Gowe “Aurora” Music Video
This Korean American making his own music video and having like a video game style with it is so awesome to me. Check this out. His flows omg I want to meet this guy and ask him, on his journey what made him do this. Out of the norm to some, but doing something different like this makes him unique. Good shit Gowe. Enjoy!!!
Yuzuru Hanyu, Winter Olympics 2014
The first gold medal ever won by Japan was won by 19 year old, Yuzuru Hanyu in men’s figure skating. It has been 8 years since Japan has gotten gold in the Winter Olympics. Hanyu had to beat out Patrick Chan of Canada, who is of Chinese decent, to get the gold. Of course, this was a big deal for Japan, since it beat out it’s neighbor rival of China, though Chan is from Canada. China has also won 2 gold medals in speed-skating and short track speed skating.
Patrick Chan, Winter Olympics 2014
Mao Asada, Winter Olympics 2014
Furthermore into the Winter Olympics of 2014 Japan so far has 1 gold, 2 silver, and one bronze medal. China has 2 golds and 2 silvers, whilc South Korea has 1 gold and 1 bronze.Japan is also hoping for another gold in women’s figure skating with silver medalist Mao Asado going against fellow South Korean rival Yuna Kim, defending Olympic Champion.(source)
Yuna Kim, WInter Olympics 2014
Browsing through the internet I found this in the Human Rights Campaign. Interesting article.
http://www.hrc.org/resources/entry/coming-out-issues-for-asian-pacific-americans
In class we had a short snippet of “Kawaii” and what it portrayed in a fashion sense.
Overall, I think that the styles are similar in a way that they demand attention and are what’s “in” at the moment.
Bruce in this quest of KungFu was a mastermind of the craft. He was such a impressive instrument of going through barriers to put Asian American and individuals that wanted to go out and learn, teach and pursue the art of Martial Arts. He was a person who took action in his studies and was a great person that has stunned and inspired my life. He was a great Martial Artist and a philosopher. He connected Martial Arts to life itself and nature. He did go against all others and did his thing in this world. Great as he was, he had no technique in particular. He had his own way of talking, kicking, punching, everything he did either KungFu or not he was unique about it. He says, “Martial Arts means to express yourself.” I saw this video about his philosophy that astonished my way of thinking and would like to share it with you. Don’t mind the Greek subtitles and one part of the video sounds weird high pitch noise, but the video in general I believe is cool and interesting.
Click here to view the embedded video.
Bottom line Bruce broke the barrier for Asian Americans and all who wanted to do something great with Martial Arts. R.I.P Bruce Lee, The Legend
Pop-osition 3) The meaning and authority invested in the word “father” or “pappy” comes from a globalized legacy of European imperialism.
Father. That word is so huge. Immediately I think of my father, who is endemic of a particular brand of Ashkenazi Jewish masculinity. Over the past few years I’ve watched my mother and father clash over gendered roles in their relationship. Since becoming disabled, my father can no longer play the part of strong, stoic caretaker. This has lead to an upheaval in their connection to the normative roles presented by the heterosexual nuclear family. I think a lot about the way that fatherhood, motherhood, and family as an institution have been colonized. “Father” is just a word, a box that contains meaning, yet it carries so much weight in our increasingly globalized culture. The way we invoke fatherhood is not separate from my father, “Our Father who art in heaven…”, or the histories of colonialism and manifest destiny.
On this journey for finding out stuff about culture and heritage, I had no idea about some stuff that happened. During the 1960′s particularly 1969 where a event in San Francisco united the rising forces of the Native people during the decolonization struggle. Also with Alcatraz where it states seventy-eight Indians landed on the Island to reclaim their land, later joined by six hundred fellow compatriots representing more than fifty nations.
This I’m like holy ****. I was always told the story differently and just hearing about the truth now, what other untold mysteries have I not heard of. This is interesting to me because being of Native American descent and to hear about this in my life just now, WTF world. High school never told me, media of course didn’t tell me and yeah, this is surprising the hell out of me. The fact that Jimi Hendrix is Native as well and made a song dedicated to the existential condition of his Native American identity in the process of ongoing extermination. Thanks Jimi Hendrix for this that. We have come along way, but we still have some ways to go and I would like to find out about more on what happened before that time and of recent events. Thanks for assigning a book that I could draw some more of my history together for better awareness and understanding so I and probably a lot others are in the dark about the real stories that are made up so the government doesn’t have to look like the bad guy. I want to learn more about the struggles that happened during these times even though the truths may not be what you want to hear, it reminds me of the debridement.
