CONNECTIONS an asian american literary & arts magazine
roots spring 202
We thank Peter Wong and other BAASA (Brandeis Asian American Students Association alumni who donated physical copies of past Eastern Tide magazines, inspiring the revival of BAASA’s literary magazine rebranded as “Connections.” We also thank Former ICC Director Madeline Lopez who helped BAASA to create a space for Eastern Tide in the ICC (Intercultural Center). We dedicate this first publication of Connections to Peter Wong and Madeline Lopez. Without their passion, we would not have been able to revive and create this magazine.
LETTER FROM THE E TOR Dear Reader, As a child, I often found myself in positions of adult responsibilities and expectations. I acted as my parents’ translator, spokesperson, and guardian, going with them to doctor’s appointments and banks, filing my own financial aid applications and reading taxes, and more. Back then, I resented the burden that was placed on me and found myself wondering why I had to be the one who held my immigrant family together. Looking back, I reali e that the connections I ha e to my culture, filled with gochugaru and dwenjang, loud con ersations and laughter, and unconditional familial lo e, is what has made me who I am today. I am connected to my first language, 한글, because my parents could not speak the words of a foreign country, and I am connected to my immigrant parents, who may not understand my orean Americanness, but who will always lo e and support me despite. It is our connections to our culture, family, and past, as well as to each other, that make us stronger. hen I was first presented with the opportunity to re i e and recreate Eastern T de as a new literary maga ine, I did not think I would grow to ha e so much fondness and lo e for this passion pro ect of mine. onnect ons has grown into an ama ing space and platform for indi iduals to share their stories, re elations, and tribulations, and I am so thankful to all of our submitters and contributers for helping to bring this maga ine to life. I am inspired by our writers and artists, both current and past, and this maga ine is grounded in the need to uplift and celebrate Asian American oices and perspecti es, and challenge the systems of oppression which perpetuate racism and iolence. In its original publication of s an er can ews on the ar in , BAA A members declared, In this country, we, like our Black, Brown, and indigenous sisters and brothers, are engaged in a struggle for liberation from the same racist exploitation as imperiali ed people abroad. istorically, we ha e been dehumani ed, ensla ed, and slaughtered. oday, all this continues. Although nearly years ha e passed, this sentiment is still rele ent, creating a necessity for a publication like onnect ons. During the ongoing pandemic, we ha e been separated by distance, time ones, and computer screens. owe er, my hope is that through this maga ine, you will be able to feel connected to one another in the stories and artwork that re ect uni ersal experiences and emotions. ith much lo e,
oo Ra ung
MISSION STATEMENT e aim to connect the history of our past with the struggles we face in the present in order to create a better future. e aim to illuminate the oices of the marginalized, and connect the bonds between di erent groups of people. ur hope is to create a space where writers and artists of arying backgrounds can come together to share their experiences and stories. y doing so, our goal is to moti ate and empower students to claim their identities boldly and proudly. e are committed to fostering a multi racial, multicultural community here at randeis that is politically aware and inherently anti racist. ogether, we can stand stronger. ur connections will allow us to heal and mo e forward.
THEME Inspired by its predecessor, Eastern Tide, this debut edition of Connections focuses on the idea of Roots. any of our submissions center connections to one’s cultural roots, ties to family, and identity, all of which connect us from our past to our future. urthermore, Connections is deeply rooted in Eastern Tide’s past as a magazine intended to uplift and highlight Asian American oices and perspecti es while promoting solidarity and liberation from racist imperialism.
COLOR PALETTE In isualizing Connections, it was crucial to recognize the legacy of Eastern Tide and our origins in AA A’s first literary magazine. olors from the pre ious co ers of Eastern Tide were pulled out and compiled to create our color palette of red, blue and yellow. he primary color palette was also chosen to emphasize the ibrancy that comes from memories and sensationalism from cultural backgrounds. hese colors guide the reader through Connections by indicating the type of piece they are experiencing. lue corresponds with poetry and shorter writing pieces, red with artwork, and yellow represents longer writing pieces. created by Hannah Park
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COVER liciting the uni ue nostalgia of childhood and family memories, the co er re ects how indi idual roots and backgrounds shape an indi idual’s world iew and alues. created by Hannah Park
EDITOR IN CHIEF Yoo Ra Sung ’23
SENIOR ADVISER
Hyojoo Juliana An ’21
CREATIVE DIRECTOR Hannah Park ’23
COPY & LAYOUT EDITOR Amanda Lui ’23
ASSISTANT DESIGN EDITOR Allie Smith ’24
LITERARY MAGAZINE WORKING GROUP yo oo uliana An ’ i yen lackwood ’ llie ang leiman ’ anice uang ’ laire ou ’ ric iang ’ Amanda ui ’ lla Russell ’ Allie mith ’ oo Ra ung ’ Rachel ang ’ arter ee ’
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A Rare hing Rachel
.
ang
y alms old heir tories
.
ears
.
anice uang
I ried o
rite A tory
.
ea e
.
osses Allie mith
.
egacy
.
aroline
e Alone Angela iu
annah ark
Don’t e ike
.
a ita undaram
e
enny e
hinatown Alison an . If hese ongues ould alk Anthony iu
.
