VOL 35 NO 47 | NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

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VOL 35 NO 47 NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016 FREE 34 YEARS YOUR VOICE

Trump presidency stokes fears within APIA community

By Stacy Nguyen NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY On Sunday, Nov. 13, President-elect Donald Trump chose Stephen Bannon, executive chairman of Breitbart News, as his senior counselor and chief West Wing see TRUMP on 11

Illustration by Stacy Nguyen/NWAW

Seattle mayor vows that immigrants are welcome

Mayor Ed Murray

By Chris Grygiel ASSOCIATED PRESS SEATTLE (AP) — On Nov. 9, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray said the country had elected a leader who has “demonstrated outright misogyny” and displayed “racism and authoritarian tendencies.”

Speaking at a news conference at City Hall that day, Murray said despite the views held by President-elect Donald Trump, Seattle would remain a welcoming city for immigrants, minorities, and others. He said Seattle would continue to be a “sanctuary city” that would shelter illegal immigrants, even if it meant losing federal funding.

He said Seattle was committed to building and growing its relationship with the government of Mexico.

While Trump won a majority of electoral votes, he lost Washington state. And voters in King County, see MURRAY on 13

New Congress: Minorities gain but still overwhelmingly white

By Matthew Daly ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON (AP) — Just like college freshmen, newly elected members of the House descended on Washington last Monday for a week of orientation, a class photo and a lottery to determine their offices for the next two years.

The new Congress includes the first Latina senator, three House members moving across the Capitol to the Senate and a few former lawmakers who seized their old jobs back.

While the 115th Congress will include a record number of minority women, Congress will

remain overwhelmingly white, male, and middle-aged.

At the first day of orientation, Republicans expressed excitement about winning the White House while Democrats struck a conciliatory tone.

Vicente Gonzalez, a Democrat who will represent a South Texas district, said freshmen members of his party will start the new session in January “having a clear view of the reality we’re dealing with and trying to reach across the aisle and finding common ground.”

A look at the new Congress:

Minority women

In the Senate, Democrats

Catherine Cortez Masto

Kamala Harris

Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Kamala Harris of California and Tammy Duckworth of Illinois are among a record 21 women, up from 20 out of 100 senators.

Cortez Masto will be the first Latina senator, while Harris and Duckworth will join Hawaii

Young couple on how DIY influenced their business and their relationship

By Nina Huang NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

Photo provided by Hudson House

Jessica Louie and her fiancé Alex Vo bought what they call the Hudson House in the winter of 2015, and that’s when their home restoration journey began.

Their home in Columbia City is almost 100 years old, and there was a lot of work to do, as it had changed ownership many times in its life, which, according to Louie’s website, “resulted in an interior and exterior clash of the decades.”

In fact, Louie quit her dream job of being a fashion designer to restore their house and start her own company, Hudson Louie, which is a home goods see DIY on 15 Before and after shots of a Columbia City house that Jessica Louie and Alex Vo are restoring

■

Tammy Duckworth

Democratic Sen. Mazie Hirono to form the Senate’s largest ever Asian American contingent.

Harris, the daughter of immigrants from India and Jamaica, is just the second Black woman elected to the Senate and the first see CONGRESS on 11

WAYNE’S WORLDS Humor columnist on how he was tricked into volunteering — and how volunteering led him to his wife. » see 7

TOP CONTRIBUTORS Long-time community leaders Kim Pham and Chung-hyung Lee talk about making an impact. » see 8–9

PUBLISHER’S BLOG How an organization helps Vietnamese heal from pains of war, through de-mining » see 10

COMMUNITY » 2 CALENDAR » 6 SUDOKU » 6 ASTROLOGY » 15

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northwest

34 YEARS

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

■ NAMES IN THE NEWS A new book, “Masao: A Nisei Soldier’s Secret and Heroic Role in World War II,” was released in September.

The biographical account of Masao Abe, a Seattle resident for more than 50 years, was narrated by the former soldier himself about his secret role in World War II. Masao was deployed to the South Pacific, where he fought on the ground, on the front line, in three battles earning a Bronze “Masao: A Nisei Soldier’s Secret and Star and a Purple Heart. Heroic Role in World War II” Masao’s memories illuminates a piece of American history that has been hidden for over 70 years.

Author Sandra Vea will talk about her book, along with Masao’s youngest son, Allen Abe of Seattle, at the Japanese Cultural & Community Center of Washington (JCCCW) on Nov. 19. 

National Trailblazer Award goes to Justice Mary Yu

The National Asian Pacific American Bar Association (NAPABA) selected Washington Supreme Court Justice Mary Yu to receive NAPABA’s highest honor — the Daniel K. Inouye Trailblazer Award. This award recognizes the outstanding achievements, commitment, and leadership of lawyers who have paved the way for the advancement of other Asian Pacific Justice Mary Yu American attorneys.

The awards were presented on Nov. 4 at a special ceremony during the 2016 NAPABA Convention in San Diego.

Yu was appointed to the Washington Supreme Court in 2014, and subsequently elected for the remainder of a twoyear term. She recently won in the Nov. 8 election for a full six-year term. The daughter of immigrant parents, Yu is the first in her family to receive a college education, as well as the first Latina, the first Asian, and the first member of the LGBTQ community to serve on the Washington Supreme Court. 

Timothy Hsia wins Royal Canadian Mint competition From left: Diane Sugimura, Mami Hara, and John Okamoto.

Photo provided by Timothy Hsia

Bio of WWII Nisei soldier now out

Photo by Assunta Ng/NWAW

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director of Seattle Public Utilities.

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, who pushed for the event, gave some brief remarks.

Diane Sugimura and John Okamoto organized the reception at the Nagomi Tea House. 

