Tammy and Victor Out of Sync

Argh! Not a good finish for Tammy and Victor last night. My wife and I were watching them do the synchronized diving, and we thought to ourselves, "Why aren't they counting?"

Well according to Victor both them and Jen and Kisha were counting before they dove. I guess synchronized diving is a lot harder than it looks.

Anyway, I have no sympathy for Kisha and Jen for coming in last, considering they made some racist comments about how the Chinese have dumb looks on their faces and all look alike. They should have drowned.

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Life Lessons at 39

Yes, I'm hitting 39. I know people always gripe about getting older. I always hate it when some douche says, "Oh I can't believe I'm 30. I FEEL SO OLD."

You know why people hate getting older? Aside from the fact that your skin starts to sag and your hair starts to gray, getting older reminds you that you have a limited amount of time on this Earth and that you may want to get crackin' on whatever goals you have in life. Every birthday is like a nagging mom that asks, "So you're X years old now... what the hell have you accomplished so far?"

I guess this is why I like time travel stories. I like scifi in general, but time travel stories are my favorite genre within the genre. Something about altering the course of history has always appealed to me:

"Hey James? Hi I'm you from the future. Just a heads up buddy: Look both ways when you cross the street tomorrow. Get a job at a company called Google, dude. Trust me. Oh, and be sure to delete your voicemail messages before your girlfriend comes home."

Alas, I don't have a time machine, but at least I can give you younger Alpha Asians a heads up on what's in store for ya. Here's a few bits of advice based on my humble life experience:

1) Hunker down by the time you hit 30. After college and in your 20's is when you can do whatever it is you want to do, because you have few commitments. If you haven't started a family yet, then the 20's are when you should do whatever it is you want to do to get it out of your system.

You want to backpack around the world? You want to start a business? You want to write a book? Shoot a movie? Be an actor or singer? Then do it.

But by 30 years of age, if you haven't made a living out of your passion, then it's time to get a stable career. No regrets.

2) College first? College later? It doesn't matter. Did you ever look at your boss and think to yourself, "How in the world is this nimrod my boss?"

Well guess what? Unless you got a degree in a specialized field that's in demand, your degree doesn't mean much this day and age. You should get a degree, no doubt. You can't get through the front door without one. But a degree simply means that you're not an idiot. It doesn't mean you're special. Your experience (both life experience and work experience) is what showcases your special qualities.

You can get your college degree early and over with, or you can get it later while you're working. It doesn't matter. We all end up in relatively the same leg of the race anyway.

3) Date around. Then settle down. I'm not telling you to be a whore, but when you're young, you should really meet lots of members of the opposite sex that you find attractive. Get it out of your system before you meet that special someone. People take this all or none approach to everything, including relationships. They think, "Oh this relationship didn't lead to marriage, so it was a failure."

But if you had a great time when you were with her, then the experience served its purpose. Not everything is meant to last, but everything can be a valuable and fun experience.

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Raised Expectations for Tammy and Victor Jih

Tammy and Victor are still in the race. Yay! I'm rooting for them to win, but even more than that, I'm hoping those redheaded cheerleaders get eliminated. One of them (I can't tell them apart) is a major BYOTCH!

By the way, is Victor gay?

My answer: WHO KNOWS? WHO CARES? Tammy's the one I'm looking at.

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Be Water My Friend

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Quiet Asian Syndrome

QUIET ASIAN SYNDROME - watch more funny videos

Related to the Angry Asian Man syndrome, QAS usually leads to running amok:

"Although commonly used in a colloquial and less-violent sense, the phrase is particularly associated with a specific sociopathic culture-bound syndrome in Malaysian culture. In a typical case of running amok, a male who has shown no previous sign of anger or any inclination to violence will acquire a weapon and, in a sudden frenzy, will attempt to kill or seriously injure anyone he encounters. Amok episodes of this kind normally end with the attacker being killed by bystanders, or committing suicide."

Yeah, not exactly the right way to make people feel comfortable, I have to say.

"You're making me angry... You wouldn't want to see me angry."

BTW, is the interviewer in this video easy on the eyes or what? Yowza!