森林⼩丘, ome
.
ophia
e er uite the ame
. Disposable eroes
elly heng
ienna ucu
. At the Di estment Rally .
e in osta
ooking ack, ooking orward
. Alcott’s sed ooks .
ay Area
.
ridges
yla
adowski
en i n
amie oh
. Rules to the ame
yo oo uliana An
oo Ra ung
. Reclaiming ost Dreams
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ang
oo Ra ung
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arts of the
hole Amanda ui
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l fruto de mis madres Ale andra onilla
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wisted in
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ear of the Rat
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lushing,
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oomin Ahn arter ee anice uang
. Are ou atisfied .
he
annah ark
andmaiden Angela iu
. Almost ou
eline ricia artolome
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elf ortrait Angela iu
.
AA A
.
AA A laylist
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xcerpts from astern ide
aiku ollection
AA A
oard
llie ang leiman and Richard ian
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A RARE THING by Rachel Wang It is a rare thing to hold your father close to feel his chest ripple against yours as he cries in your arms. I forgive you. here is an e ort to contain the cry, to sti e the sob. ut there is the betrayal of the body anyway hea e, hea e, hea e. I forgive you. In the moment where the embrace ends and I pull back to see his tearful face I suddenly see the face of his mother. It has something to do with the eyes. It must be the way he blinks back tears, with his head tilted back. he uttering eyelids of his mother. As I embrace him once more, he feels like a child in my arms. A little boy. I forgive you. I forgive you.
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And I hold him close, like a mother holds her child. like a child holds his mother. I hear the little boy inside of him sigh in relief. I forgi e him because I need to for my healing. I see now that I also forga e him for his healing. e are children, stroking each other’s backs soothing one another like we learned from our mothers. e are children, holding each other with our arms, with our eyes. e are adults with hurting children inside of us who now hurt a little less. e are adult children, holding our hurt together and letting it go at last.
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MY PALMS HOLD THEIR STORIES by Kavita Sundaram
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YEARS by Janice Huang Inspired by Staceyann Chin or the years that follow I am fixed in the bound composition notebooks and the cheeto dust on wet fingertips I remember foam containers dripping in hot oil and I remember the l mi n that ew on redwood tables as fast as hot oil dripping from the sides of foam containers. I remember the thick syrup draped on ice and how it rushed through my throat like the passing of summer. And that year, I taught myself how to feel the wa es of freedom. hisked away into this corner of mine, I wonder when things should come about. ill I still feel milk skin against my forehead when I’m drenched in sweat at A ill I still laugh into lonely bodies on summer e enings r bury my insides with milk bread and dandelion wisps I am drenched in sun ower uice It ickers against my golden skin, radiating in the summer heat.
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I TRIED TO WRITE A STORY by Caroline O I tried to write a story. I really did. hen I was in high school, I wrote this fiction piece that was eight thousand words. It was about this orean American boy named Roy Roy the boy, I know, har har who li es in an white town like my own. e hates being orean. hen this new orean American girl named ae who I named ae because ae apparently works as both an Asian and an American name, har har , and she’s the exact opposite of Roy in the orean American spectrum. You know the type grew up in a mostly orean instead of white town, listens to pop, doesn’t feel embarrassed about bringing in her orean lunch to the cafeteria. o, this wasn’t a lo e story it was some story about Roy the boy learning about his internalized racism. I read the story again a few days ago, and e en though I remember that rush of indication, like ha, yes, I’ll show my sophomore nglish class that yeah, those micro aggressions are so fucking annoying I didn’t really feel energized to write the short story that I wanted for this magazine. year old me was a lot bra er than year old me I guess, because when I tried to write about connection and the Asian American experience in fiction, my brain shut down. -ecause I guess I could write a story based o the time when I was fi e years old, a boy ran up to my brother on the playground and tugged back his eyes and shouted hing chong . I guess I could write about how my dad had stomped right o er to the little kid and said in his biggest, coldest oice, Don’t e er talk to my son e er again. I told that story to my high school youth group. he ice breaker uestion was hat’s something that traumatized you as a kid I know, what a great ice breaker. ut I said that memory because you know, suddenly feeling ad because you’re now aware that your family looks di erent is mildly traumatic. 11 |
A boy snorted and asked, hat’s your most traumatic memory some kid called you hinese
hat
I didn’t go back to that youth group, e en though the youth pastor snapped, ey hite pri ilege -ecause I guess I could write a story based on the time when I was thirteen years old, a girl standing behind me in the lunch line asked if one of the only other orean American kids in our year was my brother. I guess I could write about how the other kid and I looked at each other and looked away, embarrassed to explain that no, we’re not twins. I told that story to my friends at the lunch table afterwards. ne of my friends rolled her eyes and said, I’m sure she didn’t mean it that way. ater, a friend would add,
esides, you guys do look similar.
e stopped being friends that year for lots of reasons, and I was sad, but at least I didn’t ha e to hear her tell me I was o erreacting anymore. -ecause I guess I could write a story based on the time when I was fourteen years old, the principal brought my brother into the o ce and asked if our parents beat us if we got bad grades. I guess I could write about how the principal told my brother that our parents must pay our teachers to gi e me good grades. y brother begged me not to tell my parents. I told my parents. -ecause I guess I could write a story based on the time when I was se enteen years old, the husband of one of the library employees asked me where I really came from. I guess I could write about how I had politely told him, I was born here , and I guess I could write about how he had said, ou know what I mean. I told that story to my family later. hey winced and said,
e’s ust old, you should ha e gone easy on him. -1 |
ecause I guess I could write a story based o the time when I was twenty years old, one of my fa orite professors told me that other oreans would probably not think I was ery bright if I didn’t speak the orean language. I guess I could write about how I had frozen because I wanted to tell him that actually, most of the old oreans I’ e met at church and family gatherings were delighted to hear an American born kid like me could scrape up an anyeonghasaeyeoh and a gamsamhamnida . hen I realized I couldn’t write my paper for the class because I could ust hear the words you’re not bright , I told that story to my parents. y dad cried a little when I cried. y mom did, too. ust the three of us, crying in the kitchen on that world was already going crazy.
