per person. For more information, visit www.cacaseattle.org or contact MingMing Tung Edelman at info@cacaseattle.org.

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 5

IE NEWS

Inspectors meet ID restaurant owners to improve cultural awareness

By Travis Quezon IE Editor in Chief

Restaurant owners in Seattle’s International District met with Seattle & King County health inspectors at Phnom Penh Noodle House on April 3 in an effort to improve communication and establish cultural awareness for inspectors newly assigned to the neighborhood.

Food establishments that sell or serve food to the public must get an annual permit and be inspected by Public Health-Seattle & King County. Most establishments have two unannounced inspections per year. The purpose of the inspections is to assure that the food is being handled properly from preparation through serving. Inspectors observe kitchen workers’ food handling practices, assure equipment is working properly, take food temperatures, inspect refrigerators and storage areas, assure water temperatures, and correct level and use of sanitizers. Any problem found is written up, and the manager is taught the correct procedure immediately, according to the public health department.

The meeting was created after a conversation between Ben Grace, program director of the Chinatown International District Business Improvement Area (CIDBIA), and Becky Elias of Public Health-Seattle & King County. Grace had suggested that whenever there are new The April 3 meeting included Grace, inspectors assigned to the International Elias, three health inspectors (two newly District, they should be introduced to assigned to the neighborhood), and owners restaurant owners. of several restaurants in the International “We wanted to make sure the new District. inspectors had a good cultural awareness Restaurant owners suggested ways of these restaurants,” Grace said. “When to improve communication and get you bring in new inspectors, they have to assistance.

They recommended that it have an understanding and awareness of the cultural nuances of our neighborhood.” become a normal practice for inspectors to introduce themselves when they are newly Grace said that while inspectors may assigned to the neighborhood. be used to working with more western Restaurant owners also said they style restaurants in other parts of the city, had outdated equipment stored on their they may not be aware of the cultural property that they needed help getting differences in the International District. rid of—things like refrigerator units and Many restaurant owners do not speak metal storage.

English as a first language and may have difficulties communicating with In response to these concerns, an event inspectors, he said. was organized by Public Health-Seattle &

King County and sponsored by CIDBIA to help restaurants get their old equipment and appliances hauled away. The event takes place Wednesday, April 23 from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. at the 6th Ave S. and S. King St parking lot in the southwest corner.

safety annually, any restaurant may request a special educational session.

“If a restaurant would like us to come in and provide a food safety lesson with their staff, we’re open to that,” Elias said.

“We’re happy to have more community conversations.”

“It’s an opportunity to remove old Free Haul Away Event happens restaurant equipment and unused Wednesday, April 23 from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 appliances,” Elias said.

At the meeting, restaurant owners also asked for more food safety and education opportunities. While many food service establishments will automatically receive one special educational session on food

p.m. at 6th Ave S. and S. King St parking lot in the southwest corner. Look for 1 Green Planet Truck. Visit 1greenplanet.com for a full recycle list. For more information, call (206) 263-9566 or visit www.kingcounty. gov/healthservices/health/ehs/foodsafety.

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER CELEBRATING 40 YEARS ANNIVERSARY GALA Honoring Ron Chew SATURDAY, MAY 17, 2014 AT 6:00 P.M. MEYDENBAUER CENTER IN BELLEVUE Sponsorship, table captaining, volunteering, and other opportunities available. Contact Kathy Ho at advertising@iexaminer.org to learn more.

PURCHASE TICKETS ONLINE AT www.IEXAMINER.ORG/40THGALA $100/pp

6 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE COMMUNITY

10 tips for running a successful business startup

By Yale Wong IE Guest Columnist

of people. They can intimately share their experiences so you dont have to make the same mistakes. Don’t be afraid to say: “I dont know,” “Can you help us?,” “You’re right,” “Great idea!”

When you start a brand new company, it’s like going to war. You’re up against everybody and anybody who’s fighting to raise money. You’ve got competitors out there. There’s going to be survivors and there’s going to be casualties. In order to succeed, you have to have a lot of elements. Here are ten essentials for a successful startup.

8. Dont just look at the resume. Look for chemistry in the person. If you hire a bad apple it will ruin the bunch. People in a happy work environment can take you to the stars. It creates high quality workmanship. A bad apple will distract the bunch and create a negative wave in the company. Treat and talk to employees the way you want to be spoken to. Always bring respect at all levels. Give respect, to get respect.

1. Good people. Hire people you can trust through thick and thin. With most startups, your company will experience major ups and downs—especially running out of money or going through an economic recession. You have to find people that will pick up a rifle and follow you into battle.

It’s life or death for companies.

2. Proven technology, “secret sauce,” and know how. Run your startup idea through many people and see how many “aaahhaa” and “wow” moments you get.

If multiple people outside of your family are willing to write you a check, it’s a good idea. No checks? Then, it’s not a good idea.

Go back to the drawing board to refine it or choose another idea.

3. All-star management. Assemble an all-star, dream team management team: A creative, innovative idea guy. A visionary chief executive officer (CEO). A tight, bythe-book chief financial officer (CFO). An anal-retentive operation/plant manager.

An energetic business development/sales manager. Honest legal counsel that has your best interest.

Investors buy into an experienced team, not just a fast-talking, silver-tongued CEO.

executive summary, smashing power point presentation, and an articulate CEO that can explain inside and out all company aspects. The CEO must know and have worked most positions in the company in order to really understand the business and people behind it. So many people have great ideas, but never or find a way to raise money. This is sad, because many geniuses never get their idea out of the garage. Entrepreneurs need to find a way to hire the right financial partners to raise money to allow entrepreneurs to focus on the invention and growing the company. I think most high-powered financial guys are not good leaders of start ups and should just focus on raising money. It is rare to find this partnership between CEO entrepreneur, CFO, and investment bankers.

4. Intake and offtake agreement or letter of intent (LOI). You need sales contracts for somebody to buy you goods.

Intake an incoming source of feedstock or 6. Aligned board of directors and materials to manufacture your products. investors. It’s hard enough having 5. Ability to secure funds or raise competitors out in the world. It’s a money. Have a great business plan, whole other ball game playing against

the referees. The CEO and management don’t need distractions in hard times.

Things can work like clockwork when you communicate and have a positive relationship with everybody. Invest in the relationship. This can go a long way when things get tough and go further when things click and get rolling.

7. Humble pie. Pride, get rid of it. It gets in the way of forward progress. So many individuals get caught up in titles, roles, and rank. People should focus on the job and task at hand, not the titles.

People looking for big titles and roles are not planning to stay long. They are focusing on their next big gig to add to the resume so they can advance and get a higher paying job elsewhere. Build a team culture. Praise the people around you. Acknowledge all people in the company, both new and veteran. Open your mind to consultants, mentors, board members, advisors, and low level employees. They have been there, done that at high cost. They are your front line

9. Dont be afraid to fire someone.

You have to nip this in the butt early on.

If there is a bad apple in the bunch, get rid of that person. Employees see weakness like hyenas see an impala with a broken leg. I had a manager once who had two employees that would fight all the time.

They could never agree on a single thing.

The manager could not fire either of them, and that weakness held production back three months. So I fired all three, the manager and two employees. The new manager got production working the next week.

