Just Us

Goodbye, Paw Paw. I love you forever.

A candid moment between us at Noah's Ark Waterpark in Wisconsin Dells,
August 26, 1996.

My maternal grandmother died in her sleep around 5pm on August 16, 2024, in her house in Palatine, Illinois.

Mirroring the above, a candid moment between us on Class Day
of my college graduation, Columbia University, New York City,
May 19, 2009 (despite what her outfit would have you believe).
I wanted to take a photo in front of the chapel where
I ran a student art gallery in the basement.

I don’t have it in me to write an eloquent tribute like I’ve done in the past. Read those linked blog posts if you want something more meaningful and poignant. (Actually, definitely read the “A Tale of Two Grandmothers // On Memory” post (if you didn’t back then) before you continue with this one, since it provides some necessary background and I don’t want to repeat myself.) Instead, I feel drained; I have a headache from crying.

She’s always been one of the people I love the most. I’ve said it countless times before but she raised me while my parents worked and I was her favorite grandchild (something I liked to jokingly attribute to me just being really cool or whatever but also comes down to timing; when I was born she was perfect “grandma age”—63, old enough to spoil me, young enough to chase after me and deal with my shenanigans). We had a special bond.

Saturday the 17th was my birthday. My grandma died on Friday. My mom waited until Sunday to tell me, understandably. I knew something was off though; on Friday night right before dinner my mom spontaneously went to see my grandma (for the past year plus she and my Aunt 6 took turns going to my grandma’s house to take care of her, but their visits were usually scheduled ahead of time), and later that night her phone’s text notifications were blowing up (and I thought to myself, “Don’t look down at her lock screen”). And then my birthday itself felt odd. And it usually doesn’t rain on my birthday, but it did this time.

At O'Hare Airport to pick up my mom from her first business trip to San Francisco,
August 1988.

(I’m writing this on the 18th so my thoughts and emotions—including rage—are more immediate and raw, but I’ll wait a week to hit publish; I’d like to hold off until after I respond to everyone for all your birthday wishes (thank you all for the love).)

My grandma was 99 years old, and only three months away from 100. She was so close to reaching that milestone and I really thought she’d make it. Maybe I’m naïve. But in late April/early May 2023 the uncle, his wife, and his children who live in her house infected her with COVID, and she was never the same after that. She already had dementia but she used to have moments of sharpness before and was doing so well right until that point; the virus weakened her immensely and accelerated her physical and cognitive decline. And then last week they infected her with mumps. (For God’s sake wear a mask and wash your hands when you’re sick, especially around the elderly. Of course you should do so when you’re healthy too (my mom and Aunt 6 always masked up and were militant about their hygiene when they went).) She was apparently recovering from the mumps though, and her death came as a surprise; my Aunt 6 was there taking care of her when it happened.

Yes, she obviously lived a very long life. But it’s never enough time, you know? Your loved one could live to be a thousand years old but if you were born after them and also live to a thousand it’ll never be enough and it’ll always be too soon.

Celebrating my maternal grandparents becoming citizens (they, my mom, et al.
immigrated here in 1978), early 1990s (candid laughter as I, born troublemaker,
had the moxie to mess with a man who drank brandy with every meal).

Something that does bring me some semblance of comfort though: My grandma died exactly seven years, to the day, after her most filial child (and overall kind and good person), my maternal Uncle 4, who lived in California, died of cancer on August 16, 2017. I’m inclined to believe my mom that there’s something to that coincidence; she says maybe it’s a sign that he came to bring their mother home.

My paternal grandma on the right and my maternal grandma looking into the camera,
waiting to depart from the Big Buddha, Ngong Ping, Lantau Island, Hong Kong,
December 30, 1996. Also pictured are my parents, and, if you look closely on the left,
I'm in my then-favorite baseball cap and flannel pants
and snacking on peanut butter cracker sandwiches.

My mom accompanied the news with what might be considered clichés—my grandma’s in a better place now, she can eat whatever she wants now (her deterioration progressed to the point where she couldn’t eat solid foods, and recently she’d sometimes forget how to swallow), she can remember everyone now, she can finally be reunited with my maternal Uncle 4 now, she knew how much I loved her—but those sayings are common for a reason; they bring me comfort too.

At the closing reception of Exquisite Corpse, the first exhibition
I curated independently, Chicago, September 17, 2011.

(I guess a note on numbers/names. In Chinese we call our aunts and uncles by their birth order, followed by the specific word designated for their relationship to you; in our language it’s not just “aunt” and “uncle”—there’s a different name for, say, uncle who’s your mother’s elder brother vs. uncle who’s your mother’s younger brother vs. uncle who’s your father’s younger brother and so on.