arch day when the
-o I guess I could write about those stories. I could. -ut I didn’t, ob iously. I wrote some other stories instead. I’m writing a story right now about superheroes. I’m writing another story about a witch and a princess. I’m writing a mo ie about a little girl and a war et. I’m writing a tele ision series about two best friends adopting a kid. And all these people look like me. hich is to say, Asian. I don’t know if any of them will get anywhere. I hope they do. hat would be nice. end
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LEAVE ME ALONE! by Angela Liu
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LOSSES by Allie Smith I was born with not one, but two tongues. I don t ha e the second one anymore. he passed away. o, she died. o, she was murdered. y tongue was killed, cut right out of my mouth and slaughtered for filth. liced open and left to bleed, all her contents scraped onto the oor and left there like they were nothing. ike they were worthless. I isit her gra e e eryday when I come home, when I glance at the calendar or hear my mom talk on the phone, and sometimes I think I took her for granted. I guess I thought she d always be there. I ha e been mourning a death for nineteen years and I still don t know how to get o er it. ometimes I think she died before I e en knew her but regardless, her death is the only one that keeps me up at night, keeps me thinking. And I miss her. he was awed, and maybe she didn t fit in my mouth right all the time, but I still lo ed her.
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LEGACY by Hannah Park
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DON’T BE LIKE ME by Kenny Le As the end of my uni ersity career approaches, and I think back to the uestion for the scholarship that supported my freshmen year If you had the opportunity to ha e dinner with three people you admire, dead or ali e, who would they be and why I would be honored to ha e dinner with ruce ee and both of my grandfathers. As a kid who grew up with limited Asian American representation in my classrooms, in my city, and e en on tele ision, ruce ee was the first Asian American hero I could look up to. During unior high, people started calling me ruce ee as a nickname, because my last name is similar to his. ince then, I ha e admired ruce ee s confidence. If I could ha e a moment to con erse with r. ee, it would be about our shared Asian American identity and the di erences between his era and mine. ext, would be both of my grandfathers. I had ne er had a chance to isit either of them. hey both passed away when I was a kid. he times I did get to know more about them were ironically at the dinner table, where my parents would occasionally tell stories about growing up during a turbulent time in ietnam. Although they ha e both passed away, my grandfathers are still a part of my life. Remembering their leadership in protecting my parents during a restless time in ietnam makes me alue my cultural heritage and where my family comes from. ow in the year , li ing through the o id pandemic, I am back at home at the dinner table with both of my parents. I appreciate them a lot. owe er, undoubtedly like any twenty two year old trying to li e at their own pace, I get compared to other people my age. Despite their nagging, I still ask my parents for ad ice. I ask them how to cook our homemade beef stew along with how I can in est my finances well and they gladly share any ad ice they ha e on such topics. It took me some time to learn how to ask for help from my parents. rowing up as a second generation Asian American, it was challenging to really ask for ad ice about anything since I felt my parents were worlds apart from me in our experiences li ing in America. I grew up in America, but my parents immigrated to America. ftentimes after their long shifts of work at the dinner table, my parents said to me Don’t be like me. I belie e this was their way of sharing ad ice with me. hey made mistakes among their successes, and often compared their experiences to mine. I felt discouraged when my parents would say this to me as they put down their self worth for my confidence, howe er as I grew older when I started finding myself in leadership positions, I uickly sympathized with 17 |
them. As the older brother I had to set an example for my siblings. As a student leader, I both mentor and moti ate my peers in our Asian American student community in our uni ersity to empower oursel es with our Asian American identity while continuing to be inclusi e and educational. I also made plenty of mistakes among my own successes and I soon found myself repeating Don’t be like me to whoe er looked up to me. his phrase reminded me of both my own personal struggles and my aspirations towards those who asked for my ad ice. ith this sense of understanding, I am slowly able to communicate with my parents better and I hope to continue to learn from them as they continue to inspire me e eryday. I introduced ruce ee, and both of my grandfathers people who I looked up to, although I had ne er met them my whole life. Despite their passing, they ga e me hope from their stories and ad ice. I am optimistic that there is plenty of time for me to continue to listen to my lo ed ones ad ice, and for myself to continue to gi e ad ice. ext time when someone says Don’t be like me , I hope you can understand that they are lea ing some of their hope in you to change the circumstance you are facing into a more positi e one. incerely, enny In honor of the magazine title “Connections” I asked my friends to support me in an illustration piece that accompanies this editorial. I asked my friends to connect to someone older than them and share a piece of advice to be part of this project about inspiration and originality.
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CHINATOWN by Alison Kan
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IF THESE TONGUES COULD TALK by Anthony Liu elcome to American Accent raining ery weekend was the same my parents would sit in front of the D player for hours and parrot the o er enunciated words, rounding out the owels in barber and watermelon, in the hopes of masking their immigrant roots. ecause nglish was not their strength, I grew up in a household dominated by life sciences and mathematics. I grew up scorning nglish. I accepted that it was simply something I wasn’t good at. ath and science were my strong suits. I ma ored in iology and omputer cience. ssay writing brought dread and rereading my college applications filled me with cringe. I think I was trying to mask my heritage in neglecting the language of the culture I was raised in. ut like hen hen and cean uong allude to, there is something ugly about the nglish language. I’m not sure if writing brings me closer to acceptance or simply re eals the plain truth that I can ne er truly say what I mean to say. ut language brought me to work at a domestic iolence shelter where most women who come in sound like my parents. nglish gets stuck in their throats and they find solace in their mother tongue. I wonder if my parents still feel the same, after
years in this country.