10. Move fast. Have the ability to move fast and make changes to adjust to extreme business climates or situations.

In one occasion, when oil prices were high, it didn’t make sense to make and sell biodiesel. We just sold used cooking oil at profit and saved money in production costs not producing biodiesel. In another situation, we used to outsource companies help to clean our cooking oil. The oil cleaning vertical integration was an instant savings of 33 cents per gallon.

Don’t be afraid to fail or try. You can’t be successful until you know what failure is.

Yale Wong is the chairman and founder of General Biodiesel, Inc.

ANNOUNCEMENTS CAPAA: Governor appoints Lori Wada as commissioner enrollments, and eligibility requirements.

Earlier this month, Washington Gov. Previously, she worked at the Department Jay Inslee appointed Lori Wada as of Commerce and the State Lottery commissioner to the Washington State Commission.

Commission on Asian Pacific American Wada immigrated to Washington State Affairs (CAPAA). from Seoul, South Korea when she was Wada has more than two decades of 18 years old. She has been an active APA public service experience in support community member for over 35 years, of affordable housing and health care having provided volunteer services as a equity initiatives. She currently serves translator for those with limited English as an Operations Supervisor for the proficiency. She is a board member for Office of Insurance Commissioner. the Senior Housing Assistance Group Wada provides consultation and training and was previously a board member for on health insurance benefits, options, Metropolitan Parks and Recreation and the Pierce County Library Foundation.

IE News Services

April 30: Free health screenings at Senior Wellness Fair IE News Services

The National Asian Pacific Center on Aging (NAPCA) is partnering with the American Heart Association (AHA) to host Senior Wellness Fair on April 30 at the International District/Chinatown Community Center located at 719 8th Ave. S. Seattle WA 98104. The Senior Wellness Fair will take place from 10:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

guistically competent health education, with presentations by medical experts. Jae Hong, MD, (interventional cardiologist at UW Northwest Hospital) and Nancy Lee, PharmD, BCPS, (clinical pharmacist at Adult Internal Medicine Clinic) will speak about healthy living and herbal medicines.

Chinese (Mandarin/Cantonese), Vietnamese, and Korean interpreters will be available to participants who need assistance.

Light snacks will be provided.

Participants will receive complimentary For more information and registration, health screenings and aging related social contact Nelson Tang, NAPCA, at (206) service information. The Senior Wellness 322-5272 or Wendy Zheng, AHA, (206) Fair will also feature culturally and lin834- 8654.

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 7

Electrical engineering graduate Hans Utu. • Courtesy Photo

Engineer Hans Utu aspires for a better, greener community General Biodiesel Regional Manager of Alaska Felipe Ogoy. • Courtesy Photo

General Biodiesel’s Regional Manager of Alaska Felipe Ogoy breaks new ground in Juneau

collecting used cooking oil from the local restaurants in Juneau and signed Felipe Ogoy runs General Biodiesel’s a deal with the Juneau’s public works operations in Juneau, Alaska. General department to be the official grease Biodiesel began collecting used collector of Juneau. cooking oil from businesses in Juneau IE: What’s your experience been in the fall of 2013. The collections will like at General Biodiesel? save the city about $500,000 per year, Ogoy: Yale has a good eye for picking according to the Juneau Economic good talent. He looks for passionate Development Council. Ogoy is the people, hungry and happy to work. I Regional Manager of Alaska, General don’t work in Seattle and only know Biodiesel, Inc. a few people that work at the Seattle International Examiner: What led Operations and I notice they are all good people. I only report to Yale, so far he you to General Biodiesel? has been great to work with and makes Felipe Ogoy: I live in a small town work fun.

Juneau, Alaska, which has a population IE: Would you please describe of 30,000 people. We care about the something that has changed since environment, but there’s not a whole lot of opportunity in green company up General Biodiesel was first founded? here. When my childhood friend Yale Ogoy: I just started last year and Wong from Seattle came to visit me for don’t know too much about the business a fishing trip one year, he told me all the before, but it seems like the company exciting news about General Biodiesel is rapidly growing and found its place he was doing in Seattle. I immediately on the west coast as a real deal energy wanted to be a part of it and make a player. I have noticed and learned since difference on reducing green house I first started that so many people and gases and making an alternative fuel. businesses dump used cooking oil down I said, “I can help.” He said, “We need the drain. They don’t have to discard oil down their drains, we can pickup for used cooking oil and lots of it.” free and they can do their part on saving I told him I could start a used cooking the planet and make a difference. I am oil collection program here in Alaska. more conscious today on recycling and The next thing that month he shipped where America gets its energy from and me a up a flat bed truck, registered what countries we buy petroleum from.

General Biodiesel in Juneau, and I was It concerns me.

IE News Services

Islanders. I want to see them do better for generations to come. Yeah, we may have Hans Utu recently earned an grown up in the ghetto or the streets or electronic engineering degree. Utu whatever you call it, but you don’t have was born in Honolulu, Hawai‘i and to end there. Do better. raised in West Seattle. He recently Some parents struggle with 14 kids. came on board with General I’m one of seven and I’ve seen the Biodiesel as CEO Yale Wong’s struggle and I’ve seen what families go assistant. Utu is currently helping through. For the islanders, it’s always to build a website for General about taking care of your parents first.

Biodiesel’s Juneau operation.

Yeah, take care of your parents, but you have to take care of yourself first. You International Examiner: What have to be able to survive on your own do you do at General Biodiesel? before you make sure your parents are Hans Utu: I mainly help with the surviving. Your parents are good where technical side. I’m currently building they’re at, but you want to make it better the Juneau website. As Yale [Wong]’s for yourself and your family to come. assistant, I help him with everything You see with a lot of Asian Pacific from what needs to be done in the Islander families, it’s a four bedroom office and everything he’s doing on with twenty people. People sleeping in schedule. the living room, the basement, wherever IE News Services

IE: How did you end up with there’s space because they don’t know General Biodiesel? what it is to be like on their own. So how Utu: I’ve known Yale for going on a do you expect do it if you don’t go out year and a half. We played basketball there and try to make that life? together. I play basketball at the IE: What do you hope for yourself church where his daughter goes to in the future? school at. That’s how we met and from Utu: My hope for myself in the future there, he’s given me the opportunity is basically to just be a successful person to build my rep. I graduated with an in life and in my surroundings. To have electronics engineering degree and people in my life who want to be better. he’s kind of helping me out. The job IE: What have you learned about market is tough right now. And he’s like, “I’ll bring you on and we’ll go the biodiesel industry? from there.” Hopefully this builds into Utu: They’re making it green. They’re a great relationship for years to come.” adjusting your carbon footprint. For me IE: What do you think about at home, I unplug everything. Me and my wife unplug everything. Just being being an API in this business? more green and creating less pollution Utu: I think it’s tough knowing around the earth and around the city, it’s there’s not a bunch of Pacific Islanders really big. [in the biodiesel industry]. For Pacific We’ve got to make our state green.

Islanders, there’s that stigma: “You either play football or you do nothing.” You’ve got to start somewhere, why not For me I want it to be better for Pacific in our home, our community.

8 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

The team of General Biodiesel’s operation in Seattle. • Courtesy Photo

General Biodiesel fueled by diversity, desire to make a difference in Washington’s green house gas reduction

By Travis Quezon IE Editor-in-Chief

the company’s success would exist without Hans Utu, a recent electronicsthe drive of its employees—a diverse bunch engineering graduate now working as of likeminded individuals who wanted to Wong’s assistant, also described a family It’s the business of General Biodiesel to build a local company that reduces the environment. transform a common waste—used cooking region’s impact on the environment.