As for my family, my parents are the same age (they’re high school sweethearts), but my dad’s the eldest on his side, while my mom’s one of the youngest; she’s number 7, out of 9, and is the youngest daughter. Her eldest brother (technically her half-brother since he was my maternal grandfather’s child from his first marriage, before his first wife died when they were young—my grandmother was a wonderful stepmother to him) was number 1 and lived in Manchester; he died in 1994 when I was six. I remember my mom locking herself in our bathroom to cry because she didn’t want to do so in front of me, and I drew her a picture that said “I love you” and slipped it under the door, and I heard her immediately stop crying. She was so moved she showed it to all her coworkers the next day.

The note on numbers also brings me to generations. Due to my dad having all younger siblings and my mom having mostly older siblings, most of my cousins on my mom’s side are Gen X, while most of my cousins on my dad’s side are Gen Z. My parents belong to the younger half of the Baby Boomer generation, now also known as Generation Jones (a newly coined but much appreciated distinction since my parents never related to older Boomers who they say had all the opportunities handed to them and refused to step aside and make room for younger Boomers). My maternal grandmother was part of the Greatest Generation. Around 2010 my friend Julia Alekseyeva introduced me to a generational theory that found patterns among generations; according to the theory, the Greatest Generation and Millennials have the same generational archetypes, and that’s why we feel so closely connected to one another within our families (for her, this connection was with her great-grandmother, and is the subject of her graphic novel memoir Soviet Daughter: A Graphic Revolution). All of this, I suppose, is to serve as affirmation for the timing I mentioned at the beginning of this post, of my Paw Paw being the perfect age when I was born—or of us being born at the perfect moments in history to be able to reach each other across time. If this tangent sounded self-important, I don’t care; we’re all important.)

I now no longer have any surviving grandparents. As you know, my paternal grandma died of pancreatic cancer in November 2020 at age 86. My paternal grandpa died in 2011. And my maternal grandpa died on Father’s Day in 1996, something that, as I also noted at the end of the companion post, changed the course of our lives. That’s kind of amazing for my maternal grandma though; she outlived her husband by over 28 years.

(I’m now a few months older than my mom was when her eldest brother died and only a couple years younger than she was when her father died, and I now understand why she described her father’s death as traumatic for her to experience when she was still young.)

(I also understand that this post is unintentionally riddled with math word problems.)

When Pixar’s Soul came out in December 2020, one year after it became official that my maternal grandma no longer remembered who I was, there was this instrumental on the soundtrack by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross called “Just Us,” that, for some reason, when I listened to it for the first time back then, made me picture me and her as little blue souls, holding both of each other’s hands and spinning through the air (my mind combined it with imagery from the end of Pearl Studio’s Over the Moon, which came out a couple months earlier), and we’re reunited in the afterlife and she remembers me, and it made me cry. I honestly can’t even start thinking about that track without being brought to tears.



In searching for some of the Facebook statuses I’ve shared throughout this post, I also found this one, a memory I’d myself forgotten until now:

Perhaps my vision of us as Soul-like blobs flying together was a happier reimagining of those childhood dreams.

Perhaps growing up means realizing there are things you can’t save your loved ones from.

I’m thinking about and in awe of my mom’s strength.

And also my grandma’s, of course. I always referred to her as a badass and I still think it’s the most accurate way to describe her.

My birthday on August 17, 2019.

She deserves more than the rants and ramblings of the grandchild she lovingly spoiled. She had dreams. She had regrets. One day I’ll write a proper tribute. Her life had a lot of hardship, but also happiness.

During my summer break in 2006 I interviewed her because I wanted to document her story in her own words. I recorded the interview on a cassette and knew exactly where the tape was for years when my parents still lived in my childhood home (I can tell you it was in the third bedroom a.k.a. the piano room / computer room / guest bedroom), but since they moved we have no idea where it is anymore (12 years later they still have moving boxes they haven’t unpacked—no offense to my dad but he was as haphazard as he was arbitrary when it came to what he put in each box and where he put each box). Once we find it I’d like to digitize it and share the audio, hear her voice. I do have with me a Word document of notes I had typed up in real time. This was towards the end of our second session:

I just realized I spent this entire blog post not even recounting any of our memories together, or conveying how she was as a person to honor her. How do you even choose which memories to write about when you’ve spent your formative years with someone? There’s her laugh. Her hilariously snarky commentary when she sat down to watch whatever I was watching on TV. Her green thumb, the abundant vegetable garden she grew in her backyard. The jade she wore. Mahjong. Werther’s. Condensed milk on Wonder Bread. Fried SPAM. “Bob Simpson.” The perfume bottles in her and my grandfather’s bedroom. The huge flat cushions I made forts out of. Her hardiness. Her resourcefulness. Yes she raised me all throughout my early childhood, so I spent countless afternoons after school with her up through age 8, but there are also those years I loved, ages 9-13, when she lived on her own in a newly built townhouse that felt so bright and airy and like anything was possible (and when she first moved in I’d climb around the stairs singing “Out There” from Disney’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame, my favorite film from ages 8-9) and she filled it with all new things—a fuzzy red and black flannel throw blanket for me to curl up with when watching TV on floral-patterned couches, crisp and cloud-like bedding (also floral) for my bedroom there when I’d stay the night every weekend—I can still feel and smell it in my mind—and in the morning she’d bake pizza Bagel Bites for me. All the delicious food she’d make. When she’d knit me scarves. How, as I got older, we shared the same taste in fashion. When she moved into her current house and remodeled the basement with all pink carpeting and walls and I used it to throw my sweet 16 birthday party. Her little pink laptop she used for playing solitaire. Her affinity for ordering a bucket of KFC whenever we had a holiday potluck. How she was always dressed as if it were freezing, even in the summer. When she started losing her short-term memory and I wore clothing she’d gifted me and she complimented it and asked where I got it every single time. The photos of me and her other grandchildren on her headboard. How her hands felt.

I could go on and on. I could write a novel, literally.

Another screenshot from the notes I typed in real time when I interviewed her,
second session, August 21, 2006.

The fact that this happened around my birthday has me ruminating on my own sense of mortality even more than usual. Our time is so limited, and the years are racing by (especially these pandemic years—I still feel stuck at the age I was when COVID hit). If you’re fortunate to have a good relationship with your parents (as I do), see them and spend as much time with them as you can (as I have and will). Ask them their stories and record them and remember them yes, but also make new memories. That thing that you’ve always wanted to do? Go do it.

(I’ve been asking you about your dreams for the past 16 years, after all.)

I wonder what it’s like for my grandma right now. Is it like a veil has been lifted? Suddenly she can see—all her memories flooding back, everything that’s happened these past few years revealed to her. I guess I’ll find out in time. Grandma, I’ll see you when we’re little blue blobs.

Dusting Off the Suitcase

Here’s a type of announcement I haven’t made in a long while: I’m traveling to Hong Kong today! (Thank you, as usual, to Art Basel and Art Central for the VIP program invitations.)

It’ll be my first time traveling since before the pandemic (my last trip was over four years ago, to Buenos Aires and the Patagonia region of Argentina and Chile, which I wrote about in the early 2020 blog post “Alegría”), making this the longest I’ve gone my entire life without traveling (yes, including when I was little—my About page has always included “globe-trotting polyglot” among my many distinctions, after all).

And it’ll be my first time back in the Fragrant Harbour in five years, since March 2019:

Some of my iPhone 5s* photos from that trip.
*(Except for that narrow selfie my cousin took on his phone.)

(In the above collage: the top left photo is from my blog post “‘Life’s too short for sad art’ // A preview of HKwalls 2019”; the top right is from my honed-from-years-of-experience guide “How to make the most of Hong Kong’s Art Gallery Night // or, Art Basel Hasn’t Even Started Yet and My Legs Are Already Tired”; the second row left is of self-taught artist Fung Ming Chip and his partner Yim Tom, both of whom I’d met the previous year and whose studio visit was a highlight; the entire third row is from Take Your Cousin to Work Day the morning my maternal cousin Philip Ng, a martial artist and actor, brought me to TVB; and the middle photo in the fourth row is of my late paternal grandma on the evening I finally got to visit her home in the Pak Tin public housing estate.)

Long-time followers of this blog will remember that I took solo trips to Hong Kong every year from 2012-2019 (and in 2017 my mom tagged along to record her Cantonese opera album!).