NAAAP-Seattle awards scholarships

Photo by Katie Lai/AWAKE

asianweekly

From left: David Hsia, Stephen Hsia, Timothy Hsia, Linlin Hsia, and Grace Hsia.

Timothy Hsia was one of the winners of the Royal Canadian Mint’s 2017 circulation coin series design contest.

Hsia and his brother Stephen worked on the design together. Their mother is a University of Washington graduate and their aunt and uncle are owners of the China Harbor Restaurant in Seattle.

The Mint revealed the winners to the public on Nov. 2.

The brothers’ design, which depicts the Northern Lights, will adorn Canada’s two-dollar coins — the toonie — next spring to celebrate Canada’s 150th anniversary. 

Welcome for Mami Hara

The Asian Pacific Islander community held a welcome reception on Nov. 4 for Mami Hara, newly confirmed

Scholarship Chair, Brian Nguyen poses with scholarship winners Karishama Vahora, Linh Tran, Makenzie Kinsella and Kristin Tan.

On Nov. 5 at Motif Seattle, the National Association of Asian American Professionals (NAAAP)-Seattle Chapter held its 37th annual gala and awarded four Future Leaders Scholarship Awards each valued at $1000.

The Future Leaders Scholarship fund recognizes students who have demonstrated leadership in the community. The venue was decked out in James Bond theme and the slogan was Mission Possible: Agents of Change. This gala serves as a fundraiser for future scholarships. 

YOUR VOICE

■ BRIEFLY

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

asianweekly northwest

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Asian Thanksgiving food drive kicks off in ID, soliciting donations through Dec. 23

Photo by John Liu/NWAW

Hing Hay Coworks, a nonprofit community gathering and work space in the Chinatown/ID hosted a food drive and kickoff dinner celebration at Tai Tung Restaurant on Nov. 12. Fifty people were in attendance at the event. The food drive benefits the Asian Counseling and Referral Service (ACRS) Food Bank and runs through Dec. 23.

The ACRS Food Bank partners with Northwest Harvest to serve more than 1 million pounds of food to families in King County a year. About 5,600 people use the ACRS Food Bank and the majority are seniors and children. The Food Bank hands out rice on Wednesdays and Fridays.

The ACRS Food Bank is the only provider in the state that regularly offers foods that meet Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) dietary needs. Rice and noodles

are staples — preferred protein and pantry items include canned tuna, salmon, chicken, mackerel, mung/red beans, soy sauce, seaweed, and cooking oil. In 2015, nearly 70 percent were seniors are over 65 and children under 18.

Food items can be donated at the following locations in the Chinatown/ID and Seattle: – Hing Hay Coworks — 409 Maynard Ave S – Eastern Cafe — 510 Maynard Ave S – Asian Counseling and Referral Service (ACRS) — 3639 MLK Jr Way S – Tai Tung Restaurant — 655 S King Street St – Wann Yen U. District — 1313 NE 43rd St  Direct donations can also be made at acrs.org/contribute.

Mayor Ed Murray seeks new member for International Special Review District Board Mayor Edward Murray invites community members to apply for an open position on the International Special Review District (ISRD) Board. The seven-member ISRD Board reviews façade alterations, signs, new construction, changes of use, and street improvements, and makes recommendations to the Seattle Department of Neighborhoods director for all properties within the ISRD. The goals of the board are to maintain architectural character, cultural heritage, social diversity, and through the use of historic preservation, enhance the economic climate in the ISRD. The open position is one of two seats on the board that are filled by mayoral appointment. Individuals who have

an architectural background and an interest in historic preservation and/or familiarity with the Chinatown/ International District are encouraged to apply.

Board meetings are held on the second and fourth Tuesdays of each month at 4:30 p.m. for one to three hours.

In addition, board members may be asked to serve on an additional committee as the board deems appropriate. In general, board members must commit approximately five to six hours per month to board business.

Interested applicants must be Seattle residents. Board members serve without compensation. Those interested in being considered should send a letter of interest and resume by Nov. 30. Electronic submissions are preferred,

if possible.

Please email cover letters and resumes to rebecca. frestedt@seattle.gov (reference the International Special Review District in the subject line).

To submit a paper copy, please address: Rebecca Frestedt International Special Review District Seattle Department of Neighborhoods P.O. Box 94649 Seattle, WA, 98124-4649  For more information, contact Rebecca Frestedt at 206-684-0226.

asianweekly northwest

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

34 YEARS

■ NATIONAL NEWS

Black families encouraged to buy homes with Chinese drywall

By Christopher O’Donnell TAMPA BAY TIMES

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Sulfurous fumes seep from the walls of Valentine Hendrix’s home, slowly attacking her appliances and light fixtures, her lungs and sinuses.

It’s been that way for almost nine years.

In 2008, Hendrix’s family was one of 12 poor Black families encouraged by the Tampa Housing Authority to become first-time home buyers in east Tampa. With down payment help from federal and city grants, they took out mortgages for new homes that cost up to $175,000.

But the homes were built with tainted Chinese drywall, the same material that marred an estimated 100,000 U.S. homes built during last decade’s boom and bust. Within months, light fixtures and wall sockets stopped working.

Air-conditioning units kept breaking down.

The toll was human, too, with residents complaining of headaches, rashes, nosebleeds, and breathing difficulties.

After the problems came to light, the developer and the Housing Authority argued over who was responsible. They still disagree today. Meanwhile, a class-action lawsuit against the Chinese drywall manufacturer has stalled.

With no help in sight, eight of the 12 families eventually

walked away from their homes, their credit ratings ruined.

The rest remain, stuck making hefty mortgage payments on virtually worthless homes, still fearing for their health and future.

Hendrix, 51, is one of them, working two jobs to afford her $800 monthly payment.

She still owes $79,000 on her two-bedroom bungalow.