“The reason I work here is because of oil collected from local restaurants—into “The reason we have a successful the people,” Utu said. “When you go down biodiesel fuel. The fuel is used in all types company is because of the employees,” to the plant, everybody knows each other.” of diesel engines without any need for modification. The biodiesel produced has Wong said. “Somebody had to take a The sense of family is rooted in General the lowest carbon footprint of any biofuel chance because we didn’t have the highest Biodiesel’s initial planning, which was because the cooking oil is sourced locally, paying jobs. They could have chosen led by Wong and his wife, Laura Wong. the fuel is made here, and is then sold anywhere they wanted to work. A lot of The company was initially built on $3 to local distributors and fleets. Burning these guys got degrees. You got Microsoft million raised from friends and family this fuel, rather than petroleum-based here, Boeing, a lot of engineering jobs out before facing the challenges of the Great diesel, also results in considerably less here. But they chose to be with General Recession.

Biodiesel because they wanted to be a part greenhouse gas emissions. of making history, making a difference, OVERCOMING THE ODDS In the last eight years, General and playing their part in society and General Biodiesel was founded in Biodiesel has overcome setbacks caused in affecting climate change for a more Washington in 2006 along with eight by the Great Recession and outlasted positive planet.” other biodiesel companies. Today, only other biodiesel companies to become Process manager Matthew Rutherford two remain: Imperium Renewables and the renewable energy industry leader in Washington State. General Biodiesel, joined General Biodiesel shortly after General Biodiesel. Imperium Renewables Inc., is the parent company of General graduating from the University of is now up for sale.

Biodiesel Seattle, LLC, which runs Washington with a degree in chemical Over the years, Wong has had to navigate operations in Washington State. Last fall, engineering in 2009.

General Biodiesel through a number of General Biodiesel, Inc., opened a new “I make sure the process works, and that’s obstacles. operation in Juneau, Alaska and plans to everything associated with it,” Rutherford “Right out of the starting gates we increase production to 10 million gallons said. “Some examples are ensuring a safe got going,” Wong said. “My wife and I of capacity this year. General Biodiesel, work environment, maintaining great fuel Inc., is plotting the course for what may quality, ensuring process quality checks already did the research prior to that in ultimately prove to be an expansion along are being met, and managing equipment. 2005 just touring the country, learning the I-5 corridor and beyond.

The team atmosphere here is awesome. about the technology, learning about the entire industry. In 2006 and 2007, Yale Wong, founder and Chairman of We really work together to solve problems everybody was very hungry to get into throughout the company and try to make General Biodiesel, Inc., said that none of General Biodiesel as far as recruiting this a better place to work every day.”

investors and recruiting employees. It was a very desirable company. It wasn’t hard at all. But from 2008 all the way to 2010, boy, we ran out of money twice.”

Securing money to launch the company and keep it going has also been a challenge as an Asian American CEO trying to break new ground in a “good ol’ boy industry,” Wong said.

“I think as a CEO, starting a company and being minority-owned is extremely difficult,” Wong said. “I am American born and I have it a lot easier than a lot of immigrants coming over here, like my father. But I think a lot of it [covert racism] exists today, and a lot of people don’t see it. Some investors might look for these big degrees from ivy league schools.

The problem is many MBA graduates don’t have real experience using their own money to really understand the real world other than what is taught in school textbook style. On the other hand, they are well articulated and speak the same language and have the credibility selling to institutions. I’m thankful my investors don’t have that problem. They bought into into the leadership and the mission.”

It’s an obstacle Wong has overcome before as CEO of Compass Communications Inc., one of the largest broadband Internet service providers in Washington.

GREEN: Continued on page 9 . . .

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 9

. . . GREEN: Continued from page 8

“I was the only Asian, Chinese person, or Asian American to have an Internet service provider here in the State of Washington or within three or four states,” Wong said. “I remember going to conventions where I was the only Chinese guy and I always had to sell business and products to mostly predominantly Caucasian people. And here I am in the fuel business, and this is a ‘good ol’ boy’ network where I’m the only Asian again.”

on the bus in high school. This was when the Seattle School District mandated desegregation efforts to bus racial minority students to diversify school populations.

Always an entrepreneur, Pascua had been running a business as a FedEx contractor in North Lake, Washington.

When he heard about Wong’s latest venture into the biodiesel business, Pascua sold his FedEx van and helped to found the company.

Wong said the difficulties in being an “We just took all our talents, put it Asian American CEO came mostly when together, built the business model, and trying to secure money from institutions executed it,” Pascua said. “Some of us are and investment bankers. mechanics. I was a welder in the Marine “I think the biggest problem that Corps. I’ve taken all that education and minorities face going forward in having applied it to General Biodiesel. I certainly successful companies is raising cash,” didn’t know what the process did at the Wong said. “And in order to expand, for time, but I did know how to put the pieces whatever business you do, you need cash. I together. We were building the boat as it sit on a lot of boards of a lot of companies, sailed.” and I see all these young people, brilliant Pascua said the original goal was to people [of color] who have great ideas. build multiple plants, but the recession in They can’t raise cash. And I think a lot of 2008 made them focus locally. people judge a book by its cover.”

“Our business model has always been Wong said that the way to beat barriers to turn waste into energy,” Pascua said. created by racism is to not allow the “Biodiesel is a fuel that helps our country barriers to affect our perseverance. now. It’s a ‘now fuel.’ What we need to do “I think the way out of it is that we have is continue educating our users and our to retrain our minds to believe that no buyers. We’re a business that provides barriers exist,” Wong said. “If you walk in fuel for the country without importing any a room and say, ‘Oh, I’m Asian and these products.” people always judge a book by its cover,’ In Washington, General Biodiesel that starts to affect you. But once you start collects used cooking oil from hundreds of believing in yourself and your product, clients, including Amazon, Port of Seattle, people will see the conviction in you and Seattle University, The Space Needle, and that’s how you can be successful. That’s WA Department of Corrections, among what I had to do to overcome that. I had others. to go in there with the confidence that my It’s been the job of Hoby Douglass, color didn’t matter and it was all about ‘this is the best damn idea in the world General Biodiesel’s Vice President on and this is the best product and I had the Sustainable Business Development, to help best management with the best team and communicate with clients and potential the best experience.’ And I go in with that clients the benefits of taking part in the biodiesel process. and that’s the only way to win.”

General Biodiesel has a Green Partner program with local restaurants to collect General Biodiesel was founded by their used cooking oil and grease. General Wong, his wife, and his friend of 35 years Biodiesel provides a container for the Clarence Pascua. Wong and Pascua met restaurants to dump their used cooking oil and grease in, which is collected via a regular route service. The waste is taken to the General Biodiesel plant where the oil is refined and filtered to get the food matter and water out before it is transformed into pure B100 biodiesel.

A WINNING TEAM

General Biodiesel Vice President on Sustainable Business Development Hoby Douglass • Courtesy Photo

“It’s a closed loop waste-toenergy mission here in Seattle where the waste is local, the jobs are local, and the end product, biodiesel fuel, is used locally,” Douglass said.