This will also be my first time back after my paternal grandmother’s passing from pancreatic cancer (I wrote about her and my maternal grandmother, who raised me and is ten years older than the former and still with us but has dementia, in my November 2020 blog post “A Tale of Two Grandmothers // On Memory”); it’s going to be strange being there and not being able to ramble around country parks with her like I used to, or try to figure out how to rearrange the contents of my hotel’s mini fridge in order to fit all the apples she always greeted me at the airport with, or sit next to her at the banquet-style family dinner we’d have with everyone and get food for her first before getting mine, internally reveling in being able to step into my role as the mature, eldest cousin on my dad’s side (a role I don’t often get to play since I’m one of the youngest cousins on my mom’s side). But also, I’m a different person than I was in 2012 when I was a whippersnapper and had no idea what I was doing (not that I think I know what I’m doing now), and it was like my Hong Kong uncles and grandma were making sure this kid traveling on her own was looked after.

My Facebook status at the end of my first full day alone in Hong Kong, 2012.

It’s the kind of change that comes with growing up, isn’t it?

Anyway, I’m looking forward to it, especially since so many new things have popped up in Hong Kong over the years I’ve been away. And since I’ll also be visiting Shenzhen for the first time in a decade!

While I’m overseas, you can: follow along on my socials; view my artwork currently on display in the exhibition Click at The Art Center Highland Park; reserve a copy of LAMINATOR Vol. 1, my brand new zine featuring 68 artists, poets, and writers from around the world (also available in the gift shop of the aforementioned art center while supplies last) (I mailed all pre-orders last week and it’s been so exciting to see folks receive and post about their zines these past couple days!); and collect art from a few of the artists in said publication.

Lastly, some miscellany:

On Threads and Mastodon.

• And these were my two thoughts while watching this year’s Oscars—very different from last year’s ceremony.

See you on April 2, Chicago!

A Tale of Two Grandmothers // On Memory

This day is one of death and life, but so are all days.

A candid I took of my paternal grandma in the
Hong Kong Railway Museum, March 2018.
Exhibited at the Chicago Public Library, May 2019.

This morning my paternal grandma passed away at the age of 86, surrounded by family in Hong Kong. We knew this was coming. She was diagnosed with stage IV pancreatic cancer in the beginning of August, and it was inoperable and chemo wasn’t possible, so it was a death sentence. We didn’t tell her; think back to the film The Farewell. And lately she was on her literal death bed; the past few nights when we should’ve been sleeping, my dad would have his video chat on all night so that he could, in a way, be with her when it happened. I’d fall asleep (and oftentimes wake up in the middle of the night) to hospice noises and the sound of her labored breathing. I didn’t want to see her like that, wasting away. I wanted to remember her as she was. And who she was made me shocked when the diagnosis came, despite her age. She was so active and independent and self-sufficient. If you’ve been following my travels over the years you might remember that, every time I visit HK for Art Basel, she and I would literally hike around mountains together. She lived by herself, and she was always walking all over the city on her own, and she was always so sharp.

Pancreatic cancer is brutal. I won’t go into the details of her rapid deterioration but I empathize with anyone who’s had loved ones suffer through it. My parents and I paid attention to Alex Trebek’s journey more closely than the average person might because of my paternal grandma, and when he died a couple weeks ago, it filled me with dread.

Today is also a celebration of a life. It’s my maternal grandma’s 96th birthday according to the Western/solar calendar. She’s an immigrant and lives in the Chicago metropolitan area.

One of the photos my uncle texted us of my maternal grandma looking so
pleased after winning mahjong on various days in July and August 2020.

We always celebrated her Chinese/lunar one, which usually falls around December, but this year we decided to observe her Western one early; according to superstition, if my paternal grandma died, we wouldn’t be able to go to my maternal grandma for 49 days. (The irony is my maternal grandma isn’t superstitious, but some other relatives are, and we respect their wishes.) I guess I should backtrack a little before I continue, though.

I’ve been staying home since March. Home being my parents’ house. My parents are 63, so I knew back then, as I cancelled the physical show for SLAYSIAN when Illinois’ total cases exponentially jumped to 66, that if I didn’t come to them as soon as possible (I remember I had one last errand to run before hunkering down), I wouldn’t be able to see them for who knows how long.

We’ve been living like we’re under lockdown this entire time, nonsensical “reopening” be damned. We still get curbside pickup for groceries and sanitize them before bringing them in. We got takeout once, for my parents’ anniversary. We don’t even take walks around the neighborhood; I see too many people without masks outside. When it was warm out, my dad and I would simply walk around the perimeter of the house (how funny we must’ve looked to anyone who might’ve seen us).