I wonder if they’re still training their American accents.
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森林⼩丘 HOME by Sophia Wang oday, my body is at uni ersity, but my thoughts cannot help but be brought back miles away, to my neighborhood in orest ills, ew ork. It s the place where my grandparents reside, so it s the place I call home. hen I think of orest ills, I am filled with memories of strolls through soft rustling trees and chirpy birds, arm in arm with my gong gong and po po. ut today, the place that I consider to be pure sanctuary and bliss will fore er be fogged with fear that their daily walks can so uickly be filled with danger and uncertainty. If they aren t safe here, where will they be safe
A oem ritten in antonese
So
ia s on
on
隨⾏录 幼时读 "桃花源記" 叶镜明 其中的⼭明⽔秀，鸟语花⾹等詞句⼀均属幻想。知其然⽽不知其所以 然！事隔数⼗載时光，来⾄美国约纽约皇后区森林⼩丘所居⼤楼左边是⼀ 微形公园; ⾥⾯⼴裁花卉⼀，古⽊参天，整年繁花似锦。右边⼀条不⾜两 百⽶的⼩径其风景更绝妙：两旁⼴植”法国梧桐树 每棵树龄都⾜过百，其 树杆两⼈拉⼿均未能抱在其中整条⼩径都被树药覆盖，下夏⽇太阳虽烈， 但⼈在其中亦感 ⼗ 树 ⼩鸟 过不 ， 更 数。更 的是：每年 ⼀天 ⼩径的树 ⾯ 天 的均是 ⼀ 的 ！ 是 ⼀句古 ⽊⽽ 两旁 居 ⾥，每每
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在 年
裁 ！每天
花卉，⼈在其中 在”鸟语花⾹的 均 ⼀，两⼩时，感 ⼗ ！
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NEVER QUITE THE SAME by Kelly Zheng utside arrows that framed the etter coating beige and rustic brown mixed with dark orange Age ame
robably o er ath train
years
rust and old paint chipping o
ew ersey to ew ork
4th Grade: ld train grandfather took me on to hinatown. irst train I sat on as a little child after we mo ed to ew ersey. ld sectioned seats marked by inward cur es shaped where each person sat, my feet barely able to reach the oor. 6th Grade: Riding back to ew ersey, a new sight builders wore uniformed orange ests marked with metallic strips
all middle aged
white men in the area crafting a new train. ew ath logo plastered brighter & fresher sky blue paint.
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7th Grade: y feet were able to reach the ground now. I still took the ath from ersey to
.
randfather’s memories li ed in the old trains ut I lost hikes to the train when grandfather held my wrists before I crossed the street, or to the ten red plastic bags my grandfather carried back from hinatown onto the train to feed our whole family and me. hen both operations stopped, those crinkling red bags ne er felt uite as full.
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DISPOSABLE HEROES by Sienna ucu
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AT THE DIVESTMENT RALLY by Kevin Costa Part I oetry will contain all the names of the plants. And at ni ersities, poetry will still be taught as seas rise. In this way, sound will outlast the thought that mo ed it into speech. a esty will still be left when the horse is gone. If there is to be a catalogue, make it one of soaps.
a e it dissol e in the ri er wash your hands
clean, wash your hands clean like the silence of the h in hour.
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Part II rgency in e erything he hwaites lacier breaking from Antarctica, ice shel es retreating. Algae growing on the underside, is what sustains krill and whales. aribou in the Arctic looking for shoots breaking through the snowpack. he ones they don’t get to grow to cast shadows that absorb heat. en banks that lend and in est as if they were growing long stems toward the sun or drifting into frozen seas. umans, like ice, that when gone will lea e large stones on the land.
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LOOKING BACK by KC Sado ski Inside my brain, somewhere next to the hippocampus, li es a tangle of a gentle color. It perpetually oats in the concrete operational stage, so, unfortunately, it cannot engage in con ersations of social institutions or entertain wild possibilities of the imagination. appily It can and will re eal what was ote that accuracy depletes the closer you get to the it our ead n All Doorknobs ra Remember his It abs, extracting a thread A R and A R and othing ut A R. y body is warm though it is summertime after all. reathing again is nice feeling my mother’s arm is nicer. I shake the beach away. he tangle carefully tugs forward another thread It’s the first time I really saw you. he only thing keeping the moment from fizzling away, like the picture on an old , is that delicate tracing of gold around your eyes or maybe I’m romanticizing and it was ust pm. Another hat ime In iddle chool hen ou I swat that away like a spider’s web. ore After, unch, inter, how, ean, alf, er, Rag, ight, Any, In, Down hat was I doing fi e minutes ago I ask. hich fi e minutes ago It responds.
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LOOKING FORWARD by KC Sado ski I hink in that I ant in that I ope he future is a house that exists without anyone e er li ing in it. All the rooms are dark, and I don’t know the oorplan. unlight does not stream through the windows are there windows in the future to illuminate oors and dance across furniture. o long as ast is thri ing, uture will ha e a house. nly after I ha e turned on the lights, and made the beds, and stocked the fridge, will I know I ha e arri ed. erhaps I will e en write a poem about it. f course though, by that time, uture will ha e changed its address.