The home is valued at just $6,000.

But she won’t give up on the place where her grandchildren learned to walk and where she wants to bring her 90-yearold mother to live out her days.

So Hendrix stays, living without air conditioning, without a working stove, without hope that things will get better.

“Sometimes I cry. I got to work. I got to keep paying this mortgage, paying these bills,” she said. “This is what

■ COMMUNITY NEWS

RVC hiring part-time capacity-building coach Rainier Valley Corps (RVC), which promotes social justice by developing leaders of color, strengthening organizations led by communities of color, and fostering collaborations between diverse communities, is looking for a capacity-building coach to join its team.

The position is a 30-hour per week job and part of its responsibilities includes providing culturally responsive, customized executive coaching to the leaders of

RVC’s 10 community-based organization (CBO) partners.

According to RVC’s website: “We believe that by developing strong leaders of color and placing them to work in grassroots CBOs, providing holistic capacity building support such as coaching and back-office support, and creating opportunities for communities to work in collaboration, there will be strengthened capacity among grassroots organizations. This

see DRYWALL on 12

■ SPORTS

model allows CBOs to better serve their communities and work together to change inequitable policies and practices to create a better, more just society.”

RVC will begin scheduling phone interviews on Dec. 12. The organizes plans to have this position launched by late January. 

Growth is good, but Asian soccer still has grassroots issue

For more information or to apply, visit rainiervalleycorps.org.

By John Duerden ASSOCIATED PRESS

Want to become a fan on Facebook or follow us on Twitter?

Visit nwasianweekly.com.

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — For all the new investment and advancements driving unprecedented growth in Asian football, it’s an old problem that is still causing concern at the grassroots.

Billions have been invested in Super Leagues in China and India, the 2022 World Cup is coming to Qatar, and the flow of players to Europe is on the rise, giving Asia some prominence in the global game, but regional soccer administrators are still grappling with match-fixing.

The good news is, they’re fighting it.

On Nov. 7, the Asian Football Confederation suspended four players from the Laos national team on suspicion of match manipulation. All four were involved in Laos’ opening game against Sri Lanka at the inaugural Solidarity Cup, for the lower-ranked teams in the continent.

Steve Darby is a former head coach of Laos — he was in charge during its failed qualifying run for the 2018 World Cup — and said he was shocked and angered by the news. Two of the four accused were on his team.

“They trained well and always gave 100 percent in matches. I trusted them,” Darby told The Associated Press. “One of the others I dropped from the squad, but that was for form and nothing else.” see SOCCER on 14

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

YOUR VOICE

asianweekly northwest

■ WORLD NEWS Cambodian opposition chief found guilty over Facebook claim

By Sopheng Cheang ASSOCIATED PRESS PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — Last week on Nov. 8, a Cambodian court found the country’s exiled opposition leader guilty of defamation for alleging that a senior government official sought to inflate Prime Minister Hun Sen’s online popularity by buying “likes” for his Facebook page.

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court found Sam Rainsy, president of the Cambodia National Rescue Party, guilty and ordered him to pay a fine of 10 million riel ($2,500), in addition to 15 million riel ($3,750) in compensation to Sam Soeun, a senior official assigned to oversee Hun Sen’s Facebook page.

Hun Sen has a very active online presence, and his opponents likewise use the internet to mobilize supporters.

The rivalry between Hun Sen and Sam Rainsy evolved into a “Facebook war,” with each seeking to claim a greater number of “likes.”

At the height of their battling in March, the Phnom Penh Post published its finding that most of Hun Sen’s “likes” originated from abroad, raising suspicions Prime Minister Hun Sen about their legitimacy. Currently, Hun Sen’s page has 6.1 million “likes,” and Sam Rainsy’s has 3.3 million.

Cambodia’s courts are widely seen as being under the influence of Hun Sen’s government and his ruling Cambodian People’s Party.

The conviction is the latest in a series of cases against

5

opposition leaders in what is generally seen as an attempt to disrupt their organizing efforts ahead of local elections next June. The next general election is not until the middle of 2018, but holding power at the local level is an advantage when national polls are held.

Sam Rainsy is the most prominent target of these prosecutions, and has been in exile since last November to avoid a jail term on a conviction that he had thought was covered by a royal pardon. There are several other cases pending against him, at least two involving online postings. The government this month banned his re-entry from abroad, making it more difficult for him to fight the charges even if he chooses to return.

Deputy party leader Kem Sokha has also been tied up in legal knots after a well-orchestrated scandal involving see CAMBODIA on 12

S. Korea prosecutors Chinese e-shoppers want to question spend billions on president over scandal quirky Singles Day

By Hyung-jin Kim ASSOCIATED PRESS

By Joe McDonald ASSOCIATED PRESS

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korean prosecutors want to question President Park Geun-hye this week over suspicion that she let a shadowy longtime confidante manipulate power from behind the scenes, an official said Sunday, Nov. 13.

It would be the first time that a sitting South Korean president has been questioned by prosecutors. The explosive scandal is the most serious challenge for Park, whose public apologies have done little to calm public anger.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigation was underway, said prosecutors conveyed their position to Park’s office and were awaiting a response.

The president’s office said it needs time to review when and how Park should be investigated.

In addition to allegedly manipulating power, the president’s confidante, Choi Soon-sil, the daughter of a late cult leader who emerged as Park’s mentor in the 1970s, is also suspected of exploiting her presidential ties to bully companies into donating tens of millions of dollars to foundations she controlled.

Choi was formally arrested on Nov. 3 on charges of fraud and abuse of power.

Prosecutors have until Nov. 20 to formally charge her.

On Nov. 12, hundreds of thousands of people flooded Seoul’s streets to demand Park’s resignation in what may be South Korea’s largest protest since it shook off dictatorship three decades ago.