Like I said before, I’ve been a germaphobe since I was 10 (it began when we were given a notice that strep throat was going around, and I suddenly flashed back to the trauma of catching it from different classmates over and over when I was 6), so on the one hand it’s like most of my life has prepared me for this, but on the other hand this is pretty much my worst nightmare. We’ve been strict, with me being the strictest and the enforcer. The only times I’ve ventured beyond our yard were when I had to go to my childhood orthodontist for a retainer concern (“Welcome to the outside!” the staff joked to me) and when we drop off freshly homemade food and other snacks for my maternal grandma every month.

We have a system. My maternal grandma lives with one of my uncles and his household. They have a table on one end of their garage. We arrive and park in their driveway, they open the garage door, we place our gifts on the table, and we stay at that open end (I sometimes stand directly under the garage door and think back to my childhood fear of being decapitated that way) while they’re at the other end. We briefly say hi and exchange a few words and maybe take a photo of the two of them from this distance. We drive away as they watch us, and my grandma waves, and I wave back. In July I overheard my mom saying that every time she says goodbye to her mother there’s a feeling of sadness, and I mentally agreed. Pre-pandemic, my mom would spend time with my grandma at least a couple times a week: Sunday dim sum and errands in Chinatown, a weekday dinner at their favorite neighborhood restaurant.

My maternal grandmother is also the woman who raised (and spoiled) me when my parents went to work. We were close. I was her favorite, which boosted my ego because she has 20-something grandchildren.

I use past tense because her memory has been fading. (This is why, for those of you who follow me on social media, over the summer I was delighted to learn that she still remembers how to play—and win—mahjong, pictured above.) Before the pandemic, this was my #1 stressor. It was on Christmas 2019 that she officially forgot who I was. And it felt even worse to me that it was an otherwise joyful moment. We were at her house for the annual Christmas party with extended family and it was the end of the night and an aunt was trying to shuffle her off to bed so we were saying our goodbyes, and she forgot who I was and did not remember raising me. It was bittersweet because she was genuinely praising me and joking, “Oh, I must have done a good job then!” and doing it so cheerily and rubbing my arm and looking at me with kindness and wonder, yet I couldn’t help but let the tears flow as I smiled and nodded sadly with everyone watching us. Without context it was a cute exchange—she was even saying how tall I was (I’m 5’1”)—but I felt like I was dreaming. It was like her true self—her innate personality and humor—shined through, like she was seeing me objectively since she wasn’t beholden to our decades of memories and experiences together. It revealed to me that every version of her would like or love me, that if she met me for the first time she would still feel the same, and she’s always been the kind of strong, opinionated, firecracker of a woman who’d just as easily let it be known if she didn’t like someone. Still, it was a pain I’d never felt before. Earlier, I’d thought I’d be OK with it like Miguel in Pixar’s Coco, but I wasn’t. Then again, unlike Miguel, I’d lived an entire life with her.

Then COVID-19 hit and my priorities completely changed. On March 1, the last time I went to yum cha and before the location of the state’s 4th case was confirmed (we’d received news of it from a cousin who saw a post by a local hospital worker that said Arlington Heights), I suspected community spread and shifted to survival mode for my family. And when your mindset shifts to staving away death, sickness, and suffering, everything else can seem so trivial. I was now happy my grandmother was alive and safe, and I would do everything to keep it that way. Her memory loss also became a silver lining to me: She wouldn’t have to worry about what was happening (she barely knows what’s going on); she wouldn’t have to miss me. I became OK. Throughout the pandemic I’ve even joked about her condition with my mom (imitating a little old lady voice, “Who are these two women who bring me snacks every month?” “She probably doesn’t even remember the previous visit; the snacks are a nice surprise each time”).

So, two days ago it was a race against time for my mom to bake my maternal grandma a cake and for us to drive the 8 or so miles to her, hurriedly wish her a happy birthday, and then get back in the car and leave, before anything happened to my paternal grandma.

We made it, as my paternal grandma held on. She clung to life until all the HK family could be at her bedside at once, holding her hand and bidding farewell. I couldn’t be with her as she was dying of course, but I don’t regret it. I will now always remember her as she was in life: Loud, fierce, hiking mountains in her 80s. Life and death may have been on my mind, but so has memory.

I’m suddenly thinking back to when my maternal grandfather died, on Father’s Day—the Father’s Day that the Bulls won their 4th championship and the first one Michael Jordan won without his father—when I was 8. That was a death that changed my life in so many ways, and marked the end of one era and the beginning of another: I wrote my first diary entry; my mom eventually quit her job; [because] my grandma, who used to live in the house across the street from the one I grew up in (my parents had intentionally moved there so she could babysit me), moved out of that house and started anew. There were too many memories there for her. After staying with us for a little while, she moved to Palatine, where she’s been ever since.