General Biodiesel truck driver and Seattle music promoter Tom Yamada (left) and General Biodiesel co-founder Clarence Pascua (right) • Courtesy Photo

Douglass was able to secure agreements with a number of restaurants to let General Biodiesel collect used cooking oil for free.

These same restaurants had in the past received checks of about 10 cents on the gallon from other grease collection and biodiesel companies who picked up their waste.

Douglass said he was able to get restaurants to supply their waste for free because of General Biodiesel’s policy on great customer service—something often lacking in the waste management business. He said that restaurants were also receptive to the fact that General Biodiesel supports the local economy.

LOOKING TOWARD THE FUTURE

Wong said that the business model that General Biodiesel has created can be replicated and opens many doors for possible expansion in the future.

“What General Biodiesel has done in the last eight years, since 2008, is really proven ourselves as the renewable energy industry leaders in Washington State,” Wong said. “We proved it on the technology side. And we proved it as a successful business model. This is viable, sustainable and renewable. We made it work to get it to profitability.”

Wong said that the next step for General Biodiesel, Inc., is to expand along the I-5 “General Biodiesel creates local jobs,” corridor all the way down to San Diego.

Douglass said. “Every other company “We want to end up in San Diego and but us ships this [fuel] out of Washington maybe have some presence in Nevada and state.”

Arizona,” Wong said. “We don’t want to Tom Yamada, who also met Wong in do anything in the Midwest, we just want high school, was General Biodiesel’s first to stay on our side. What we want to do is collections driver. Today, he leads the to merge and acquire with other biodiesel fleet of drivers who collect grease and companies similar with business models used cooking oil from throughout the or other grease collection companies that city. Yamada is also an established music want to be a part of the General Biodiesel promoter in Seattle. companies.”

Yamada said most people don’t The industry as a whole needs to join understand biodiesel despite it being forces, Wong said, and not compete around for so long. He described how against each other to drive up prices. If, biodiesel was demonstrated at the 1900 in the future, a West Coast expansion is World’s Fair. successful, Wong would like to take the “We’re picking up garbage, we’re not technology and business model to Asia. using virgin seed stock,” Yamada said.

“The big dream, if I can get it there, “We are doing it the hard way because is to open 20 plants in Asia and most we’ve got to think about the environment.” predominantly in China,” Wong said.

He described how the byproducts in “Our business would thrive exponentially making the biodiesel, such as glycerin in China. And the reason being is because and methane, don’t go to waste either. they have the grease, the population to The glycerin is used for soap and beauty support the waste vegetable oil, and they products, the methane for fuel. desperately need the renewable energy to “There is no waste in our company,” help offset their carbon producing coal fire Yamada said. “So you would think more plants. It’s a perfect win-win situation for us to be in China.” people would jump on this.”

10 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

Matthew Rutherford

Shawn Noble

General Biodiesel’s team in 2006. • Courtesy Photo

General Biodiesel’s team members pose for a photo at the plant. • Courtesy Photo

“We’ve been able to do great things with limited resources, but our teamwork seems to be the most common denominator. You won’t hear, ‘That’s not my job,’ at General Biodiesel,” said Shawn Noble, pictured above. • Courtesy Photo

Zach Shelton

Angee Smith

“Good leadership comes from good mentors thanks to board members Jerry Lee and Dean Allen.”

—Yale Wong, General Biodiesel chairman and founder

General Biodiesel board member Jerry Lee (left) and founder and chairman Yale Wong (right). • Courtesy Photo

Wong (left), General Biodiesel board member Dean Allen (center), and Lee (right). • Courtesy Photo

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 11

IE NEWS

ANNOUNCEMENTS Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month at the Seattle Center IE News Services

Seattle Center Festál presents the 13th Annual Asian-Pacific Islander Heritage Month Celebration event on Sunday, May 4 from 11:45 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. The free family-friendly event will feature live entertainment, activities, and cultural elements.

America’s Got Talent contestants Lions Ambition will be the headliner at the event. The Seattle-based six member team blends together skilled lyricism, soulful vocals with innovative new melodies that entertain and captivate audiences. Their unique sound has gained the band praise to be selected to open for national acts like Ludacris and Shwayze.

There will also be 17 of Seattle’s cultural entertainment groups performing that include Rachel Wong, Natya, OKK Taiko, Au Lac Vovinam-Lion Dance, and many others.

For more information, visit www. apiheritage.com.

From Typhoon Haiyan to large-scale mining: Report-back performance, discussion IE News Services

Community members of the Bayan Pacific Northwest region will retell their stories of transformation, highlights, and challenges in a multi-media show entitled “KADASIG,” which means courage in the Bisaya language. The 17 delegates from Seattle, including four children, traveled to the Philippines last winter to support Typhoon Haiyan relief efforts and to further their understanding of the harsh realities of Philippine society.

Seattle and Henry Luke of Alay ng Kultura were the first of the Seattle team to arrive. They participated in a fiveday caravan of the first national relief mission organized by BALSA, a national grassroots, all-volunteer organization in the Philippines.

“When we arrived in Tacloban, the devastation of the area and desperation of the thousands of survivors lined up to receive relief goods blew my mind,” Butiu said. “Yet it was inspiring to see how organized all the BALSA volunteers were in putting the relief packs together and distributing them to the survivors, despite the Philippine government’s inability to respond to the disaster.”

The Seattle team spent half the time in Quezon City near the capital of Manila, celebrating the 150th birthday of Philippine national hero Andres Bonifacio, and the other half on the Team members also brought along southern island of Mindanao learning their families, including hip hop artist and about the impacts of large scale mining activist Geo Quibuyen—aka Prometheus on the land and surrounding community. Brown of the rap duo The Bar and Blue Super Typhoon Haiyan, the strongest Scholars. tropical storm recorded in history to Quibuyen said: “Going back to the hit the Philippines, struck the town Philippines for the first time since I of Tacloban on the island of Leyte on was six was an experience I’ll never November 8. One week later, Precious forget. It meant everything to share that Butiu of the organization GABRIELA experience with my family and be hosted

by many selfless organizers who we learned from and even worked alongside in their various campaigns and projects to better the conditions of the country my family still calls home.”

All are invited to KADASIG on April 25 to hear more experiences from the Seattle team and bear witness to the power of the mass movement for genuine democracy in the Philippines.

WHAT: 17 Seattle-based community members traveled to the Philippines at the end of 2013 to assist with grassroots recovery efforts from super Typhoon Haiyan.

This event is their report-back to the community.

WHEN: Friday, April 25, doors at 7:00 p.m., show starts at 8:00 p.m.

WHERE: Southside Commons, 3518 S Edmunds St, Seattle

WHO: Co-sponsored by BAYAN Pacific Northwest, Philippines-U.S. Solidarity Organization, GABRIELA Seattle, Alay ng Kultura, Coalition of Anti-Racist Whites and Social Justice Fund NW. Tickets: $10 pre-sale/youth, $15 at the door

12 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE ARTS

In the Book Of explores challenges of Afghan people

By Roxanne Ray IE Contributor The U.S. war in Afghanistan has wound down, but the challenges facing the Afghan people continue. Taproot Theatre is currently presenting a play, In the Book Of, by John Walch, that deals with some of these ongoing challenges.

DONATE to NAFCON’S Typhoon Relief Program For info on how to donate, visit nafconusa.org.