In an attempt to stabilize the situation, Park has said that she would let the opposition-controlled parliament choose her prime minister. But opposition parties say her words are meaningless without specific promises about transferring much of her presidential powers to a new No. 2.

Under South Korean law, a sitting president has immunity from prosecution except in cases of treason, but many scholars say a president can still face

BEIJING (AP) — In a bright spot for China’s cooling economy, online shoppers spent billions of dollars Nov. 11 on “Singles Day,” a quirky holiday that has grown into the world’s busiest day for e-commerce.

The country’s biggest e-commerce brand, Alibaba Group, said sales by the thousands of retailers on its platforms passed 91.2 billion yuan ($13.4 billion) in the first 15 hours of the event. That is four times the $3 billion research firm comScore says Americans spent in total last year on Cyber Monday, the country’s biggest online shopping day.

Rivals including JD.com, VIP.com, and Suning offered deep discounts on clothing, smartphones, travel packages, and other

President Park Geun-hye

investigation.

Park has 15 months left in her term. If she steps down before the end of it, an election must be held within 60 days. 

goods to attract shoppers.

JD.com, the country’s biggest online direct retailer and Alibaba’s top rival, said it tested delivery by drone to customers in four rural areas in what the company believed to be the first commercial use of see SINGLES DAY on 13

asianweekly northwest

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

34 YEARS

■ COMMUNITY CALENDAR NOV. 17

SMALL BUSINESS WORKSHOP FOR NEW MINORITY, REFUGEE, AND IMMIGRANT BUSINESSES Nagomi Tea House, 519 Sixth Ave. S., Seattle 5:30–7:30 p.m.

RSVP to staff@tabor100.org, 425-881-8768 HAPPY HOUR FOOD WALK Seattle’s Chinatown International District 4–7 p.m. cidbia.org SEATTLE STARTUP WEEK REAL TALK: DIVERSITY AMONG ASIANS IN TECH Hing Hay Coworks, 409B Maynard Ave. S., Seattle 5:30–7 p.m. seattlestartupweek2016.sched.org NOVEMBER MAHJONG NIGHT! Kin On Community Health Care, 4416 S. Brandon St., Seattle 7:15–9:15 p.m. kinon.ejoinme.org YOUNG PROFESSIONALS NETWORK EVENT General Assembly, Seattle Tower, Third Floor, 1218 3rd Ave., Seattle 5:30–7:30 p.m. $20–$25 206-389-7278

18 MANDARIN LUNCHEON, “DUBAI, BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT AND TOURISM” Foodshion, 707 148th Ave. N.E., Bellevue 11:30 a.m.–1:30 p.m. luncheon@seattlechinesechamber.org

STRUGGLE OF INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES FOR SELFDETERMINATION, CULTURAL PRESENTATIONS Tour Burke Museum 2–4 p.m.

Free

19 COMMISSION ON ASIAN PACIFIC AMERICAN AFFAIRS PUBLIC BOARD MEETING Japanese Cultural & Community Center, 1414 S. Weller St., Seattle 10 a.m.–2 p.m. capaa.wa.gov, 360-725-5667

20

27 VENTURING LAO’S MIGHTY MEKONG, ASIAN ARTS AND CULTURE PROGRAM Seattle Art Museum 1–3 p.m. friendsofasianart.org

28 COMMUNITY MEETING ON PUBLIC SAFETY AND UPDATE ON THE DONNIE CHIN MURDER INVESTIGATION Nagomi Teahouse, 519 6th Ave. S. #200, Seattle 5:30–7:30 p.m. sharontomiko.santos@leg.wa.gov, 360786-7944

THE BEAUTY OF KAISEKI IN NOVEMBER, JAPANESE-STYLE MEAL Pike Place Market Atrium Kitchen, 1433 1st Ave., Seattle 12–7 p.m. m.bpt.me/event/2713846

DEC 1

IN-NW DIGITAL INNOVATION SERIES: CREATING A SUCCESSFUL MULTICHANNEL STRATEGY Microsoft Events Center, Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, 1301 5th Ave. Ste. 1500, Seattle 12–1:30 p.m. $35–$90 206-389-7278

3 MULTICULTURAL HOLIDAY ARTS & CRAFT FAIR St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, 1610 S. King St., Seattle 10 a.m.–3 p.m.

206-323-5250, stpeterseattle.org

22 FIRESIDE CHAT WITH GIPHY FOUNDER & CEO ALEX CHUNG TUNE, 90 Blanchard St., Seattle 6 p.m.

RSVP at giphyfireside.splashthat.com/ tune

26 HAPPY HOUR FOOD WALK Seattle’s Chinatown International District 3–6 p.m. cidbia.org HOLIDAY POP-UP MARKET Hing Hay Park, 423 Maynard Ave. S., Seattle 11 a.m.–6 p.m. shopsmallseattle.com

View the solution on page 14

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The Editorial Board reserves the right to reject any advertisement, letter or article.

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

YOUR VOICE

■ WAYNE’S WORLDS

asianweekly northwest

7

An electrifying fair or — how I avoided DEATH, fell in LOVE, and became a CHAIRMAN

By Wayne Chan NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

to continue organizing the one large event that they put on every year. That event? You guessed it — the San Diego Chinese New Year Faire.

Our board chair then looked around the table, and finally set his eyes on me when he asked, “Wayne, do you think you could help look at the feasibility of us taking this on?”

And for reasons that I will likely never understand, I said, “Sure, I’d be happy to help.”

How it went from my agreeing to do a feasibility study to my chairing the whole thing is a story unto itself, but let’s just say that peer pressure can be a very powerful thing.

Deep down inside, I suspect there is a more meaningful reason.