Life is strange and everything can change so quickly. Now more than before I think about how little time we have with our loved ones. The years are fast.

This day is one of life and death, but on this day I celebrate both my grandmothers’ lives. On this day I choose to celebrate life.


P.S. Something I was always proud of was how both my grandmothers admired each other. They’d always individually praise each other to me, telling me how they thought the other was so impressive and such a good person. They have so many children and thus so many in-laws, yet it was my grandmothers who connected. In my youth I’d joke how it was a testament to how powerful I was. (Of course, being my maternal grandmother’s favorite probably didn’t hurt.)

P.P.S. Oh, the limits of the English language. In Chinese we have completely different words to distinguish between one’s maternal and paternal grandmothers.

Alegría

First: I am so happy to announce that, for the third year in a row, I’ve been chosen to exhibit my artwork at the Chicago Public Library during May to celebrate Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month! This year, I’ll be in my own neighborhood’s branch: Logan Square! Thank you, CPL!

Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, Patagonia, Chile.

Second: I know I haven’t been updating this blog much lately, and that’s an understatement [she says as she sheepishly looks at the post numbers by year in the Archive sidebar]. (Like, my last real post was a contextless but wistful one about my college reunion.) So I’ll simply bring you up to speed with my most recent adventure.

Last month, my parents and I traveled to Patagonia, where we rang in the new year. Going there was on my personal bucket list, which people have been asking me about since 2008 because of Dreams of a City, and I’m usually cagey with my answers, but now you know one of them.

Patagonia was, without a doubt, one of the best trips we’ve ever had. My mom said it was on the same level as when we went to Egypt (coincidentally, the same year I started my aforementioned mapping project), and my dad said—while we were standing in the above spot in Torres del Paine—that out of all the places we’ve been to, Patagonia is the most beautiful. I’m inclined to agree.

San Carlos de Bariloche, Patagonia, Argentina. First full day of our trip.

Yet even more than the grandeur of the landscapes and wonder of being in such wilderness was the beauty in the human connections. Music, passion, dancing in the heat, late nights overflowing with wine. Beautiful souls, rollicking laughter, finding that most things—and not just the age-old human desire to be near mountains and bodies of water—are universal. It’s summer in the southern hemisphere and all of it was the epitome of summer’s bittersweetness, fervent and fleeting. “Only connect,” that literary-reference-learned-as-a-teenager-turned-tenet-in-adulthood, comes to me again, and it couldn’t be more suited for a space where it’s a reflex to pass your mate to all your friends old and new and everyone drinks out of the same metal straw, and I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect way to enter a brand-new decade.

Volcan Orsono, Los Lagos, Patagonia, Chile.
The ferry (one of many when crossing the Argentina-Chile border)
turning a bend and revealing this was unreal. New Year's Day.

(Even the imperfect was perfect. Like that time one of the many buses we’d take for the Argentina-Chile border crossing broke down before it reached us so we waited in the shade around a replica of Che Guevara’s La Poderosa II. Or that other time the trailer carrying our luggage broke and we bonded while stranded for four hours at a rest stop in Villa Tehuelches and then in our [absolutely lovely and lovable and hardworking and total sweetheart of a 23-year-old Argentine tour] guide Esteban’s hurry to finally leave… left behind Sonja from Vienna at said rest stop and didn’t realize it until the bus was already minutes away while driving at full speed. (We made a frantic U-turn to get her back.) It was straight out of a movie; it had us cackling and clapping; it was glorious.)

The mighty Glaciar Perito Moreno, Parque Nacional Los Glaciares,
Patagonia, Argentina. This is the third largest ice field in the world
(the first and second are in Antarctica and Greenland). 

I loved it all, and I already miss Argentina and Chile dearly. (I missed them as soon as our plane took off from Buenos Aires and my mom said “goodbye, Argentina” and then I whispered it and felt a swell of sadness, but still.) Naturally, I took a ton of photos (and yes, still with my little 5s) and have shared a few of them (33 photos/photosets) on Instagram. They’re also organized on my Tumblr with tags for Patagonia and Buenos Aires. (And if you enjoy scrolling, they’re also on Twitter and Facebook.)

Life is art; paint it with the world.

Mt. Tronador right after crossing the border from
Argentina's Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi to
Chile's Parque Nacional Vicente Perez Morales. Patagonia. New Year's Day.

Happy 2020!

Candid of my parents taking it all in.
Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, Patagonia, Chile.

P.S. In case you missed the previous post, the call for artists for my next group show is up!