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Wen Ho Lee was just an Echo in History

So the Secret Identities: The Asian American Superhero Anthology hits the shelves next week on April 15. Here's a reading of one of the stories in the book:



"In the story By the Time I Get to Arizona, a young man named Mason Wong learns that his father has been incarcerated and accused of spying on the United States. His father, Dr. Benjamin Wong, was a research scientist that helped develop a series of nanotechnology prototypes that gave people superhuman abilities. Mason is sent on a quest by his fathers partner, Dr. Malcolm Eady, to retrieve a weapon before it gets into the wrong hands.

"Peril was partially inspired by the real life case against Dr. Wen Ho Lee. In 1999, Lee, a Chinese American scientist who worked at Los Alamos National Laboratory was indicted on 59 counts of espionage, jailed in solitary confinement for several months, and released on time served after the government failed to prove its case against him. He was ultimately charged with one count of mishandling sensitive documents, while the other 58 counts were dropped. In the months leading up to Lee's indictment and release, several media organizations, and top federal officials, had made Lees name public, which exacerbated perceptions that the foreign-born Lee was a threat to national security."


Was Wen Ho Lee Just An Honest Mistake?

I actually had a reader email me regarding Bill Richardson stating, "Do you think his conviction of Wen Ho Lee could have been an honest mistake?"

Here's how I responded:

"An honest mistake? An honest mistake based on prejudice and racial profiling. Forget the fact that Wen Ho Lee immigrated to the US several decades ago and became a US citizen. Forget the fact Wen Ho Lee came from TAIWAN not China. Forget the fact that Wen Ho Lee was literally chained in solitary for 9 months, despite the fact he was a frail old man.

"Of all 59 counts against Wen Ho Lee, not one was espionage. They didn't have enough evidence to prosecute, and the FBI was hoping he would confess to something after being chained up in solitary for 9 months.

"Of all the counts against him, he pleaded guilty to illegal/unauthorized downloading of sensitive material. This downloading IS COMMON PRACTICE among people at the laboratory and among security agencies despite its prohibition under the law. In fact a former head of the CIA was convicted of illegal download around the same time as Wen Ho Lee and that didn't make any headlines.

"If there was a spy at the lab, he or she got away, because the FBI wasted valuable time and energy barking up the wrong tree based on faulty information and prejudice. Even the judge who oversaw the case realized that Richardson and the FBI had misled him and the public as to the validity of their case, and that's why he apologized to Lee."


Wen Ho Lee: An Echo in History

The Wen Ho Lee case is really just an echo of a previous case involving the U.S. government's false accusation of a Chinese American scientist. Ever hear of Tsien Hsue-Shen? Here's a Wikipedia entry on him:

"Tsien Hsue-shen (born December 11, 1911) is a scientist who was a major figure in the missile and space programs of both the United States and People's Republic of China...

"During the 1940s Tsien was one of the founders of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. During the Red Scare of the 1950's, the United States government accused Tsien of having communist sympathies. Tsien and his family were wrongfully imprisoned in an isolated island off of Los Angeles. Stripped of his security clearance, Tsien decided to go back to China.

"After being under house arrest for 5 years from 1950-55, Tsien was released in exchange for the return of US pilots captured during the Korean war. Notified by U.S. authorities that he was free to go, Tsien immediately arranged to go back to China in September of 1955... He returned to China and led the Chinese rocket program, and became known as the 'Father of Chinese Rocketry' (or 'King of Rocketry')."


In other words, Tsien Hsue-shen, a Chinese American scientist who helps the US develop its missile and space program, gets accused as a Communist. So for all his hard work and American patriotism, he and his family get placed under "house arrest" on an ISLAND off the coast of L.A. Then he gets deported back to China, where he essentially fathers the Chinese missile and space program.

Wow, the U.S. government really dropped the ball on that one. Anyway, Aviation Week named Tsien Hsue-shen their "Person of the Year" for 2007:

"China is now at the forefront of space exploration, with two key developments in 2007: a successful anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons test and a planetary mission," said Aviation Week & Space Technology Editor-in-Chief Anthony L. Velocci, Jr. "AVIATION WEEK's profile of Tsien discusses these aspects of China's space program in rich detail, and analyzes the far-ranging impact Tsien has had on the global aerospace industry -- indeed, the world -- at large."