It was 1990, and I had just moved back to San Diego after working a few years at my first job after graduating from college. I decided I wanted to get involved with the local Chinese community, and I knew that the annual Chinese New Year’s fair was coming up and always needed volunteers. After going to a few volunteer meetings, I was assigned to work at the children’s booth, manning the goldfish pond game.

This game entailed setting

Well, now I’ve done it.

I didn’t think I would. Actually, I was sure I wouldn’t.

I’ve got too much on my plate already. I wouldn’t be able to do it justice. Even if I wanted to, I just don’t have the time, so no way. It’s just not going to happen. I’m ruling it out. Somebody else will have to do it. It’s not happening.

No way, no how.

And yet, for all of my naysaying and absolute rejection of it, I’m doing it.

What am I talking about?

I’ve just “volunteered” to be the chairman of the San Diego Chinese New Year’s Faire.

How on earth did this possibly happen? What could have possibly happened that could compel me to take on this job?

That’s the thing, I didn’t. In the end, my friends did me in.

It started simply enough. I was recently asked to join the board of the San Diego Chinese Historical Museum. I wasn’t really looking to join another board, but after I got the invitation, I thought it was for a good cause and a terrific museum, and I already knew several people on the board. It’s also important to know that the museum had nothing to do with the Chinese New Year’s Faire.

I attended the first board meeting and all was well, nothing really out of the ordinary … until the very end of the meeting.

Our board chair mentioned that the San Diego Chinese Center was planning to close its doors after many decades of service, and were looking to find another organization

see WAYNE on 12

■ ON THE SHELF

NWAW’s month book recs Stories about historical events that resonate today

PRODUCE

BIG TARO

$0.49/LB

CALIFORNIA ORANGE

By Samantha Pak NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

SHERLIHON

$0.49/LB

SHANGHAI BOK CHOY

NAPPA

$0.69/LB

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MEAT

SEAFOOD FRESH BUTTER FISH

BEEF ROUND EYE THIN SLICED

$5.69/LB

BEEF BACK RIB

$1.79/LB

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CHICKEN LEG QUARTER

$0.99/LB

$2.39/LB

$3.49/LB

WHOLE CHICKEN WITH EGG

$9.99/EA

FZ BASA FILLET

YELLOWFIN TUNA STEAK

FRESH SKATEWINGS

$3.99/LB

PORK LEG HAM BONLESS

$1.99/LB

36/40 WHITE SHRIMP 4LB

$20.99/BOX

GROCERY

MT FZ SLICED MANGOES 16OZ

$1.69/EA

MT JAPAN SWT MT FZ TARO CUT HALF POTATO 14OZ

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MT FZ CRUSHED COCONUT 16OZ

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MT FZ LEMGRASS W/ CHILI 16OZ

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TGE FRIED RED ONIONS 8OZ LAL CHICKEN BROTH 42OZ /EA /EA

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TUFOCO RICE PAPER 22CM 12OZ

$0.99/EA

GM SEASONING SAUCE 20OZ

VINACAFE 3IN1 COFFEE 24S

$2.99/EA

OFFER ONLY GOOD WHILE SUPPLIES LAST. WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO CORRECT ALL PRINTED ERRORS.

All sale lasts from Friday 11/18 to Thursday 11/24 1221 S. King St., Seattle ∙ 206-720-0969 Monday–Sunday: 8 a.m.–8 p.m. • lamsseafood.com

“Boxers”

By Gene Luen Yang First Second, 2013 It’s 1898, and foreign missionaries and soldiers roam the Chinese countryside, bullying and robbing Chinese peasants.

Little Bao, a young man living with his father and two brothers, has had enough and decides to do something about it.

He joins — and soon becomes a leader of — an army of commoners, training in kung fu, to fight to free China from the “foreign devils.” The army of Boxers harness the powers of ancient Chinese gods to help them in their battles. And it works, as the grassroots rebellion is successful — and violent — with many deaths on both sides of the fight.

As the body count rises, it becomes clear that things are not so simple. In addition to the foreign missionaries, thousands of “secondary devils” — Chinese citizens who have converted to Christianity — are being killed in the battles.

While the Boxer Rebellion was a significant point in Chinese history, it is an event I am not too familiar with.

“Boxers” serves as an introduction into the rebellion and together with its companion publication, “Saints” (which I have previously recommended), the two graphic novels by Gene Luen Yang tell the

story of the Chinese Boxer Rebellion from two different points of view: that of a Boxer (Little Bao) and a Chinese citizen who has converted to Christianity (Vibiana).

As a graphic novel, “Boxers” not only tells part of the story of the rebellion, it illustrates it. The phrase “a picture is worth a thousand words” rings true with Yang’s drawings. From depictions of the battles to pictures of the struggles of life on the countryside, readers get an idea of what the Chinese people went through in those years. We see how difficult life was see SHELF on 13

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

■ TOP CONTRIBUTORS HONOREE

34 YEARS

Vietnamese newspaper publisher urges community voice to be stronger

By Stacy Nguyen NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY It was 1986, and Kim Pham was a new University of Washington grad, though not a typical one. He was 36 years old, a husband, the father to three young children, and a Vietnamese refugee. To support his family post-graduation, he worked at Tacoma Boatbuilding Co., a now-defunct shipyard and marine architecture firm, but what was once the largest private employer in Tacoma.

The 1980s saw an influx of Vietnamese refugees flooding the Seattle area, a result of American withdrawal from Vietnam and the victory of the North Vietnamese government over the American-backed South in the 1970s.

The changing demographics of the Seattle area fostered racial tensions — these new immigrants felt the weight of scrutiny and the lingering loss of their home. In the midst of this, Pham saw a need, and he sought a different path, an alternative. He had a dream.