Who: Jimi Hendrix
What: “The Star-Spangled Banner”
When: Vietnam War
Where: Woodstock
Why: In 1969, Jimi Hendrix song “The Star-Spangled Banner” at Woodstock. Usually, people say the singers who sing the national anthem are very patriotic. In this book, the author also said “With the use of pure sound as a sole medium of expression, Hendrix is able to represent the testimonial voice of the historical contradiction in their rawest form as the “other” of patriotism.” (Kato, p84) However, in my opinion, we can take two reasons why he song this in Woodstock. I mean the truth might be mystery because we don’t know this action was only from his patriotism or not.
Click here to view the embedded video.
“Through the cracks opened up in the sonic statue of liberty, we hear the wail, cry, and scream of those souls that have been killed, raped, exploited, and bombed by “America,” interspersed between the shrieking sounds medium of expression and violence.” (Kato, p84)
So, it was easy that people in Woodstock must have associated his national anthem with Vietnam War. It was sure that he song against the war. However, is it sure that he song this only because he wanted to be peace in America? I wonder whether we can also think about this was because he might mad at America having the war or not.
Asian Pacific Islander News: Hawaii
Article Title: “Waikiki shop removes dead bottled baby sharks for sale after protests”
On February 6, 2014, a Waikiki gift shop called Nani Aloha Street, across from the Kuhio Beach, removed bottles of dead baby sharks it was selling after an environmental group protested.
“Accordingly, what tourists look for is no longer the experience of a chance encounter, but preprocessed sight objects organized and packaged for their convenience” (Kato, p. 150).
(Photo taken from: http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/24668601/waikiki-shop-removes-dead-bottled-baby-sharks-for-sale-after-protests)
“The store had posted a sign below the sharks that said in Hawaiian mythology, sharks are believed to be aumakua or spiritual guardians.
“It was thought that keeping these aumakua in their homes will keep (them) safe from harm,” the sign said.
“I was horrified and I was infuriated at the fact that they had used our cultural traditions, they had used our aumakua as a way to make more money,” Kalama said.
(See full story at: http://www.hawaiinewsnow.com/story/24668601/waikiki-shop-removes-dead-bottled-baby-sharks-for-sale-after-protests)
Kato p. 1- 112:
“The one armed swordsman reflects the life, history, and social relationships of the common people” p 16
“Mandarin cinema’s adaptation of kung fu in the 1970s seemed an opportunistic denial of the importance of Cantonese contribution to Hong Kong pictures because the kung fu genra was identified as primarily Cantonese, not because of its long-running Wong Fe-hung series but also because many of its real-life practitioners were Cantonese. Even the term “kung fu” is derived from Cantonese” p. 17
Lee attempted to bring as much realism to the film screen as possible.
“On December 7, 1941, Japan invaded the Philippines, Burma, Malaya, Indonesia, and Hong Kong simultaneously with their bombing of the American base in Hawaii known as Pearl Harbor. On “Black Christmas Day,” as it is remembered by the peoples of Hong Kong, the British colonial forces finally ceded Hong Kong to Japan. Following a period of widespread, indiscriminate killing and looting, Japan installed a totalitarian military regime in Hong Kong, where the military and civilian police (known as Kenpeitai) maintained the reign of terror.” p. 18
p. 19- Description of Japanese terror.