In the play, the character of Anisah has served as a translator for the U.S. military and now fears reprisals from some of her fellow countrymen as the U.S. military departs from Afghanistan. So she follows a sympathetic lieutenant home to a small town in the United States.

“I wanted to write about immigration in contemporary America, but didn’t just want to write an ‘issue play,’” playwright Walch said. “I wanted the play to be in conversation with the larger, historical discussion.”

Walch pulled from both the past and the present. Inspired by the biblical Book of Ruth, Walch sought to explore the issue of immigration from a more contemporary perspective. “Ruth is one of the earlier narratives about immigration as it is set in a time when trade is increasing mobility and people had to begin to deal with the

reality that we don’t live in a bubble,” he Walch expects to continue drawing said. upon historical sources for pathways Walch said that the Book of Ruth into presenting dramatic work about provides an example for people to follow. contemporary issues. “It kind of goes “Boundaries will eventually be crossed, the back to my first thoughts, when you challenge is how we deal with it—either put something contemporary against we open our arms to them or we slam the something historical,” he said. “It lets the door shut,” he said. “The Book of Ruth is contemporary story be bigger because an example of meeting the stranger with it’s in conversation with timeless themes, kindness and respect, giving them the events, characters.” dignity to work without harassment.”

While this production is Walch’s Seattle premiere, he hopes to connect Anisah, however, does not receive quite with our region more in the future. so warm of a welcome and must struggle with the challenges of integrating into a Although he was not involved in the new community. selection of this play by Taproot, or in Despite these differences, Walch the initial casting or directorial process, feels that both stories foreground the Walch did join the Taproot team for the strength of women. “Like Ruth, Anisah is final week of rehearsals and for opening strong, determined, and coming into her night, and looks forward to his next visit to the Pacific Northwest. independence,” he said.

“I wouldn’t say this is what interests me most about Afghanistan,” Walch added, “but in working on the play, I became fascinated with how women are becoming more and more empowered and shaping the cultural conversation. Look at someone like Malala Yousafzai, (the Pakistani 15-yearold shot for advocating education): it’s just incredible.”

“It’s part of why I wanted to come and work with Taproot: they are new to me,” Walch said.

In the Book Of will be performed through April 26 at Taproot Theatre, 204 North 85th Street, Seattle. For more information, visit taproottheatre.org.

To read a Q&A with playwright John Walch, visit iexaminer.org.

Students make global connections at Case Competition

By Shirley Qiu IE Contributor Students from Thailand, Spain, Australia, and six other nations around the world joined students at the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business this week to participate in the annual Global Business Case Competition.

Now in its 16th year, the event invites international students each year to both compete in the international businessfocused competition—in which teams of students each receive a business scenario they must find a solution to—and also to experience Seattle culture and build connections with the local community.

One of the main focuses of this year’s competition is making sure the visitors have time to explore Seattle before getting started on the case competition.

The first few days of the week included a tour around Seattle and visits to local businesses, such as Seattle coffee giant Starbucks.

“It’s not just a competition, it’s an opportunity to create connections with other people, like-minded individuals, around the world,” said UW senior Lisa Dang, GBCC co-chair.

Dang said that while many international case competitions only last around 48 hours, UW’s case competition lasts one week to facilitate group activities to create that local connection.

This year’s emphasis on connectionbuilding applies not just to the visiting

Left to right: Naramon Pidet, Moko Yokoichi, and Napat Tanawarotai visiting from Thailand bond with UW business student Kiersten Walker at the GBCC Bowling event on April 9. • Photo by Shirley Qiu

international students, but for UW’s “The activities they have has really business students as well. helped us to open the view that we have GBCC co-chair Connor Harle, a UW around the world and [get] to know new senior, said they hoped to involve Foster people and make new relationships, visit School of Business students in the event to companies,” Espinosa said. “Also it’s create more ties between UW’s business good that they mix teams so you meet other people and learn to work with school and the global community. other cultures.”

“One of our goals was to focus on really The dual benefits of a professional creating connections with the international case competition along with organized community and Foster, because we thought that’s one thing Foster could improve on,” leisure time are what student planners hope the international student visitors Harle said. take away.

One of the new events introduced this “We want the international students year in an effort to achieve that goal was to have a more global perspective,” a bowling night at the UW’s Husky Union Harle said. “[We hope GBCC is] Building, where business school students giving them lessons that they might were encouraged to attend. not necessarily learn in the classroom, Yleana Espinosa, a student visiting from from the competition itself, from visits Mexico, attended the bowling night and with companies, from other students in got to mingle with other UW students. general.”

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 16 2014 — 13

IE ARTS

Missing Pictures, Sons, and Shorts

By Yayoi L. Winfrey IE Contributor

when he was finally set free, he was flown back to Phnom Penh.

In French-accented English, a narrator describes Khmer Rouge’s assault on Cambodia. Using voiceover, the actor performs as 13-year-old Rithy Panh recalling the invasion of Phnom Penh in 1975 with the realization he’s “the enemy” to the communist intruders.

Because Panh’s father was a schoolteacher, his family was labeled bourgeois and forced into a labor camp. Along with over one million fellow citizens—artists, educators, journalists, poets, photographers and intellectuals who might speak out against (or even record) what would become a four-year reign of terror—Panh and his relatives were relocated to the agrarian countryside for “reeducation.”

This failed agenda masterminded by Khmer Rouge was their attempt at equalizing Cambodian society.

Exiled as a criminal alien, Kosal was deported to his birthplace; paradoxically, a country he had never really known. Befriending others like himself, he learned they also had youth criminal records and knew little of the language, customs and culture of their new residence. With families in the United States, these unwilling expatriates grouped together through their shared experiences.

Replicating chickens, dogs, oxen, fences, houses, staircases, palm trees, plants, rickshaws, trains, and more, he employs diorama to illustrate the deadly drudgery of being imprisoned by Khmer Rouge. The lifeless forms representing Cambodian characters are minutely detailed down to their slack expressions. Engraved with grim, unsmiling faces, their vacant eyes conveying only weariness, the clay figures are juxtaposed against archival black-and-white propaganda footage shot

by Khmer Rouge. The result is startling.

patterned kimono.

Director Masahiro Sugano focuses on Kosal’s success as a spoken word artist and his invitation to represent Cambodia at the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad. But Sugano also addresses important topics like immigration, refugees and deportation. His interviews with other exiles battling loneliness with drugs and other unhealthy lifestyle choices are poignant. Creatively shot with Unlike many of his unfortunate compatri- artistic flair, the film also displays definitions ots, Panh survived the catastrophe. Living in from gang vocabulary.

France, he became a filmmaker compelled to From Japan comes the 68-minute anime tell the stories of those who died, and those feature, Short Peace comprised of four pieces who lived and suffered. He made The Miss- compiled by director Otomo Katsuhiro. ing Picture, he contends, because he was In Possessions, an 18th century man belooking for a nonexistent photograph to prove comes lost in the mountains during a storm.