While he would continue to plug away at Tacoma Boatbuilding Co. for many more years to financially support his family, in 1986, Pham and his wife, Hang Nga Pham, founded Nguoi Viet Tay Bac, or Northwest Vietnamese News, a Vietnamese-language newspaper — the first private Vietnamese-language newspaper in Seattle and also the longest-running Vietnamese-language private newspaper.

This year, Northwest Vietnamese News celebrated its 30th anniversary. And on Dec. 1, Pham, as the paper’s publisher and cofounder, will be honored by Northwest Asian Weekly as a Top Contributor to the Asian Community in its annual Top Contributors Awards Dinner held at House of Hong Restaurant in Chinatown.

Kim Pham

Beginnings

Pham was born in 1950, when Vietnam was embroiled in the First Indochina War, one in which a communist and nationalist liberation movement arose from nearly a century of colonization by France. In 1954, when Pham was only 4 years old, the French were defeated by Viet Minh nationalists, the war ended, and Vietnam was partitioned — only for war to start again anew.

Pham was the middle child in his family, artistically inclined. He used to paint, but naturally, did not see that as a viable means to make an income, so he set his sights on law school, where he met his future wife.

In 1972, at age 22, Pham was drafted into war. His plans

to study law got dropped.

He served in the Republic of Vietnam Navy (the naval branch of the South Vietnamese military) as a press officer for three years, until the end of the war in 1975.

“I think being drafted was the first thing that made him think that it was possible to do more than just a nine-to-five,” said Julie, his daughter.

After the South fell and Vietnam was unified under the Communist Party, Pham and up to 300,000 others like him were sent to reeducation camps — essentially prison camps where they incarcerated were abused, tortured, and made to perform labor for years.

Pham was released from the reeducation camp in 1978, at age 28. Fearing that he’d get sent back to the camps, Pham, his wife, Hang Nga, took Julie, then only 2 months old, and boarded a boat illegally heading to a refugee camp in Malaysia — risking death by drowning or by murder at the hands of pirates over remaining in a country that had become aggressively hostile to its own people. Pham was not yet 30, but by this time, he had already lost nearly a decade of his life to war.

It’s this context that Pham carried with him through the years, as he started his paper, as he built his paper, and as he grew the legacy of his paper.

“We need to have a voice,” Pham said in Vietnamese.

“That’s the importance of this work, not just in linking different Asian communities and linking Asian communities to the mainstream, but also in making ourselves more visible.

People need to see us and to hear us — because we will be ignored if we don’t broadcast ourselves.” see PHAM on 16

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

YOUR VOICE

■ TOP CONTRIBUTORS HONOREE

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Chung-hyung Lee transforms Korean alumnae chapter into community powerhouse

By Andrew Hamlin NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

When asked about a pivotal memory from growing up, Chung-hyung Lee, an honoree of this year’s Top Contributors to the Asian Community Awards, reached back to her childhood in Seoul, where she lived until age 36, when she immigrated to Moscow, Idaho with her husband and three children.

“In Korea, junior high and high school students take their year-ending finals, and all the students are ranked within their school’s respective class year,” she explained.

“After earning a top score for two years in a row, my junior high homeroom teacher encouraged me to pursue higher education and a career. This acknowledgement and encouragement to a female teenager was rare in the 1950s in Korea, and I felt inspired to dream and envision myself as someone more than a wife, mother, and homemaker.”

Lee recalls her parents as passionate, encouraging, and surprisingly free of conventional notions for Korean women at that time. She was the middle child of six.Her parents dubbed her “the smart one.” Armed with high scores on her college entrance exam, she entered Ewha Womans University.

Ewha, founded in Seoul in 1886, is a private university for women, founded by the American Methodist Episcopal Church.

The university provides both bachelor’s degrees and graduate school education to Korean women of all backgrounds in Liberal Arts and STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) fields.

Lee earned a degree in pharmacy from the university. She credits a female biochemistry teacher at Ewha for setting her on that path.

“I was awestruck by her knowledge, and it was influential in my choice to pursue a degree in pharmacy.”

Ewha, its name taken from the Korean word for “pear blossoms,” is the largest female educational institute in the world. Lee began working for the Seattle chapter of the university’s Alumnae Association in the 1980s, after relocating to the city.

The Seattle chapter had, at that point, 10 members. Lee worked very hard, often with shoestring budgets, to build the chapter and prepare it to award scholarships out of its own pocket.

“I am extremely proud of our members’ energy and talent,” she summed up. “In 2010, after years of fundraising, the Seattle chapter established its own scholarship fund for Washington state college students, to promote Korean history and cultural awareness.”

Currently, the Seattle chapter’s membership is more than 200 members strong. It is an active member of the Ewha Alumnae Association of North America and funds scholarships both abroad in South Korea and locally in Washington state.

In 2008, utilizing the talents of Seattle Ewha alumnae, the Seattle chapter successfully campaigned for and hosted the annual Ewha Alumnae Association of North America membership meeting that was attended by more than 300 members from across the United States.

As summed up by Seungja Y. Song, who nominated Lee for the Top Contributors honor, Lee transformed the local chapter from an ordinary alumni organization into a vital resource through imaginative

Chung-hyung Lee

programs and wide-ranging fundraising events in the community.

These include concerts, photographic exhibitions, and an annual day-long bazaar, including a variety of homemade, delicate, and exotic Korean food and desserts contributed by members. Comprehensive activities are planned each year by the leadership team, with Lee at the head.

Outside experts are frequently invited for lectures during monthly meetings on topics of current interest, such as women’s health, advice on taxes, finances, retirement, and the history of fine arts. Within the chapter, special interest groups carry out activities, such as hiking, mountain climbing, golf, travel, East Asian fine arts, photography, calligraphy, and museum trips, with monthly reports to the chapter.