"AVIATION WEEK recognizes Tsien as our Person of the Year for his unique contributions to aerospace science in both the U.S. and China -- two of the three nations to successfully develop their own manned space missions. His legacy of research and discovery resonates today," said Tom Henricks, President, AVIATION WEEK, and a former NASA astronaut.


Get Ready for More Echoes:

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An American Asian in London

So I'm back from London and Paris. It was the first time my wife and I visited Europe. It's always interesting to see how people live in other parts of the world. London has a very distinct look with its neighborhood streets and buildings. Here's the street of the hotel where my wife and I stayed at:


A lot of the London streets aren't straight and tend to curve slightly, which gives it an interesting perspective. Not only that, but you know you're in London when you see the red double decker buses, red telephone boothes and retro style taxi cabs. The subway or "the Tube" is kind of crazy, but leave it to the British to have very orderly, but rapid streams of people walking briskly through the stations and on to the trains.


In contrast, the Paris subway has less people, but more chaos. I thought London streets were distinct, but Paris streets are even more distinct and have a very Old World look to them. Perhaps we walked through the bad part of town, but Paris seemed a little dirty, and not in a naughty, sexy time way. Everybody smokes, and there are cigarette butts littering the streets.


There were a lot of Africans in Paris, and a lot of Indians in London. I can't say I saw very many Asians in Paris. There's a small Chinatown in London, but the Chinese make up only 1% of the city population. I have to say that my wife and I turned quite a few heads in both London and Paris, not necessarily because we were Asian, but because we were Asians speaking English with American accents. Of course I'm sure the French hated my butchering of the French language, and the Brits were annoyed with my wife and I doing mock English accents all the time.


Two things that my wife and I missed about the States were 1) the food and 2) the service. Food in Europe is much more simple, understated and smaller. Not to mention expensive. There's no supersizing. The Indian food in London was excellent, but not exactly filling. Sandwiches in Paris emphasize fresh bread and cheese, not how much meat you can pack in to give you lockjaw.


I guess since America is a country of immigrants, we have a greater hunger for all things. The children of immigrants want more. Which is why food that comes to America from other countries evolves into something bigger, tastier and more varied. Pizza and pasta are very simple and plain in Italy, but boy do we pack on the toppings here in the States. Sushi is simple in Japan, but Asian Americans have introduced some colorful and flavorful rolls.

Not only do Americans constantly want bigger, better and more, but we want it right now. Restaurant service is a bit slower in Europe, where customers enjoy their leisure time and don't like their food to be rushed. My wife and I found it particularly aggravating.

Nevertheless, we enjoyed London and Paris. If it weren't for the cramped conditions of the city, I wouldn't mind living in London for a short time.

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Don't Hire These Guys for your Wake-up Call

More evidence the Japanese are a cruel (but hilarious!) people.

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Westerners and Easterners see the world differently

SOURCE: New Scientist

Chinese and American people see the world differently - literally. While Americans focus on the central objects of photographs, Chinese individuals pay more attention to the image as a whole, according to psychologists at the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor, US.

"There is plenty of anecdotal evidence suggesting that Western and East Asian people have contrasting world-views," explains Richard Nisbett, who carried out the study. "Americans break things down analytically, focusing on putting objects into categories and working out what rules they should obey," he says.

By contrast, East Asians have a more holistic philosophy, looking at objects in relation to the whole. "Figuratively, Americans see things in black and white, while East Asians see more shades of grey," says Nisbett. "We wanted to devise an experiment to see if that translated to a literal difference in what they actually see."

The researchers tracked the eye-movements of two groups of students while they looked at photographs. One group contained American-born graduates of European descent and the other was comprised of Chinese-born graduate students who came to the US after their undergraduate degrees.

Each picture showed a striking central image placed in a realistic background, such as a tiger in a jungle. They found that the American students spent longer looking at the central object, while the Chinese students' eyes tended to dart around, taking in the context.


