cóng mei guo lai de, by Vanessa Wan

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FEATURE PHOTO PROVIDED BY VANESSA WAN When I was little, I thought I was Chinese. That’s what my parents said when we were asked the inevitable question: “What are you?”  I later learned we were not Chinese.  Assigned to research the flag of my parents’ home country for class, I went home to find out that I needed to check out books not on China but on Taiwan. As it turned out, my parents simply went along with people’s assumptions that we were Chinese because it was “easier.”…

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“Danny, Danny”: Meet San Francisco filmmaker Huan Cheng

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FEATURE PHOTOS COURTESY OF HUAN CHENG, 2021 San Francisco-based filmmaker and multidisciplinary artist Huan Cheng explores the loneliness of the immigrant experience in her short film Danny, Danny. Cheng, born in Taiwan, draws upon her own experiences of arriving in the United States as a young adult in Danny, Danny, which screened at CAAMFest this year and The Method Fest in 2020, and is now available to audiences again. Cheng is a member of the Hollywood Professional Association 2021 Young Entertainment…

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Convenience Store Encounters, by Katie Chen

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HONORABLE MENTION, HIGH SCHOOL CATEGORY The alarm beeps. And where there is no response or movement from the lump of blankets on the bed, it beeps again, with increased urgency. And beeps again. And vibrates with increased frequency. And when it seems like the alarm is about to vibrate itself off the counter it’s sitting on, a hand emerges itself from its home on the bed and smashes the alarm clock hard. Twice. Finally, there is blissful silence. It is 6:31 AM.  Carla stumbles out of her…

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Judges Charles Yu and Shawna Yang Ryan select award recipients

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We are pleased to announce the inaugural cohort of honorable mentions, finalists, and grand prize winners of the Betty L. Yu & Jin C. Yu Creative Writing Prizes, established in partnership with TaiwaneseAmerican.org in honor of Yu's parents, who are longstanding Taiwanese American community leaders. Their work will be published on TaiwaneseAmerican.org throughout the year.  We received a remarkable number of thoughtful, passionate entries, each of which was carefully reviewed and deliberated…

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SPARK Accel: A Virtual Accelerator for Taiwanese American Entrepreneurs

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Inspire. Educate. Accelerate. SPARK Accel is a personalized virtual accelerator designed to help Taiwanese American entrepreneurs grow as leaders and scale their businesses. Built by a team of experienced tech professionals across the U.S., the program will give entrepreneurs the opportunity to learn from successful TA founders and business leaders, join a supportive members-only network, and win up to $15,000 with no strings attached. Steven Chen, one of SPARK Accel's co-founders, is Head…

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Meet Laura and Olivia, Co-founders of Project EMplify

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Photos provided by Olivia Chen Project EMplify, co-founded by Taiwanese Americans Laura Huang and Olivia Chen, is a global non-profit initiative dedicated to addressing inequality and disadvantage through personal empowerment. Their programming includes a book matching program, mentoring sessions, and workshops to help underserved communities discover how they can find and create their edge, as outlined in Huang’s debut book, EDGE: Turning Adversity into Advantage. Their goal is to reach…

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Taiwan’s Got It! A Talent Competition for All

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Taiwanese identity is contested, challenged, and complicated for a variety of reasons. Its ongoing interrogation, though, presents a ripe opportunity to further challenge our own assumptions about belonging and personal choice. The people of Taiwan are not simply the indigenous, benshengren, or waishengren.  They include expats, more recent migrants, foreign exchange students, and more. And, interestingly, the concept of Taiwanese identity has become less tethered to race and ethnicity, and more…

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Jude Chao: ‘Skin Care for your soul’ and sexy radishes

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“Internet big sister” Jude Chao on how a passion for skincare led her to share more about mental health, wellness, and the art of real living with her debut book and sheet mask line ‘Skin Care for your soul’ and sexy radishes “Internet big sister” Jude Chao on how a passion for skincare led her to share more about mental health, wellness, and the art of real living with her debut book and sheet mask line Chao is a longtime friend of TaiwaneseAmerican.org. In 2019, she shared…

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Katrina Liu on Asian American Motherhood: “Mina Learns Chinese”

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There are a lot of things that delight me about children’s books despite being a single, childless, young adult. For example, in Katrina Liu’s bilingual book, “I Love Boba,” I’ve found a new favorite bit of joyful dialogue: “但是你是叫它波霸奶茶, 珍珠奶茶, 還是泡泡茶呢? Do you call it boba, pearl tea, or bubble tea?”  That, and a sweetly illustrated girl wisely explaining why fat straws are more appropriate than skinny ones for drinking boba.    View…

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Response to Pew Research Reports Hiding Taiwanese Identity: “We made it count. Now tell our stories.”

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Taiwanese American Community Response to Pew Research Reports on Asian American Communities IMAGE SOURCE: PEW RESEARCH CENTER Recently published reports by the Pew Research Center analyzing Asian American communities have included footnotes that data for “‘Chinese’ includes those identifying as ‘Taiwanese.’” As of today (May 1 - the start of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month), the methodology for Pew Research Center’s Asian American fact sheets makes no reference to why…

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