A Return Visit to Speak at Delta State University

On Sept. 20, I made a visit to Cleveland, Ms., where I had previously talked in 2008 at Delta State University about the history of Chinese in the South. We decided to depart from a more standard lecture presentation with powerpoint slides and use a more informal format in which I would be interviewed in a conversational style. Dr. Albert Nylander, my host, served as the interviewer and asked questions directed toward understanding what led me to write my books on Chinese American history in the South, what the process entailed, how the books were received, and what I felt was the significance of my findings.

My Visit to the University of Memphis, Confucius Institute

I had an opportunity on Sept. 13, 2011 to give three presentations about the history of Chinese in the Deep South that were sponsored by the Confucius Institute at the University of Memphis.  This program funded by the Chinese government focuses on providing native speakers of Mandarin to public schools for language instruction. Many other universities in the U. S. and other countries have similar programs.

My most challenging audience was a class of 5th graders at the Campus School. At first, I was reluctant to make this presentation because of the young age, but realizing that it was important for young people to be introduced to the history of how Chinese immigrants were mistreated in the U. S., I welcomed the opportunity.  I was pleased with the attentiveness and curiosity that these youngsters showed during my talk.  One child was particularly interested in the example I showed of one of the poems that an immigrant had carved on the wall while interned at the Angel Island Immigration Station.  He wanted to know where he could read some of the other poems that were discovered when the barracks were about to be demolished after the station was closed.

A second talk in the afternoon attracted a general audience of students and faculty and generated considerable interest in the topic of how Chinese came to settle in Mississippi and Georgia, how they earned their living, and how they were treated in the segregated South.

The audience for the final talk in the evening consisted of students in the Honors Program. I spoke about my memoir, Southern Fried Rice, which described what it was like to be a member of the only Chinese family in our city, Macon, Georgia, during the 1920s-1950s.

Talk on Chinese in the South at Ole Miss, Sept, 2011

    The Sociology/Anthropology Department at the University of Mississippi in Oxford sponsored my presentation, On Being Chinese Where Everyone Else is Either Black or White, about some of the experiences of Chinese living in the Deep South during the era of Jim Crow laws.
      After the talk, I enjoyed Southern hospitality with delightful company at the well-known Ajax Restaurant on the town square, which features delicious Southern food.  I also had the opportunity the next day to be interviewed on Mississippi Public Radio about the lives of Chinese grocers in the Mississippi Delta during that period.

Return to the Deep South for Book Talks This Fall

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A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to My Retirement Home, Chateau Cupertino, June 11, 2011

A variant of a talk about my adventures after retiring from college teaching in writing and speaking about Chinese American history that I first presented in April at California State University, Long Beach.  My audience consisted primarily of college students, and some former colleagues not yet retired, in the Department of Psychology. It played well, and served to tell students that they don't have a corner on the life of the mind, and not to dismiss us retirees as 'over the hill' intellectually.

Speaking at Chateau Cupertino (just down the street from a well-known computer company), I faced an audience at the opposite end of the age span, some even older than I, and all in some stage of retirement. I gave essentially the same talk, but the implicit message was different. For some of them, the message was "it's never too late!"  That is, using your life experiences and wisdom, you might have some meaningful things to write about that you could share with others.  

Sweet & Sour @ Culinary Historians of Northern Calif, Omnivore Bookstore, S. F. June 9

It was a special treat, and challenge, to discuss the history of Chinese restaurants with a 'foodie' audience at a wonderful 'foodie' bookstore rather than a predominantly Chinese audience. A friendly crowd packed the confines of a charming bookstore which allowed eye to eye contact with each person, which was essential since I could not display any slides or graphics to illustrate important points.  One surprise was the unannounced appearance of my good friends, Joe and Liz Chan, each of whom has contributed valuable narratives to my books, with Joe writing about his life growing up in his parents' Oriental Restaurant in Ft. Wayne, Indiana for the "Sweet and Sour" book and Liz sharing memories of her life growing up in her parents' laundry in Louisville, Kentucky, for the "Chinese Laundries" book.  Joe gave me a precious gift that I was honored to receive, a stainless steel serving dish, complete with cover, used in the Oriental Restaurant probably over 50 years ago!
    A highlight of the evening was Nellie Wong's recital of 3 of her poems about working in her parents' family restaurant in Oakland, 2 of which she generously gave permission for use in "Sweet and Sour."