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ALCOTT’S USED BOOKS by Kyla en i in CHAPTER I In ortland, regon, between the illamette Ri er and Route , on the corner of nd and Duke, sits a formerly abandoned gas station once known as pace Age uel that some thirty years and thirty gallons of oli e green and alabaster white paint ago, was con erted into the shop now known as Alcott’s sed ooks. he shop owners, a young immigrant couple named r. aruah and s. hhan, share a lo e of reading. hey had spent e ery minute and e ery penny they had, designing, building, polishing, stocking, consulting, and ad ertising until they had turned the once dull, unnoticeable, fi e minute stop into a popular, ibrant, slightly out of place destination for book lo ers across the state. i e years after the opening of Alcott’s sed ooks, the shop made headlines in he regonian, much to the excitement of its owners. n the same day that they are celebrating their newsworthiness with a storewide sale and a bottle of champagne at work, a woman, rs. ng from alifornia, fi e months pregnant and acationing with her husband r. ng in ortland, is heading back toward their hotel ia nd after taking a post domestic argument dri e to clear her head. hen she first sees Alcott’s, she mistakes it for a gas station and corner store and pulls into the parking lot, hoping to grab a snack and drink and refill the gas tank before ha ing to face her husband again. hat she didn’t know, though, was she wouldn’t ha e to worry about facing him, as he was already one step ahead of her and would spend the rest of the e ening a oiding her by smoking his amel cigarettes behind the hotel until the box was empty. nce in the parking lot, she realizes that the gas pumps aren’t operational, completely plastered in paint and ines and anked by pots holding arious houseplants and large chalkboard signs reading D . urprised and intrigued, rs. ng parks her car and walks to the front of the store and, peering in through the windows, concludes that the signs do not lie. rom green wall to green wall the same green as the gas station pillars and roof, and the outline and accents of the store exterior from oor to ceiling, are rows full of bookshel es, and bookshel es full of books. oward the back of the store, she can see an opening where a bean bag, an armchair, and a rocking chair sit around a giant rug, surrounded by shorter shel es of books. robably the children’s section, she guesses. ut most wondrous of all to her is the fact that there are actually uite a few people in the store shopping and reading. he had thought that, being so well disguised, it would be rare
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for someone to stumble across the bookshop, like some enchanted landmark that only appears to those it wishes to be seen by, and disappears as uickly and une entfully as it appeared. As such, she decides that the people in the shop are not first time isitors or tourists like herself, nor e en fre uent shoppers and locals, but actors or mechanical puppets taking part in an elaborate museum exhibit for her iewing. It dawns on her that this mysterious bookshop must also ha e a name, so she steps back from the window and looks up. here her gaze is met with a slightly o center sign that reads Alcott’s sed ooks. hat name is the final detail needed to push her and her delighted curiosity through the front door, and any thought of her husband waiting back at their hotel out of her head. he ding a la ding of the bell and subse uent turning of a couple heads toward the door announces her arri al. ther than that, nothing in the store changes, the light buzz of con ersation and the customers’ silent reading carrying on without interruption. or some reason, she expected a more in iting and exciting welcome. ut she brushes it o , remembering she is in a reality without enchanted things, and walks toward the fiction section along the left wall. As she steps into the row and shrinks below the magnitude of the shel es of books towering on either side of her, she sees a woman standing in front of the shelf marked A, reading a book. he notices this woman for a couple reasons one being that she is also pregnant and two, the book she is reading is ittle omen by ouisa ay Alcott. his woman is none other than the co owner of Alcott’s sed ooks, s. hhan, but rs. ng does not yet know this when she approaches and says hat’s one of my fa orite books. s. hhan lifts her head and smiles. Really e, too. he shuts the book and places it back on the shelf, then gently pats her stomach. I’m naming my baby after one of the main characters actually. rs. ng raises her eyebrows in disbelief. aughing, s. hhan says, you naming yours after
ou’re kidding. o am I.
o way, what are the chances
aurie, of course. ou’re oking.
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ho are
I’m not. I’m naming mine after o. he two half gasp and half s ueal, eyes and smiles wide, and suddenly, instinctually, grasp hands, as if they’ e ust realized they’re lifelong friends who forgot for a minute who the other was. In fact, they might as well ha e been. here’s not much more any two people could ha e in common than being two pregnant women in the same bookstore naming their children after best friends from their same fa orite book. he two of them, rs. ng ha ing forgotten her enthusiasm for the newfound book shop, and s. hhan ha ing forgotten her book shop, sit and talk on the oor by the A’s in the fiction aisle until . . closing time, at which point all other customers ha e long since filed out. rs. ng learns that s. hhan had grown up in ambodia, where she met r. aruah when they were both in their twenties and he was tra eling from engali. here, the two of them had eloped and mo ed to the . . together, where they spent a few years in acoma, ashington before mo ing to ortland. ow, she and her husband ha e owned Alcott’s sed ooks for fi e years thus far, and ha e indeed named the place for s. hhan’s fa orite author. s. hhan learns that rs. ng is from an ose, alifornia, where she had grown up with her mother, four siblings, and se eral aunts and uncles, of whom she had always been unable to distinguish between blood relations and family friends. Although, of course it didn t matter because they were all ietnamese and that was as much of a family as they could e er hope to ha e. s. ng met r. ng through her Aunty inh, and is now in an unhappy marriage with him and on acation right now to sa e said marriage. hey both lack sorely in friends, kept busy by their husband’s ob in the case of s. hhan, and pregnancies, and reading books in replacement of a social life. o it is, in fact, a disappointment to them when they realize it has grown dark outside, and s. hhan needs to close up shop, and rs. ng needs to head back to the hotel, although she correctly guesses that her husband has likely not been missing her. Reluctantly they stand up and make their way back to the front of the store, where they exchange phone numbers, hugs, and goodbyes. rs. ng, on the dri e back to the hotel, and on the plane ride home, and while in labor, and during her di orce, and at almost e ery other moment would remember the co owner’s final plea and in itation If you’re e er in town again no, when you’re in town again, because I refuse to belie e this will be our last time seeing each other please stop by, I’d lo e to see you. I know you’d find yourself feeling right at home here. And she would hold her to that, hold this promise close to her heart.
