Candice Wang: The Palace Within

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Before I learned the word uterus, I knew all about the baby palace. That’s what my mama called it, placing her palms over the soft lower region of her stomach. I’d stare down at my naked abdomen and wonder—how could there be a whole palace built within me? Was I that cavernous?  To me, the uterus wasn’t a mass of delicate tissue, arching fallopian tubes, and pulsing blood vessels. It was a glittering hall carved directly into the skeleton of my body— something akin to the Hall of…

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Jaja Hashimoto: I Cut My Own Tongue Off

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I had a tongue that held three languages by a single thread.  When I was in second grade, I had a tutor who was the brightest among all. He had a Masters in Animal Science and a PhD in stem cell research. He attended National Taiwan University and graduated top of his class.  On Tuesdays and Thursdays, my tutor would come and help me with English, Math, Science, and everything else I needed help with. Every time we had class, he would assign vocabulary homework to help with my weak word…

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“The Other End” & other Poems by Averylin Cummins

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Averylin is a high school student, athlete, and activist; a third generation Taiwanese-American seeking to reconnect with their culture; and an aspiring writer and poet who explores race, gender, and sexuality through their work, using it to observe and reflect not only the world but also their own experiences. From Averylin: "Three Strong Emotions" started as a rant, typed sloppily into the notes app of my phone. I wrote "Anger" first, but it felt incomplete because that wasn't…

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All Hail the ‘BNS’: Meet Wil Chung of Impromptu Spices

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In the spring of 2020, a small group of Taiwanese Americans started the Taiwanese Home Cooking Facebook group in order to have a place for the Taiwanese diaspora and others to share and learn about Taiwanese food that was more focused than other groups we had been a part of.  It was through this group that I first met Wil Chung, the creator of Impromptu Spices and its signature Beef Noodle Soup spice mix. How did you come up with the name Impromptu Spices? Trader Joe's "Everything but…

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Nnadi Samuel: “Subject Lessons” (Poems)

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We are so honored to share "Subject Lessons," a collection of poetry by Nnadi Samuel. Samuel is a recipient of the prestigious Falun Gong Poetry Prize, which got him a two-year scholarship in National Dong Hwa College in Hualien to study Chinese Language & Literature. Nnadi Samuel (he/him/his) holds a B.A in English & literature from the University of Benin. His works have been previously published in Suburban Review, Seventh Wave Magazine, North Dakota Quarterly, Quarterly…

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Dignity, Belonging, and Meaning-Making in a Pandemic: What Learning Taiwanese Taught Me in a Season of Loss and Hate

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[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="1024"] FEATURE PHOTO PROVIDED BY AUTHOR[/caption] When the Covid-19 pandemic hit the East Coast last spring, I unexpectedly found myself at home for an extended stretch of time. For me, quarantining with family meant that daily walks with my dad and weekly drives to a local Taiwanese bakery became a natural time for me to learn more Taiwanese — something I had been trying to do on-and-off for quite some time. As weeks turned into months, my vocabulary…

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“Elegy for a Century Egg” and Other Poems by Katy Hargett-Hsu

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  Kathryn Hargett-Hsu 徐凯蒂 is an incoming MFA candidate in poetry at Washington University in St. Louis. A 2018 Best New Poet, she is the recipient of fellowships from Kundiman, the Bucknell Seminar for Undergraduate Poets, Belgrade Art Studio, and UAB. Most recently, she received the Barksdale-Maynard Prize in Poetry and was selected as a National YoungArts Foundation Finalist in Writing. Find her in Field Notes on Survival (2020), Best New Poets (2018), Anomaly, The…

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Jennifer Co: 1993 – 1998

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I am 21 and I am waiting. I wait for the university to spit me back out into the world, for the past four years to suddenly, and unabashedly, mean something. I wait and I watch friends and roommates and chosen strangers arrive upon the doorsteps to the rest of their lives: grad school admissions and gap years and start ups, sprinkled with full time offers from the companies spilling from my father’s news coverage sometimes, a marriage every now and then, a baby shower. I think of the palpable…

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Emily Lo: A Growing Pair of Asian Eyes

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First Grade  Pop. Click. Pop. Click. I opened and carefully sniffed all twenty-two of my Mr. Sketch markers, shoving caps onto untipped ends. Engaging in a ritual that preceded each and every session of my “builder’s workshop,” I faced my desk with anticipation.  Growing up, I periodically faced the most daunting task an elementary schooler could possibly imagine: finding a treasure to flaunt at show-and-tell. Perhaps, however, I was the only one intimidated by the need to present something…

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Chewing on Home: Boba, Authenticity, and Identity

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FEATURE PHOTOS PROVIDED BY AUTHOR In 2019, Domino’s rolled out a limited-edition pizza in Taiwan topped with sweet tapioca balls and honey, drawing mixed reactions. While some adventurous foodies vowed to try it, others expressed complete and utter disgust. I fell more in the latter camp. How could Domino’s take a sweet and integral part of my childhood and sprinkle it on a cheese pizza? I rolled my eyes at what seemed to me a publicity stunt by an American corporation. But upon further…

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