Harmony versus goals

Nisbett and his colleagues believe that this distinctive pattern has developed because of the philosophies of these two cultures. "Harmony is a central idea in East Asian philosophy, and so there is more emphasis on how things relate to the whole," says Nisbett. "In the West, by contrast, life is about achieving goals."

Psychologists watching American and Japanese families playing with toys have also noted this difference. "An American mother will say: ‘Look Billy, a truck. It's shiny and has wheels.' The focus is on the object," explains Nisbett. By contrast, Japanese mothers stress context saying things like, "I push the truck to you and you push it to me. When you throw it at the wall, the wall says ‘ouch'."

Nisbett also cites language development in the cultures. "To Westerners it seems obvious that babies learn nouns more easily. But while this is the case in the West, studies show that Korean and Chinese children pick up verbs - which relate objects to each other - more easily.

"Nisbett's work is interesting and suggestive," says John Findlay, a psychologist specialising in human visual attention at Durham University, UK. "It's always difficult to put an objective measure on cultural differences, but this group have made a step towards that."

Nisbett hopes that his work will change the way the cultures view each other. "Understanding that there is a real difference in the way people think should form the basis of respect."
My Thoughts: Does this study confirm that non-Asians are racist self-centered assholes? Of course not. I know plenty of non-Asians who see the big picture and think of others.

But boy does this study explain why the myopic racist bastard is so prevalent in our society. It also explains why Americans like to put people and things into categories and are prone to stereotyping and believing so firmly in these stereotypes.

On the flip side, this study also explains why everything is situational for Asians. Asians look at things in their context. There's never an absolute answer for Asians, and because of this, I think we're more willing to see other people's perspectives.

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Flying to London

My wife and I will be flying to London, so this blog won't be updated for about a week. In the meantime, I wanted to share a little bit of the Alpha Asian philosophy. Sometimes people ask me, "Alpha Asian? What's that mean?"

And I respond, "Means I'm one badass motherfucker."

Seriously though, being an Alpha Asian means you live a life based on self-determination and duty to your community. I'm sure longtime readers have noticed certain themes pop up when I blog:

1) Don't look for a leader. Be one. If you develop yourself and accomplish things, then share your expertise with the community. Improving the Asian American community is best done from bottom up, not top down.

Most people think that change comes around when the government intervenes or when a non-profit organization goes on a campaign to improve the community. It's a very top-down mentality that is very condescending: "We lead. You follow."

But it is much better when idea viruses spread and individuals change on the inside. How the hell is someone going to help and contribute to the community if he or she doesn't have their sh!t down in their personal lives? If you give people the tools and the psychology to enrich themselves, then the community is better as a whole.


2) Create instead of react. If you look around the AA blogosphere and the AA forums, most people are reactionary. Most people use the Internet to vent and rant about how non-Asians are racist. Fact is most non-Asians are prejudiced against Asians. Nothing that whites, Blacks or Hispanics surprises me anymore. I assume they're doing the chinky-eye behind my back every chance they get... those racist bastards!

A paraphrased quote from Harvey Milk puts things in perspective, "If I turned around everytime someone called me a faggot, then I'd be walking backwards. And I don't want to go through life walking backwards."


3) Don't ask for respect. Earn it. Asians tend to be Confucianist-conformists, so they constantly worry about what others think: "Gee, what do white people think about Asians?"

Who gives a crap? Seriously, if your esteem and happiness are based on what others think, then you might as well get some therapy.


4) Pure academics insulates from real world experience. Asians stress academics, and that's great. But real world experience is what counts. I've known plenty of people who had to work through school, and they ended up ahead in life because of their time dealing with people and managing a business.

A professor of mine at UC Davis did a survey of all the famous geniuses in history and his findings revealed this: revolutionary geniuses (really smart and innovative people who change the world) don't stay in school past the 4 year degree. Geniuses with rigid thinking (you know, the boring ones who join Mensa) get graduate degrees. These geniuses maintain the status quo, whether or not it is ideal.

Bottom line: Do, don't just talk.

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