Khmer Rouge’s spree of genocide. However, Seeking shelter at an abandoned shrine, he Panh discovered a storytelling style using discovers that it’s haunted by the souls of 100 hand-carved figures made of clay and water year-old objects. Sewing and mending them that completes the narrative without the ab- throughout the night, he restores beautifully sent photo. colored paper umbrellas (kasa) and vividly

The most riveting of the shorts, Combustible is a seemingly authentic tale from Japan’s Edo Period. Growing up as wealthy next-door neighbors, Waka-chan and Matsukichi-chan are torn apart as adults. While Waka is forced into an arranged marriage, Matsukichi defies his parents to the point of being disowned— so he can become a firefighter. Ironically, he’s sent to rescue his beloved Waka in a rapidly spreading fire she causes. Containing details from 19th century woodblock prints, and texLeaving behind everything they owned, tile patterns and kimono from real fabric, the Cambodians were forced into uniforms of film also incorporates elements of kabuki and black pajamas and red-checkered scarves. banraku plays.

With their first names stripped away, they Gambo is the name of a gentle, white bear were ordered to dig dirt—dirt to plant rice that living in a forest near a village that a gigantic they never tasted (most of it shipped overseas red demon has ravaged. Kidnapping women or fed to Khmer Rouge party leaders) and dirt one by one, the demon has nearly depleted to bury their dead. Panh uses real dirt too, the community when a Christian samurai and real grass, carefully crafting scenes of his arrives on the scene. Between him, Imperial pleasant childhood home as well as the vile soldiers, the last remaining girl, and Gambo killing fields. Between Americans dropping (who understands human language), they 500,000 tons of bombs and leader Pol Pot fight the monster together. inflicting unbelievable cruelty, Cambodians A Farewell to Arms has the only modern endured unspeakable dehumanization. storyline in the ensemble. Featuring soldiers “Ideology kills,” the narrator declares, with names like Gimlet and Rum, it’s one but that proclamation doesn’t even begin to long, noisy battle scene between a mechaniexplain Khmer Rouge’s terrifying dogma. cal enemy and heavily armed, non-Japanese Instead, it’s Panh’s very personal memories looking fighters in a post-apocalyptic city. that require no missing photograph to tell the The psychedelic, jazz-flavored music in the truth about what happened. introduction of the series (where a white rabAnother documentary about Cambodia bit entices an Alice-in-Wonderland character) unsurprisingly features another victim of is sublime; and, images of soothing Mt. Fuji Khmer Rouge. In Cambodian Son, poet end two of the episodes.

Kosal Khiev is examined up close and personal. Arriving in America with his family The Missing Picture screens April 4 at as refugees when he was just a year old, Ko- SIFF Film Center. Cambodian Son screens sal was granted asylum status. But growing April 21 at 8:00 p.m. at UW Law School, up impoverished in California without his Gates Hall, Room 138. A Q&A with direcfather led him to street life. At 16, Kosal tor Masahiro Sugano follows. (April 22 show was charged with attempted murder and sold out) Short Peace screens April 24 at sent to prison for fourteen years. There, Grand Illusion Cinema. he discovered the art of spoken word. But

Artist Thuy-Van Vu captures the extraordinary behind the ordinary

By Minh Nguyen IE Contributor

And her childhood home was full of items to study, Vu grew up seeing her parents cling to particular items.

While some artists seek to capture the Her parents, along with all the others who extraordinary, Thuy-Van Vu is more concerned with the mundane—but just as re- fled the Fall of Saigon in 1975, left all that they knew, filling their luggage with belongvealing—objects of our lives. ings that could most connect them to their The paintings in her newest show at G. pasts.

Gibson Gallery showcases domestic, archaic In a similar exhibit blocks away at The items like stools, clunky dressers, and typeWing Luke Museum of the Asian Pacific writers. These objects, usually found amidst American Experience (The Wing), the artthe other clutter in a person’s space, are cenist duo Annie Han and Daniel Mihalyo’s tered in this exhibit as the main attraction.

“Transit in Half-Light” also meditates on But Vu has a knack for representing com- the cultural and emotional weight of obmonplace things in a way that reflects the jects, demonstrating that when objects take lives of their owners. on owners and their lives, they transcend the The paintings are titled literally: “Type- mere raw materials from which they were writer (Museum Storage),” “American made. Han has dedicated parts of the exhibit Dresser (Museum of Art),” “Storage (For- to her grandmother, an immigrant from Korea, who fell into a deep grief because her mer PS).” belongings never made it overseas.

Although the items in the series are the In the narrative of the immigrant experiproducts of human labor, there is a conspicuous sense of human absence—save a self- ence, objects are never solely objects. Within objects, people embed the affirmations of portrait of Vu herself. their past, their resiliency, and in many cases, “Much of my work is about the transfortheir miraculous continued existence. mation of objects into artifacts that are disThough Vu presents her objects with a played to support narratives about history and culture,” Vu explains. “The process by gentle neutrality, some items from the past which objects are selected to represent per- will never be neutral. One such example is sonal history or heritage has always inter- the machine called the “Iron Chink,” a device built to gut and clean salmon for canested me.” ning, ultimately replacing Chinese fish plant Vu’s interest in artifacts led her to history workers. When you are confronted with Vu’s museums to paint relics of the past. Vu’s own “Iron Chink”—its unwieldiness and painting “American Dresser” is of an object brashness — you are also confronted with she found in a furniture display at the Modthe brashness of a time that rationalized such ern Museum of Art (MoMA), while other an invention. paintings, such as “Metropolis of TomorThe most standout piece in Thuy-Van’s row” and “Iwasaki’s Box,” are displayed locally (the latter currently encased in a glass show is her self-portrait, “Twenty Seven vitrine at the Museum of History and Indus- Weeks.” As the only painting that features human life, not merely its vestiges, the painttry (MOHAI). ing portrays Vu naked with an extended Growing up in Phoenix under the strict belly, colored in the same soft, fleshy salmon supervision of her parents, Vu spent much that is used in the piece adjacent to it, the time alone in thought and observation of her “Iron Chink.” The juxtaposition serves as a surroundings, developing the patience and reminder that the change of objects and ideas attentiveness that would lead her to her craft is as continual and constant as their rebirth. years later.

While the “Iron Chink” embarrasses us as Vu’s early work included portraits of fama vestige of our brutish history, it also posiily members and appropriated images taken tions us to see the machine with enough disby journalists in Vietnam during the war. tance to see it for all of its obvious faults. It She later became more interested in how obgives us a place to start all over. jects are used to create historical narratives.

14 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE COMMUNITY RESOURCE DIRECTORY Arts & Culture

Professional & Leadership Development

Asian Counseling & Referral Service

Asia Pacific Cultural Center 4851 So. Tacoma Way Tacoma, WA 98409 Ph: 253-383-3900 Fx: 253-292-1551 faalua@comcast.net www.asiapacificculturalcenter.org Bridging communities and generations through arts, culture, education and business.

1300 1st Ave, Seattle, WA 98101 Ph: 206-654-3209 Fx: 206-654-3135 SAM connects art to life through special exhibitions, educational programs and installations drawn from its collection of approximately 25,000 objects. Through its three sites, SAM presents global perspectives, making the arts a part of everyday life for people of all ages, interests, backgrounds and cultures.

Education 3327 Beacon Ave S. Seattle, WA 98144 ph: 206-725-9740

3639 Martin Luther King Jr. Way S, Seattle, WA 98144 ph: 206-695-7600 fx: 206-695-7606 events@acrs.org www.acrs.org ACRS offers multilingual, behavioral health and social services to Asian Pacific Americans and other lowincome people in King County.