When asked her thoughts on Seattle’s Asian community, Lee opined that when

she first moved to Seattle, she felt there was a separation between the ethnic groups within Seattle. That line of separation has blurred over the years, in her view, which she attributes to our younger generation’s open-mindedness and community vision.

“It’s good to see the Seattle Asian community supporting and learning from each other. When we partner together as a community, I feel we can advocate for each other and have a bigger voice.”  Chung-hyung Lee will be honored on Dec. 2 at the Northwest Asian Weekly’s annual Top Contributors Awards Dinner, held at the House of Hong Restaurant in Chinatown.

Andrew Hamlin can be reached at info@ nwasianweekly.com.

asianweekly northwest

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34 YEARS

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

■ PUBLISHER’S BLOG

OPINION

Turning ghosts to ancestors Reversing the consequence of the Vietnam War

Photo by Assunta Ng/NWAW

The scar between Vietnam and America remains deep even after the Vietnam War ended 40 years ago. How do you reverse the consequences of a war?

Enter PeaceTrees Vietnam, founded by Seattleites in 1995. It’s about one tree at a time — it’s one landmine at a time. It’s a promise to help those who have suffered from the consequences of the Vietnam War — it’s a tale of healing between Americans and Vietnamese.

“How do you turn ghosts into ancestors (healthy environment and fertile lands)?” asked Karl Marlantes, author and keynote speaker for PeaceTrees’ fundraising luncheon at the Four Seasons Hotel on Oct. 25.

The ghosts that Marlantes, a former U.S Marine who served in the Vietnam War, referred to are the dangers and fears associated with landmines, left behind after the war ended. But through the courage of the Vietnamese people who clear the landmines, a direct and horrible effect of the war, the land gets rehabilitated, turned into safer environments and fertile soil. The literal and figurative transformation turns the landscape from ghost to ancestor.

PeaceTrees is dedicated to clearing landmines in the Quang Tri province, an area heavily impacted by the legacy of war.

More than 10,800 people have been killed or maimed by landmines and unexploded ordnance (UXO). Bombs, shells, grenades, landmines, or cluster munitions that didn’t explode when they were originally deployed still pose a risk of detonation, even many decades later.

Since PeaceTrees began, more than 93,000 mines have been cleared, and 43,850 trees have been planted in Vietnam. Also, the group organized 59 citizen diplomacy trips to Vietnam for tree planting, in addition to providing support for medical treatment, nutritional support, scholarships, and micro-credit lending for UXO victims and their families.

Photo from PeaceTrees Vietnam

By Assunta Ng NORTHWEST ASIAN WEEKLY

PeaceTrees staffmember Pham Thi Hoang Ha (left) with PeaceTrees boardmember Thoa Nguyen

Unexploded ordnance clearance, from August 2012

Pham Thi Hoang Ha, a staff member of PeaceTrees who works in Vietnam, said the team has increased the area “cleared this year far more than last year. [They have] collected and disposed 3,259 UXOs.” Ha said expanding the scope and scale of PeaceTrees’ work means it will “clear more safe land for children to play, farmers to grow crops such as pepper, more schools and libraries to be built safely.”

Ha said the “peppers are growing very well. Farmers are [becoming] more and more involved in the project: learning, doing, visiting their farms every day …”

Ha said the pepper project is life-changing for the villagers, and they are aware of it. The black pepper from farms can give the farmers products to sell, and it raises their income five times more than they get with rice.

Thoa Nguyen, owner of Chinoise Restaurant and a board member of PeaceTrees, said the purpose of PeaceTrees is “to help Vietnamese people, the children in Quang Tri to feel safe, secure, and sheltered. Vietnamese farmers can till their land free of

As part of their healing and honoring their losses, the idea for PeaceTrees was born. But the family had to wait 25 years to start their project.

“There were no diplomatic relations between Vietnam and the U.S. [until 1995],” said Brusseau. “In 1996, we tracked down organizations and worked with the Vietnamese government.” Together, they worked with the Vietnamese people and also with the U.S. State Department to clear the mines.

Brusseau is excited that PeaceTrees has reached another level after 21 years. “We have established the next generation of leadership to lead this work. Trust is most important in working together over a long period of time. We have more work and productive work to do in the future.”

PeaceTrees raised $170,000 from 380 guests, among them were several Vietnam veterans, at its luncheon. 

TAITUNG

worry and fear. Remnants of war become a remnant of the past.”

De-miners

De-mining is dangerous work, even with training. So far, no accidents have happened under PeaceTrees’ watch. However, one deminer from another de-mining organization was killed earlier this year.

PeaceTrees has added six de-miners, including female de-miners. In total, PeaceTrees has 38 de-miners in partnership with the Vietnamese government. PeaceTrees is the only American organization working on de-mining in Vietnam. The Vietnamese government has its own groups cleaning up the remnants of war. Imagine four decades later, the ‘ghost’ is still present.

PeaceTrees’ history

PeaceTrees’ founders are Jerilyn Brusseau, her late husband, Danaan Parry, and her mother, Rae Cheney. The family founded PeaceTrees when Brusseau’s brother Lt. Daniel Cheney, a pilot, was killed in 1969 during the war.

Assunta Ng can be reached at assunta@ nwasianweekly.com.

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

YOUR VOICE TRUMP from 1 strategist. Bannon was previously chief executive officer (instated August 2016) of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

Under Bannon’s leadership Brietbart News positioned itself as the “platform for the alt-right,” a group with farright ideologies who actually reject mainstream U.S. conservatism. The most passionate critics of the Brietbart and the alt-right say that the alt-right feed and promotes white supremacism, Islamophobia, misogyny, homophobia, antisemitism, and racism.

And thus, the cautious optimism that some people of color may have entertained — that President-elect Trump could be more tempered than candidate Trump — has taken a hit.