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BAY AREA by Jamie oh
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RULES TO THE GAME by Hyo oo Juliana An In this game, no letter in a word will be softened. There will be no silencing of a “t” or softening of a “p”. In “listen”, you will pronounce the “t” to be heard as “lisT-en” not “lis-en”. In “spaghetti”, you will voice the “p” and accent the “t”. It will not be pronounced as “spuh-geh-he” but as “s-Pah-gae-tee”. No “p” or “t” will be assimilated into the surrounding consonants. All will be pronounced, never silenced. There are rules to this game. You must know that correct pronunciation is the password to English, an identification tag to access the right to belong. So in this game, you will not signal loyalty to English. Every letter will be sound. i like that i don’t sound white. there’s no crisp emphasis to my words. there’s no curled Rs or silent s. there’s no appeal. i like that i rely on my ummsss and made up words to my presence until the next words come to me. i like that i stu tte rrrrrr and bu... er to my presence until the next words come to me.
hold break
i like that my tongue slips out 지금 몇 시야 to llie and Ale andra and Rachel. i like that my tongue lets out to 유현 and 솔비 and 효경. i like that my tongue holds no citizenship. no borders. no isas or ight tickets to separate families. i like that it doesn’t sense law. lets loose to whate er language of the land it belongs to.
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i don’t like that my tongue performs to whiteness professionalism, fakeness. but I like that it knows the taste of being in my 엄마’ kitchen, the fermented spicy kick of side dishes, the faint sip of ancho y stock. i like that I don’t know words like disparage because fuck diction, only money can gi e you that. my tongue is not bound to the words I can a ord in an nglish dictionary. i like that I’m not praised as elo uent or articulate. but definitely immigrant. definitely lost. lost of confidence. lost in anxiety. lost in thought... i like that it belie es in itself to hold alues of thought in l i e d experiences than craft, than theory, than obser ance. i like that it finds healing comfort in the words of orean poets. i like that it treasures friendship to tears in second, third generation friends. but definite and lonesome in its presence as first to figure out my worth is not tied to false security business degrees, nglish uency. my tongue knows 대전 to A oreatown, white suburbs to college towns. it tasted tears of distance in search of home but ne er home. my tongue knows the taste of guilt for the tears of 엄마 and 아빠 for where will they lie at the end they too are ne er home. i like that my tongue is sacred only to me. i am writing this for me not for white critics
not for white standards
not for white institutions
not for white aspirations
not for normal imagination i am writing this for my 엄마 and 아빠 who do not understand the nglish words i write or the translations i o er but belie e in my alue on this land despite.
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37 | CONNEC ON
BRIDGES by oo Ra Sung n June 25,
5 , u gi oh broke out.
n June 26, 5 , o er unarmed orean women and children refugees were massacred by the members of the American th a alry Regiment as they attempted to cross the o geun ri railroad bridge and reach safety. n June 2 , 5 , the outh orean army destroyed the an gang bridge to delay the rapidly ad ancing orth orean troops, and in the process, pre ented thousands of people from being able to lea e eoul and escape the ensuing iolence. n Ju y 27, 5 , u gi oh ended, the th parallel was drawn, and the ridge of o Return became the singular passageway connecting the now di ided orean peninsula for the purpose of exchanging prisoners of war. 돌아올 nce you chose to cross, you could ne er return to the other side again. In , my parents emigrated to a foreign country to escape the systemic ine ualities and pressures created by a post war society focused on success and material wealth. ife was unsustainable in a country riddled with corrupt politics and po erty. hey built a bridge to escape to the nited tates, and did not look back. I was when I left the place I call home. I ha e only isited twice since. y parents named me , and chose to not gi e me an nglish name. our name sounds prettier than any of those American girls, my mom reassured me. I was sent to orean school on aturdays to learn how to read and write the language of my people, and I brought han-bok to school on show and tell days. I was ne er ashamed of who I was or where I came from, no matter how many people mispronounced my name. y name, designed as a essel of courage and strength, holds the power of my ancestors, and reminds me of the dash bridging my two identities orean and American. At years old, I watched as my handicapped, immigrant father struggled to find words in a language he had not been taught how to speak. e was trying to defend himself to a policeman who denied his disability and denied his place in American society. ilent tears dripped down my face as I witnessed my dad being mocked. rom then on, I was no longer a child, I was a translator, interpreter, and guardian for my soft hearted, fragile parents. I laid the bridge between an unfamiliar world and my 엄마 and 아빠. 38 |
ifteen years after I first left orea, I returned to my homeland and was immediately embraced by the many and I did not know I had. I was fed heaping plates of food by my , and for the first time, felt like I was home. I breathed in the distinctly polluted air of eoul, wandered the streets of amdaemun arket, and ibrated with the excitement of being surrounded by people who looked, spoke, and thought like me. It was as if all this time, I was a saltwater fish swimming in a freshwater lake, and I had finally found the ri er that led out to the ocean. I was enamored by the beauty and e ciency of orea, and was drawn to the bridges which connected metro lines and cities and people. I wished there was a bridge across the acific cean which could connect orea to the nited tates. After returning to the , I immediately yearned to return to orea. I was home but I also wasn’t. I ha e jeong for the people and places and memories which tie my heart to awaii, but I also ha e han for the life I imagine I would ha e had, if my family had stayed in orea. I found a way to bridge the gap between my jeong and han in learning about imperialist American structures and gendered transnational politics in orea. I read the works of race ho and i eon uh and atharine oon and rystal un hye aik, orean American women scholars who attempt to dismantle estern centric narrati es and reckon with intergenerational trauma. I disco ered newspaper clippings and unrecorded narrati es attesting to the iolence in icted against orean women in the aftermath of the war. I began writing my own story through academic research, unearthing lost memories of my family to form an answer to the uestion I had been asking myself my entire life hy did I ha e to lea e y words, written in a language foreign to oreans, yet now more familiar than orean to myself, tell the story of a multigenerational family. hey bridge the past to the present, and connect me to my mother, grandmother, grandaunt, and all the strong, independent orean women who came before them. r d es are sturdy, reliable structures. hey hold the weight of cars and trains, creating paths across water and through mountains. r d es are in isible, intertwined connections between people. eople with eong and han and e ery indescribably intense emotion in between. r d es are lifelines and support buoys keeping people a oat in the unpredictability of our chaotic world and the uncertainty of the future. r d es are a reminder that I am a descendant of sur i ors.