And I’m here to remind you

Reunion 2019, Columbia University in the City of New York.

As the Starlight Celebration went on into the night and all milestone reunion years (every 5 years all the way up to ’49) danced under the benevolent gaze of Alma Mater, right after I took the photo above and descended from Low I found myself sitting on the Steps with my good friend Andrew (who, until reunion, I last hung out with 7 years ago in Beijing) and had a deep conversation about—literally—our mortality; love; loss; longing to leave a legacy and pass on our stories; how we’ve reached an age where we’ve made certain decisions we can’t ever come back from and must make peace with that; Andrew saying the question he asks himself now is “What do I want to get out of life?”, which I know will stick with me; how we don’t want certain feelings to ever fade away… all the good stuff, and it was so Columbia, and I loved it, and I love my friends I made here so much. He and I talked about how we don’t remember too much about what we learned in class (well for me I did internalize everything I learned freshman year, which is when I knocked out most of the Core, but after that… yeah sorry Columbia), but to us this place has always been and always will be about the people.

Honey, I'm home.
Columbia University, my 10-year reunion.

At my 5-year reunion it felt like I never left, like I had just come back from a long summer break. At 10 years though, enough time has passed to make it seem very, very strange. It’s all so familiar, yet—as I told Andrew—it feels dreamlike. Columbia, post-graduation, has always had a dreamlike quality to me, but when I wandered around campus that night I felt like a ghost. Like I was looking at everything through incorrect prescription contact lenses (which is highly probable). I lived here in another lifetime, something I did notice years back.

Who else from Columbia remembers the school-only
Facebook group from 2005 called "I had a crush on
Alexander Hamilton" because I did when I was 16.

And the next morning my throat was sore from scream-singing (while intermittently raising my wine cup) along to “You Oughta Know” which was inexplicably the last song the live band played.

"In lumine Tuo videbimus lumen."
Columbia Reunion during the Starlight Celebration portion of the night.

(But then there’s something so perfect about a crowd of dressed up Columbia alumni singing Alanis Morissette at the tops of our lungs at midnight.)

Using Riverside Church as a guide, spot Columbia, turquoise copper roof
Lego block oasis. Goodbye again. Miss all you nerds already.

ABC in HK // Kin Wong

ABC in HK is a new mini interview series amplifying the voices of Chinese Americans who’ve returned to their roots / motherland, whether it’s for work or any other reason. These are their stories, their struggles, their triumphs, their dreams.

If you’re a Chinese American (either an ABC—a.k.a. American-born Chinese—or Chinese who grew up in the US) currently living in Hong Kong and would like to participate, see the call here.

To kick off this project, meet Kin Wong. When I emailed him my questions I knew that he and I had NYC in common (he’s a native New Yorker and I lived there during college). What I didn’t know was that he moved to Hong Kong just two months ago, he’s from a family of undocumented immigrants, he’s a fellow INJ (T here), and he survived 9/11. And that he’s quite the storyteller. Digest every word. I know I did.

Photo courtesy of Kin Wong

Name: Kin Wong

Title & Occupation: Project & Services Director for an Office Interior Design & Construction Company

Where you were born and grew up: New York City

When you moved to Hong Kong: I arrived January 8th, 2018.

Why you moved to Hong Kong: I moved to start a new job here.

Tell me a little about yourself! Basically, what’s your story?

This can go in several directions so I’ll start broadly and then focus on my Hong Kong move.

I have an older brother and older sister who were both born in Hong Kong but left when they were young. (My brother has not returned to his birth country since then.) My family illegally immigrated to the US and then in 1976, I was born in New York City. We were poor but my hard-working parents eventually built a middle-class life for us. My mother’s plan for her children: go to school, get good grades, go to college, get a steady corporate desk job. (She later added marriage for us and grandchildren for her but I never followed up on those two.) She never pushed us to be doctors or lawyers so we had to figure out what we wanted to do.

I followed her plan and went with the flow. I studied business in college but ended up doing I.T. for about 20 years for the company that hired me right out of school.

Two major life events were September 11 and my mother’s death from brain cancer.

I was on the 80th floor of Two World Trade Center when the first plane hit Tower One. I’m alive today because I did everything right that day. A small Hong Kong interior design company was rebuilding our Hong Kong office when we asked them to drop everything to rebuild our New York City office. I soon became friends with the interior design company’s owner. (Spoiler alert: This friendship is important later.)

My mother died in September 2004. My siblings and I cared for her for over a year after her brain cancer diagnosis. Initially it was an emotional roller coaster ride of good and bad news. But the last 6 months were a helpless decline until her end at age 61.