Sweet and Sour, Chinese Historical Society of Southern California, June 1, 2011

 

The Chinese Historical Society of Southern California holds its meetings in the historic Castellar Elementary School in Los Angeles' Chinatown amidst many restaurants that feature traditional Cantonese based cuisine, a great setting to talk about the history of Chinese family restaurants. As a member of this vital organization, and well-acquainted with many of its members, I was pleased to share my findings with them. 

I had made 2 previous presentations about my other books on Chinese American history; in fact, I can pinpoint the exact moment that I was directed toward researching Chinese grocers in the Mississippi Delta.  

I had just finished talking about my memoir of growing up in a Chinese laundry in Macon, Georgia, where our family were the only Chinese in town.  A former resident of the Delta, Roland Chow, thanked me for my talk, and urged me to consider writing a history of Mississippi Delta Chinese, a topic that I had never considered writing about simply because I did not feel I knew enough about it.  However, with the encouragement of Roland leading me to do some research for several months, I became engrossed with the topic and recognized the urgency for someone to try to write on the subject which had been ignored since the 1970s work of James Loewen, Mississippi Chinese, and Robert Quan Seto, Lotus Among the Magnolias.  Thus,  the idea for "Chopsticks in the Land of Cotton," published in 2008, was born at Castellar School.

Q & A after Chicago Talk about "Sweet and Sour." May 21, 2011

         It was a delight to be back in Chicago's Chinatown to speak again at the rebuilt, better than before, Chinese American Museum of Chicago.   Chicago Chinatown is  significant to me on a personal level because when I was working on my Ph.D. at Northwestern University I would occasionally take the L train from Evanston to get some 'soul food' from a Chinese restaurant down there.

        

Sweet and Sour, Chinese American Museum of Chicago, May 21.

This jewel of a museum in the heart of Chicago's Chinatown is one of my favorite venues.  It has a dedicated and energetic group of volunteers to support its competent staff.  I was delighted to talk about my Chinese Laundries book there three years ago because the classic book on the topic by Paul Siu was based on Chinese laundries of Chicago in the mid-20th century. A few months later, the museum suffered a major fire that shut it down for over a year.  Due to the determination of the people of CAMOC, it was not only restored, but even enlarged.  I was privileged to be able to return there last week to speak about Sweet and Sour, which included some historical facts about early Chinese restaurants in Chicago and narratives from two people who grew up in their families' Chinese restaurants.  One of them, Bill Tong, still lives in Chicago and was willing to make a 'cameo' appearance during my presentation to speak about the history of Tong's Tea Garden, his family's restaurant.

A Funny Thing Happened on My Way to the Retirement Home, (CSULB April 27, 2011)

 

I got a chance to speak about my 'retirement' career at Calif. St. University, Long Beach, the very place from which I retired after 40 years as a professor of psychology.  Instead of talking about the "content" of my four books on Chinese American family businesses, I described the remarkable sequence of events and people I've met that facilitated my success in a field about which I knew very little until I retired from academia. I wanted to impress upon the audience, which consisted of many students, that with a little bit of luck, many contacts, and some moxie, it is possible to have an impact with one's writing and publishing. Over the past 6-7 years, I wrote and published 4 books and gave over 35 talks across the country and once in Canada on the life experiences of Chinese immigrant families in their self-run businesses during most of the last century when racial prejudices denied them employment in many more lucrative occupations and professions.

The "take home message" to students is that life doesn't have to end in retirement if one seeks and embraces new challenges: expect the unexpected!