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RECLAIMING LOST DREAMS by oo Ra Sung In February of 2020, right before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, I happened to take a personal trip to Los Angeles, where I interviewed my maternal grandaunt, Hyun Woo, for a final project assignment in my class, HIST 184B: Legacies of the Korean War. My grandaunt told me stories of a time and place I had never experienced myself, but strongly identified with. I listened to her talk for more than three hours, intently and patiently, as her words flowed ceaselessly. I carried her stories with me from Los Angeles, back to Boston, determined to memorialize her experiences and struggles, and to illuminate the trauma of countless Korean women whose stories have been forgotten. The following is an excerpt from my thesis paper for the Jerome A. Schi Undegraduate esearch Fellowship entitled, “ eclaiming Lost Dreams: Uncovering Intergenerational Trauma in Korean and Korean American Women Through Oral History Methodology.” Dreams act as both a manifestation of past traumas and a bridge of hope into the future. hey remind us of where we come from and where we are going. In retelling and illuminating the struggles of yun oo, yun in, and im i ook, my inter iew sub ects, I hope that my work can relie e some pressure and create breathing room within the silences that ha e su ocated generations of oreans. hile nothing can re erse time to undo traumatic experiences, facing and confronting the unspoken memories that a ect the way we li e allows us to mo e forward. In doing so, members of the orean diaspora, including myself, can recognize that the most potent way to speak back against old ar conditions of power, is to reclaim both the dreams that continue to haunt our past, and the dreams we ha e for the future. he narrati es of these women, which would ha e gone untold if not for this pro ect, are proof of the power that stories hold. y hope is that this pro ect does not end with my paper. tories of the past are only e ecti e in changing future history to the extent that they are told, retold, remembered, and recorded. y reclaiming the lost dreams of my family’s past, re ecting on my own dreams, and dreaming of a better future for myself and the orean diaspora, I ha e written this paper pro iding a glance into the complexities of a post war orean society. owe er, this narrati e is only the beginning of unearthing the past. here are still many more stories to be disco ered and rewritten.
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PARTS OF THE WHOLE by Amanda Lui hat are they he car salesman asks my parents and they reply. Reply with a aded tongue that had answered so many times before. Answered for the woman at the park as I limbed o er rope barriers blind to their searching eyes. Assured the cashier scanning items, es, she is mine. o, I am not her nanny. An unbalanced transactional purchase, eddling curiosity for self righteous alidation, nable, no, unwilling to notice the damage wreaked. yes drag up and down my body, erifying my parent s truth. mooth slick stares. he eyes are hinese. he cheeks are exican. rocessing and labeling each part of me, ecause separate makes sense, is Acceptably roken down ultures. A eautiful ombination.
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EL FRUTO DE MIS MADRES by Ale andra onilla
soy morena, tengo ojos cafés como la tierra, mi pelo es chino y enorme, mi paladar le encanta todo lo picoso y sabroso, hablo el lenguaje de mi madre, pero no el de nuestras madres ancestrales, mis raíces están unidas a las de mi madre, y las de ella a las de su madre. tengo su carácter, fuerte, sentimental y feliz. sue o regresar a mi tierra ancestral un día y llenarme de ella. soy Alejandra Tinoco Bonilla y soy hija de Mayra Bonilla. mi madre es mi padre y madre. soy titulada universitaria. soy abogada de mi familia, de pachamama, de los derechos humanos. tengo el honor de disfrutar de los sacrificios de las mujeres en mi linaje. soy el fruto de su dolor. soy Alejandra Bonilla.