“Wing Chun kung fu, allegedly invented by a Shaolin nun specifically for a woman’s self-defense, bestowed Lee with a solid foundation in Chinese ancient philosophy (Confucianism, I Ching, and Taoism)” p. 19
“Thereafter, the controversy over the ignominious pages of Japan’s history was stirred up and intensified periodically by the Japanese governments attempts to revise the standard school textbooks and by remarks by high-ranking government officials aimed at whitewashing their imperialist history” p. 33
“The triangular image complex-bu, judo, and Katanta deployed in Fist of Fury thus captures the fundamental aspects of the culture of Japanese imperialism with sobering accuracy from the viewpoint o Chinese and Asian people in general” p. 38
“Fortified by this shaved image, his conscious portrayal of himself as a “common folk” hero in his films not merely affirmed the existence of the Asian masses, but also opened up an allegorical link with the mass movement toward decolonization in Asia” p. 41
“The pursuit of freedom in action-expressed through the mind and body in their totality- thus became the paramount agenda of Lee’s artistic expression” p. 49
“In other words, transcendence of the dualistic mind is a necessity for overcoming an unequal relationship” p. 56
“It marks the pinnacle of the Jeet Kune Do philosophy, in that with a creative flexible, and rhythmic approach to movement, one can overcome the opponent by leading him/her to the path of self-destruction” p. 58
“…Lee’s philosophical system, which views combative art as a means to realize selfhood. The ultimate combat, therefore, is with one’s ego or institutionalized selfhood” p. 58
“… Watch, but don’t stop and interpret, “I am free” then you’re living in a memory of something that has gone. To understand and live now, everything of yesterday must die” p. 60
“As alluded to earlier, what separated him from other figures of the countercultural scene was his realism based on the shamanic articulation of his historical and cultural existence” p. 88 – About Jimi Hendrix. Similar to Bruce Lee.
“Through their engagement in the primordial sound, both Hendrix and Coltrane were able to demonstrate the possibility of reconstructing our perception of reality by removing the boundary that separates the spirit world and material world” p. 92
“The artistic expressions of Coltrane and Hendrix could indeed be seen as the return of the spirit Palongawhoya at the dawn of global capitalism, as they too are caretakers of the new mode of consciousness sprouting on earth where Nature is under incessant attack by capitalist development” p. 92- similar to Shaolin monks
“In the scene where Han “offers” great martial artists what he calls “gifts,” Golden Harvest had no choice but to hire real prostitutes, as it was explained to the director: “If a Chinese woman was not considered a whore, she couldn’t be cast as one. It would be a terrible disgrace…In Hong Kong, if you’re going to write a prostitute, then you had to cast a prostitute for the part” p. 105
Class Notes:
Shaolin Gong Fu: The Original Five Animal Styles
Tiger- extensive footwork, acrobatic kicks, low, wide stances, and unique fist position.
Leopard- Speed and angular attack. Does not rely on strength, as does the tiger, relies on speed and outsmarting its opponent.
White Crane- Deep rooted stances, intricate hand techniques and fighting, mostly at close range, imitating a pecking bird.
Snake- Strikes the opponent from angles in which they wouldn’t be expecting.
Dragon- attacks with low yang; quick movements that originate from the feet, guided by the waist, flows through the body and exits through the fist.
(More information found from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiger_Kung_Fu)
The Wedding Banquet had all the stereotypical Asian plot twists that we had come to know over the last several decades with a few new ones. Namely the fact that male lead was Chinese and gay while the parents were trying to marry him off to have grandchild. The long suffering partner telling him that he should tell the parents before it gets any further with both comedic and heart-wrenching consequences. For the purpose of this writing I shall only focus on one.
Being a gay man has its share of problems to being and doubly so if you are from Asian background with a family wanting to marry you off for the sole purpose of gaining grandchildren. How do you then explain that you don’t quite feel that way to the overbearing relatives? How do you explain that you don’t want have anything to do with women other than as friends? In this case,you don’t. You endure a lie when they come visit,put your partner in the guest room and have a fiancee on stand-by. The problem with that is is parents just aren’t that stupid. Doesn’t mean that they accept it. Just means that parents would rather not see what is plainly in their faces. Despite all the signs that are there.
What makes this unique in a movie setting is that the parents,mother in particular, deny the fact their son is gay,but, come to some sort of acceptance to the point of accepting his partner. Which is unusual to say the least. The moment with Simon and his partner’s father clearly illustrates that love sometimes can overcome anything if you are willing to accept it. Dad accepting his son’s choice of a partner,welcoming him into the family in the traditional manner says a lot to the older generation attempting to accept what they don’t want to.
Unlike other types of movies with a similar content the single fact of this entire exchange between lover and parent sets it above the rest by taking out the often used typical Asian dad,by making him real,by making him understanding of his son’s choices. Showing a small scene the importance of family no matter who that family is.