Those two events left a profound mark on my life. They made me appreciate life, friends, and family more. (As part of that appreciation, I bought a motorcycle after 9/11, but hid it from my mother, of course.) My mother’s passing left me lost about my life’s direction. It caused me to question whether a steady corporate desk job was the best way to spend my precious time on this planet. I searched for a meaningful purpose but never found it. (I’m not poo-pooing steady corporate desk work for anyone else.)

I was unhappy with my job for a long time and waited for a kick-in-the-pants to leave that never came. Even after a corporate takeover was announced, I was offered a position at the new company. It was then that my Hong Kong interior design friend offered me a job to work with him in Hong Kong. So many things about the offer lined up with what I thought (and still think) I was looking for in a job/career/life, especially given the lessons I learned after surviving 9/11 and losing my mother. This was better than that kick-in-the-pants I was waiting for. It was like winning the lottery.

How would you personally compare Hong Kong with NYC?

Hong Kong is bigger but feels more densely populated. I do not find Hong Kong easily walkable; you need to know inter-building corridors, overpasses, underpasses, bridges, and tunnels. I also find it dirtier here. I’m waiting to see how I fare in the summer humidity. There’s no Amazon.com here, which is both good and bad, I guess. Transportation here is cheap. Get used to not having hot water on demand. Small apartments.

What have been the biggest challenges you’ve faced since moving to Hong Kong?

While I have no problem living in HK, my biggest challenge has been job-related. I’m having a hard time adjusting my personality conflicts (INFJ) to suit my new job. My old job was very comfortable in that it let me indulge in negative and lazy habits. I knew this would be one of the challenges when I decided to make the move. It continues to be very difficult but the struggle is good for me.

What have been the best things about living in Hong Kong?

It’s not about Hong Kong specifically but more about a fresh start in a new place. It felt pretty awesome to purge most of my belongings. I realized that the belongings owned me in some way.

My employer is great. The company is very successful and they do high quality work. I’m proud to say I work with them.

A childhood friend of mine said he grew up after he left NYC. I think there’s something about having my family (brother/sister) around that let me let things happen to me. This is especially true because I’m the youngest sibling by at least 9 years. I’m 42 this year so it’s kind of embarrassing that I’m still growing up. I have more control over my life now… a little more than my lazy self wants. Nothing is stopping me from succeeding except me.

I also enjoy just being here. Sometimes even when walking to work, I feel like I’m on vacation because Hong Kong is still new to me. I think about how cool it is to be here and how lucky I am for the people that helped make this happen.

Where/what are your favorite places/things to do in Hong Kong?

It’s fun and exciting to explore the restaurants in my Soho neighborhood but I’m uncomfortable eating on my own at the busy places. It’s a treat when someone takes me somewhere very local: flimsy stools, toilet paper on the table, cheap food. I get excited about discovering side lanes between buildings, pedestrian bridges, and tunnel connections. I’m also pretty grateful for some of the people who look after me here so spending time with them gives me the warm fuzzies.

Have your views about being an American changed since you came here?

No. In many ways, I identify myself as an American, but really I’ve got one foot on each side of the door (not 100% American and not 100% Chinese). I’ve always been Chinese to “Americans” and now that I’m in Hong Kong, the people around me see me as an American. I don’t think I’ll shake that until I learn to speak Cantonese perfectly… but those tones!

Have your views about being Chinese changed since you came here?

No. But I’m still struggling to fit in while maintaining my me-ness.

Has being an ABC in Hong Kong shaped/changed your overall views about heritage, home, and identity?

Whoa, deep questions. This is a pretty permanent move for me. I don’t have plans to go back to live in the US so Hong Kong is becoming more of a home every day. I don’t think anything has changed but I think I’m more aware of some things. For example, my family left China and Hong Kong for the US to pursue the dream for a better life. They did it with nothing in their pockets. Now I’ve returned to the place they left, for the same reason, but not struggling nearly as much as they did.

What advice would you give to an ABC who would consider moving to Hong Kong?

If you don’t speak Cantonese, learn it. Unless you have the means, be prepared for a smaller apartment. Practice doing currency conversion in your head. Temperature conversion too. I laughed at people wearing puffy jackets in 50 degree winter weather. I don’t laugh anymore because it is cold when both your office and apartment don’t have heat. Get an Octopus card. Forget fluffy cotton towels because nothing dries here. The Ikea in Shatin is big; Causeway Bay, not so much.

You can find Kin on LinkedIn.