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TWISTED IN WOOL by Soomin Ahn It’s been fifteen years since I first came to the nited tates. ea ing my home in outh orea, I came with my parents, my brother, and most importantly, my maternal grandmother halmonie. y halmonie could not stay permanently with us, but she would isit us often. y halmonie is a fantastic teacher. he taught me to read orean in my uncle’s house in the small town of anton, assachusetts, she taught me how to write my name in orean at a tiny corner desk, and she fostered a lo e for dramatic dramas in my four year old heart as well as the time honored tradition of chastising the characters on screen . he was, and still is, the definition of orea to me, and thus the skills she left me with became my oreanness. A few years after we had settled, though, my halmonie’s isits became more and more infre uent with changing isa regulations, tra el fares, and long tra els becoming harsher and harsher on her body. ach time she would still lea e me with pieces of history, with stories and crochet hooks arming her for hours, entertaining an energetic granddaughter. y halmonie taught me to calm down in the process of folding paper into birds, show my lo e in sewing pillows for my dolls, be patient enough to crochet and knit much too long scar es since before I was ten. e communicated what we were creating since then ia the expanding technology of Internet phones when she was back home. hen smartphones became popular, we sent each other pictures of what we had knit up, what we had created, across the planet. his halted a few times I had gotten distracted from this craft with preparations for college, a wrist surgery, and modern technology, but my halmonie was always there, creating in the ancient ways of wea ing patience into garment. hen ID hit and it was clear we would not see each other for a long time, I began knitting again. ours spent by my laptop learning and re learning techni ues bled into days and weeks and months, and I finished my first sweater, each stitch knit with the history and stories of my halmonie wo en into the ery fibers of the yarn. ery time I unra eled that sweater to re knit faulty stitches became a time not lost, but gained,
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as I re knit the patience re uired to fashion a garment back into my hands the lost art of halmonie’s all around. In this time of forced stagnation, I knit to remember that slowness does not mean there is no progress. I knit to remember the lo e it takes to create a garment in a culture that worships fast fashion. And I knit to remember my halmonie, creating across the planet, as the wool in my hands ties me to my oreanness. A sweater (designed by PetiteKnit) I am knitting (left) and a sweater my halmonie, sent from Korea (right)
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YEAR OF THE RAT by Carter ee
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FLUSHING, 2019 by Janice Huang pm is a haze, alking beside my father, his hands are sullen and weary like they are ust barely gripping to life. e en the children waiting for their next steaming bao Dumpling folds kiss a woman’s red hi ab. rancing into street corners et a ame by blinding hair salon lights I am estranged from you, as you talk about deli ering piles of mail to homes in the suburbs ut you could ne er write me a letter. Instead, you grumble speedily he dialect ying o your tongue ike broken glass pieces separated by miles and miles of empty road. ou’ e left me alone to piece them together. And then, when I gaze toward you ou say nothing. he silence is disrupted by chiming bells hey signal the end of morning. arkets greet us with tumbling oranges onto wooden frames And parsley snapping into red baskets.
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THE HANDMAIDEN by Angela Liu
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ARE YOU SATISFIED? by Hannah Park
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ALMOST YOU by Zeline ricia artolome ou, but lighter. ou but straight. ou but ust a piece you picked apart to be seen in the scenes with no space in between, no pride to be claimed, no o erlap to embrace, no ueer brown Asian woman, no intersection, no you but a frac tured piece of someone new.
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SELF PORTRAIT by Angela Liu
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BAASA HAIKUS by AASA board his spread is dedicated to AA A eboard’s commitment to our weekly meetings. ery unday at pm, we gathered together on oom to coordinate e ents and check in with each other. embers who arri ed late would pay a fine to a bonding fund in pre ious years. ut being irtual this year, we decided to ask our members to write a aiku poem. ere are excerpts from a collection of small moments Heather Choe 2 7 2 lasses ha e started I am so so sad cry cry h no oh oh no E ayne Chen 2 7 2 oday was dumb cold ut I saw a huge doggo tay safe AA A fam Gon 2 2 2 I lo e AA A fam an’t wait for A A in hank you e eryone
arch
a oun ee 2 2 2 ey iz you’re aging oon your bones will start cracking ut you’ll still look great Chr st ne e 72 oom makes me angry ut the good thing is that I ate lots of sushi E e Tan e an 72 oo makes me kimchi ried rice to nourish my soul. o e her fore er
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tan ey o 42 o how s e eryone doing today Are you guys doing alright o, you re all left. T na 2 2 are for a classmate e indinicer the reat ate can be erased Carter ee 2 2 resh rolls and friendship made me late for the meeting it was all worth it R chard T an 2 2 ishop to cholar’s mate in about two, ou are dogwater. e y hen 2 2 trawberry calmness hill my body with sweetness athe chocolate lo e Ho e hou 4 2 A cool summer treat. Red explodes between my teeth. atermelon please Char es Cu ata 4 2 et us eat sushi ith all our AA A friends In the near future Er c J an 4 2 I lo e beef noodles y mom cooks them really well Dang, I’m homesick now
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BAASA PLAYLIST by llie ang Kleiman
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Richard ian
EXCERPTS FROM EASTERN TIDE cerpt rom all
ssue
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cerpt rom Spring
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ssue
cerpt rom all
ssue
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cerpt rom all
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ssue
SUBMISSION W I
S
IS S
Thank you to all of our wonderful writers and artists who submitted their work for publication in the first edition of Connections oomin Ahn ’ yo oo uliana An ’ eline ricia artolome ’ ienna ucu ’ Ale andra onilla ’ e in osta ’ yla
en i n ’
anice uang ’ Alison an ’ enny e ’
ass owell
Angela iu ’ Anthony iu ’ Amanda ui ’ amie oh ’ aroline
erkeley ’
annah ark ’ adowski ’ Allie mith ’ a ita undaram ’ oo Ra ung ’ Rachel
ang ’
arter ee ’ elly heng ’
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