Executive Development Institute 310 – 120th Ave NE. Suite A102 Bellevue, WA Ph. 425-467-9365 • Fax: 425-467-1244 Email: edi@ediorg.org • Website: www.ediorg.org EDI offers culturally relevant leadership development programs.

WE MAKE LEADERS Queen Anne Station, P.O. Box 19888, Seattle, WA 98109 info@naaapseattle.org, www.naaapseattle.org Fostering future leaders through education, networking and community services for Asian American professionals and entrepreneurs.

Facebook: NAAAP-Seattle Twitter: twitter.com/naaapseattle

Senior Services

VNSF enables underprivileged students in Viet Nam to achieve success and happiness through education. We are looking for volunteers and board members to join the team and make a difference in the lives of kids in Vietnam.

Housing & Neighborhood Planning HomeSight 5117 Rainier Ave S, Seattle, WA 98118 ph: 206-723-4355 fx: 206-760-4210 www.homesightwa.org HomeSight creates homeownership opportunities through real estate development, home buyer education and counseling, and lending.

Address tobacco control and other health justice issues in the Asian American/Pacific Islander communities.

PO Box 14047, Seattle WA 98114 (206) 325.0325 (Helpline) info@apichaya.org www. apichaya.org API Chaya is dedicated to serving survivors of domestic violence, sexual violence and human trafficking in the Asian, South Asian and Pacific Islander communities. We offer multi-lingual services that are free and confidential.

Community Care Network of Kin On

815 S Weller St, Suite 212, Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-652-2330 fx: 206-652-2344 contact@kinon.org www.kinon.org Provides home care, Alzheimer’s and caregiver support, community education and chronic care management; coordinates medical supply delivery for Asian/Chinese seniors and families in King County.

Kin On Health Care Center

4416 S Brandon St, Seattle, WA 98118 ph: 206-721-3630 fx: 206-721-3626 contact@kinon.org www.kinon.org A 100-bed, Medicare and Medicaid certified, not-for-profit skilled nursing facility offering long-term skilled nursing and short-term rehab care for Asian/Chinese seniors.

803 South Lane Street Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-292-5184 fx: 206-838-3057 info@legacyhouse.org www.scidpda.org/programs/legacyhouse.aspx Description of organization/services offered: Assisted Living, Adult Day Services, meal programs for low-income seniors.

Medicaid accepted.

National Asian Pacific Center on Aging Kawabe Memorial House 221 18th Ave S, Seattle, WA 98144 ph: 206-322-4550 fx: 206-329-3330 connie.devaney@gmail.com We provide affordable, safe, culturally sensitive housing and support services to people aged 62 and older.

601 S King St. Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-682-1668 website www.apicat.org

CISC helps Asian immigrants make the transition to a new life while keeping later generations on touch with their rich heritage.

Legacy House InterIm Community Development Association 310 Maynard Ave S, Seattle, WA 98104 Ph: 206.624-1802 Services: 601 S King St, Ph: 206. 623-5132 Interimicda.org Multilingual community building: housing & parking, housing/ asset counseling, projects, teen leadership and gardening programs.

Senior Community Service Employment Program ph: 206-322-5272 fx: 206-322-5387 www.napca.org Part-time training program for low income Asian Pacific Islanders age 55+ in Seattle/ King & Pierce Counties.

International District Medical & Dental Clinic 720 8th Ave S, Suite 100, Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-788-3650 fax: 206-490-4011 email: info@ichs.com website: www.ichs.com Shoreline Medical & Dental Clinic Coming in 2014!

ICHS is a non-profit medical and dental center that provides health care to low income Asian, Pacific Islanders, immigrants and refugees in Washington State.

Seattle Rotary Club Bill Nagel Meets Every Thursday 11:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.

New Hong Kong Restaurant Bill.nagel@gmail.com http://www.seattleidrotary.org/ Improve the local community by engaging activities such as community improvement projects, scholarship opportunities, and undertakings that promote education.

Housing, property management and community development.

Please mail a check for $35 to the International Examiner or donate to: 622 S. Washington St., Seattle, WA 98104.Thank you for your contribution.

Our programs help people meet their immediate needs and gain the skills and resources needed to reach solid ground and achieve their dreams.

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1601 E Yesler Way, Seattle, WA 98122 ph: 206-323-7100 fx: 206-325-1502 www.nikkeiconcerns.org Rehabilitation & care center; assisted living community; senior activity program; continuing education.

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1501 N 45th St, Seattle, WA 98103 ph: 206-694-6700 fx: 206-694-6777 info@solid-ground.org www.solid-ground.org

ph: 206-624-3426 Seattle Chinatown/International District Preservation and Development Authority ph: 206-624-8929 fx: 206-467-6376 info@scidpda.org

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Chinese Information and Service Center 611 S Lane St, Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-624-5633 fax: 206-624-5634 info@cisc-seattle.org www.cisc-seattle.org

info@deniselouie.org www.deniselouie.org Multicultural preschool ages 3-5 years old. Now enrolling Private Pay full-day ($900/mo) and part-day classes ($500/mo) with locations at ID, Beacon Hill, and Rainier Beach.

P.O. Box 16016 Seattle, WA 98116 info@vnsf.org www.vnsf.org

Social & Health Services

Merchants Parking provides convenient & affordable community parking. Transia provides community transportation: para-transit van services, shuttle services and field trips in & out of Chinatown/ International District & South King County.

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INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014 — 15

IE NEWS

Computer literacy program reaches out to close digital divide

with the city and organizations to bridge that divide,” Kipp said.

By Nina Huang IE Contributor

Comcast also runs an Internet Essentials broadband adoption initiative, which provides low cost broadband service and computers to families with children enrolled in the National Free and Reduced lunch program. Internet Essentials has resulted in more than 1 million people, including nearly 10,000 families in the Seattle metro area, having access to the Internet from their homes, according to Comcast.

Civic leaders, Seattle Goodwill, and Comcast banded together on March 18 to launch a digital literacy program that reaches out to people on the wrong side of the digital divide.

The program, created by Goodwill and funded by Comcast, utilizes mobile devices to teach people technology skills necessary for finding jobs and participating in other essential needs in the 21st Century.

The program goes beyond teaching basic computer skills. With grants from Comcast, Goodwill will utilize 100 tablets at its Seattle, Everett, and Bremerton Goodwill Job Training centers to provide more than 800 students with digital literacy instruction in the first year. In addition, Seattle Goodwill will actively share this curriculum with other Goodwill organizations across the country and with other non-profits.

Goodwill will also train English as a Second Language instructors to roll out the program in all 10 job training sites.

Comcast spokesperson Steve Kipp said the company began its association with Goodwill about four years ago with seed money to support classroom initiatives.

Washington State Senator Bob Hasegawa chats with students at the March 18 event supporting digital literacy. • Courtesy Photo

Seattle City Council Bruce Harrell, who attended the event, said that currently 20 percent of families have affordable highspeed Internet because of the program, and their goal is to hit 50 percent. He also said that 77 percent of jobs in the next decade will require technology skills.

“We can’t survive without these Mobile devices are the primary or only computer skills in this century,” Kipp said. way many disadvantaged people have Comcast is funding the program through for accessing the Internet, according two $50,000 grants, one of which is part to Barbara “B.G.” Nabors-Glass, Vice “This is where the action will be,” of the company’s Gold Medal Recognition president of Job Training and Education Harrell said. “It doesn’t matter where you Program honoring community partners for Seattle Goodwill. across the country that are leaders in “Growing up, it was reading, writing, come from, or where you stand, it matters connecting families to home broadband arithmetic—the basic skills now are how where you’re heading. We know where through Internet Essentials, the company’s to interface with technology,” Nabors- the jobs will be, we know what skills are necessary to compete in this world. I low cost broadband adoption initiative.

Glass said. commend Goodwill training and Comcast Goodwill’s training program is Goodwill’s free educational programs investments, they are investing in real considered to be the first of its kind among help people learn skills such as word people and at the end of the day, that’s Goodwill locations across the country to processing, retail customer service, and what it’s all about,” Harrell said. feature mobile devices rather than desktop cashiering, to help them obtain jobs in State Senator Bob Hasegawa, who or laptop computers, Comcast said in a the market. 154 Goodwills across the statement. country wiill also learn to interface with was also in attendance, said that digital technology to do things like checking literacy was important in tackling social students’ grades and depositing checks issues because it’s a way for people to stay informed. online.

“If we’re going to fix the social problems “Even in a city like Seattle, known for its tech savviness, too many people in this that we’re facing right now, we’ve got to city live on the wrong side of the digital have access to information that everyone divide and we’d like to be able to partner can use to make good social decisions.”

Check back for Sudoku in the IE every issue! Answers to this puzzle are in the next issue on Wednesday, May 7.

16 — April 16, 2014 – May 6, 2014

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE NEWS

Councilmember Harrell: Asian Pacific Islanders need a ‘no-excuses’ police chief who can deliver Travis Quezon

IE Editor-in-Chief Earlier this year, the City of Seattle launched a national search for a new Seattle Police Department chief who can successfully manage police reforms while garnering public confidence amidst calls for accountability.

The City held seven community workshops throughout Seattle in addition to creating an online forum for people to provide input. Seattle Mayor Ed Murray appointed community members to two committees to try to ensure a safe and secure process within this 100-day search.

The Community Advisory Committee represented the diversity of Seattle and provided feedback from a community perspective. The Search Committee has the task of screening all applicants and presenting a list of finalists to the mayor for his consideration.

Seattle City Councilmember Bruce Harrell is a part of the Search Committee, which will be sending its recommendations to the mayor this week. Harrell is also chair of the Council’s Public Safety, Civil Rights, and Technology Committee.

The International Examiner caught up with Harrell to find out how the police chief finalists were selected and what this decision will mean for Asian Pacific Islanders moving forward.

IE: Did you observe any differences in the concerns between neighborhoods from the north side of Seattle compared to neighborhoods from the south side?

Harrell: Yes, but even regardless of geography within the north side [or] the south side, you can hear the same themes. ... The first theme has been accountability, use of force, fairness to people, and whether the officers are behaving as bullies or overstepping their bounds. The other theme that emerges in all communities is that they want good strong policing. They want effective policing. ...

Southern folks want good police officers and northern folks embrace the accountability too.”

IE: What concerns have been brought forth by the Asian Pacific Islander community that you think are the most important?

Harrell: There are a couple of people, myself and Eric Sano, that are on the Search Committee. We know in the Chinatown/ International District, as an example, that many conditions are unacceptable. That when it comes to thuggery or open air drug dealing International Examiner: What or just unlawful loitering, we want a chief that specifically does the Asian Pacific will be bold enough to say, “We need a drastic Islander Community need to know about improvement of the conditions.” And we also want a chief that’s bold enough to say, “We can’t this Police Chief search? arrest ourselves away out of all conditions and Councilmember Bruce Harrell: They many of these folks will need social services.” need to know that a quality we’re looking ... The unacceptable wrap will be to do nothing. for in this chief is one that fully embraces And I would argue that many times we’ve diversity—that they not only embrace it, but done nothing. And so, this new chief needs they have actual experience dealing with to step up to meet the high expectation of the diverse communities, Asian communities, API community, which are clean streets, safe communities that speak English as a second conditions. This affects many of the bottom language ... that they demonstrated not only lines for the businesses down there. They want in the prior work experience but in hiring it to be safe for tourists and patrons and if it’s people in their command staff. not, then we are failing.

IE: When it’s all said and done, and we have a new police chief, how can the community ensure that the new chief will create a police force that reflects the racially diverse and low income communities they are paid to protect?

whether they have civilian oversight or an auditor and see if they’ve actually pushed it publicly or criticized it publicly. So, cultural competency and accountability come hand-in-hand in my eye. And they would’ve taken or should’ve taken public stances to support it. So, on the other hand, if I see a chief that says they embrace diversity and I see absolutely no public display of that, no hiring decisions to support that, other than that hallow representation, that doesn’t mean a lot to me.

in diverse communities. And we’re opening up the criteria, if you will, to make sure that we get well-rounded officers. ... [I’m also] looking for a chief that can be as comfortable in a corporate board room as they are in [an] Asian restaurant, talking to Asian communities, and being able to relate and genuinely respect the communities and have a good dialogue.”

IE: Any specific example of how the police has “done nothing” in terms of the International District?

Harrell: Sure. There are certain areas in Chinatown during certain times of day where it is just unsafe. And many of the restaurant Harrell: The test for the new Chief [will owners have complained and they have be deciding who] to hire on his command continued to complain and they’re just not staff. We passed the recent law that allows seeing the results that they want. Around Hing him or her to hire whoever they want as Hay Park and a few other areas, and I’m sure you assistant chief. The prior law required that know the areas that I’m talking about. We’ve the assistant chief come from the city itself, made a lot of progress, but I still get complaints from the Seattle Police Department. We weekly. And our officers are being pulled in lot changed that to allow them to hire whoever of different angles and right now their common they want, assuming this person is qualified. complaint is the amount of paperwork they’re I hope to see that we have diversity at the required to fill out whenever any force is used at all. And because of the scrutiny there, there are top staff. many officers that may not be as aggressive as And I also hope [the new police chief looks they would have been a few years ago. at] who he hires and why he hires those folks.

In other words, when we recruit new officers, IE: How does a candidate demonstrate we do give sort of a preferential consideration to whether they’re a veteran and I think that’s cultural competency? How can cultural the federal requirement. ... Now we’re also competency” be qualified? Other than being asking the question whether this person is bilingual, what other characteristics are you bilingual, whether this person has experience looking for?

IE: How do you assess the overall participation of the API community in this process? Do you feel that the community has been really involved in the search process up to this point? Has there been a strong showing?

Harrell

Harrell: I look specifically at their past hiring practices. I look at how they’ve handled in the press because finding their press exposure is fairly easy. Controversy of situations dealing with ethnic communities— whether they ignored it or whether they issued statements on it. I look at their past disciplinary practices, when they’ve had to impose discipline, when they have not, when they’ve ignored it. I look at what kind of accountability scheme they are used to,

Harrell: I hope so. And I’m sure that we could’ve done a lot better. ... I’ve been in the community my entire life. I was born here. And I don’t need months and months of process to know what this community wants. I think I’m pretty close to it. And if I need ten meetings to be convinced that the community wants one thing and I don’t know that, then I’m not very good. And I would say that that would apply to the mayor and the other councilmembers as well. So, yes, we probably could have done more to listen to the communities, but that doesn’t apply just the police search, that applies to every major issue that affects their communities.