“Trump is a dangerous conman, a fabulist who is now driving around in a clown car of bad ideas,” said Jamie Ford, who of Chinese descent and the author of “Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet” (2009), a novel about the forced incarceration of Japanese Americans by the U.S. government during World War II. “He’s shown the worst side of himself and the electorate: racism, misogyny, antisemitism, an appetite for bullying, a disregard for science, and a love of conspiracy theories.”

Does the APIA voice count?

In this election cycle, exit polls and surveys showed that the majority of Asian American and Pacific Islander American (APIA) voters backed Hillary Clinton for president.

According to the Asian American National Election Eve Poll, 75 percent of APIAs voted for Clinton — 19 percent voted for Trump.

APIAs have been the country’s fastest-growing racial group, having grown by more than 620,000 voters with each election cycle since 2000. It’s projected that one in 10 Americans will be an APIA by 2040.

Yet, according to the Asian American National Election Eve Poll, campaigns, political parties, and civic organizations neglected to ask 57 percent of Asian Americans to vote or register to vote. Of those contacted, 84 percent were asked in English. This is exceptionally noteworthy, as twothirds of Asian Americans are foreign-born, with limited English language skills.

This is a community that is often ignored or overlooked — and also one that generally does not align its values with those of Trump.

When local APIA community leaders were asked how APIAs might further social justice work within a newly changed political climate, nearly none who were asked advocated direct collaboration with the future Trump administration.

CONGRESS from 1 with South Asian roots.

The House will welcome its first Vietnamese American and Indian American women: Democrats Stephanie Murphy of Florida and Pramila Jayapal of Washington state.

Overall, the number of minority women in Congress will increase to 33 in the House from 27 and stand at four in the Senate.

New senators

Six new senators join the ranks — a seventh will be chosen next month in Louisiana’s runoff. Orientation for new senators started Tuesday.

Harris, 52, a former prosecutor, currently serves as California’s attorney general.

Duckworth, a two-term House member, is a veteran of the Iraq War, where as an Army pilot, she lost both legs when her helicopter was hit by a grenade. Duckworth, 48, was born in Thailand, to an American father and Thai-Chinese mother.

A former two-term Nevada attorney general, Cortez Masto, 52, also has worked as a prosecutor and chief of staff to former Nevada Gov. Bob Miller. Her father is of Mexican descent and her mother is of Italian descent.

Republican Rep. Todd Young of Indiana is a three-term congressman and former Capitol Hill aide. Democratic Rep. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland will replace Barbara Mikulski, who is retiring after 30 years in the Senate. A key lieutenant to House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi, Van Hollen, 57, has focused on budget issues and foreign policy.

New Hampshire’s Maggie Hassan, a two-term governor, defeated freshman Re-

In its Nov. 16 statement, OCA Asian Pacific American Advocates – Greater Seattle stated that as an organization, it “believes that consequences of Trump’s presidency on APIAs will be harmful, especially among our newer immigrants and those who are poor, because of his exclusionary and white nationalistic policies.”

OCA–GS stated that such policies will result in millions of APIAs left without basic health care and dramatic decreases for educational and social resources to immigrants and refugees, as well as furthering the widening divide between “whites and communities of color, which will set back U.S. race relations.”

‘A civic society’ In its Nov. 15 story, “How Bannon flattered and coaxed Trump on policies key to the alt-right,” the Washington Post points to a Breitbart News Daily radio segment between Trump and Bannon that aired last year on Nov. 2, 2015 — in which Trump expressed worries that Asians who come to the United States to study at Ivy League colleges end up returning home to Asia because of strident U.S. immigration laws.

At the time, Trump stated that there should be a way to keep that sort of talent in the United States — that is, to make it so talented Asian students can “go through the process” and become citizens.

At the time, Bannon did not appear to agree with Trump.

He made the observation that “two-thirds or three-quarters of the CEOs in Silicon Valley are from South Asia or from Asia.” Then he euphemistically said, “A country is more than an economy. We’re a civic society.”

“Stephen Bannon apparently thinks there are too many Asians in Silicon Valley,” Ford said of Trump’s new senior counselor and chief West Wing strategist. “[And Trump] is a man who isn’t sure the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II was a bad idea.”

The outlook Immediately following the outcome of the election, Vu Le, a leader in nonprofit and the brain behind NonprofitWithBalls.com, wrote on his blog, “Right now, I can’t offer much encouragement, because I honestly just feel like crap. I’ve had presidential candidates I supported who didn’t win, but I’ve never been as affected as I am by this particular loss.”

“A Trump presidency could bring us back to the dark ages,” said Kathy Wong Chinn, a longtime community volunteer. “All the progress made in the Civil Rights movement could easily vanish in an instant.”

publican Sen. Kelly Ayotte in the nation’s closest Senate race.

Women ascend in Senate, decline in House

☆西雅圖首創墓園☆

11

Stacy Nguyen can be reached at stacy@nwasianweekly. com.

A total of 104 women will serve in the next Congress, the same as in the current Congress and 19.4 percent of the total number of lawmakers. Twenty-one women will Welcome back serve in the Senate while 83 women will Three former House Democrats won serve in the House, a drop of one from the current 84.

In addition to Hillary Clinton’s defeat in the presidential race, women saw setbacks in Congress. Maryland’s 10-member THANK YOU FOR RECYCLING congressional delegation reverted to allTHIS NEWSPAPER! male, while Pennsylvania voters rejected Democrat Katie McGinty’s bid to become the first woman in the state elected to the Senate.

Democrat Lisa Blunt Rochester will be 自1872年起服務西北岸社區 Delaware’s first woman and first Black 非營利獨立協會 American in Congress. Only Mississippi and Vermont have never sent a woman to either chamber of Congress.

Lake View Cemetery

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“Asian Americans have experienced an increase in harassment and attacks quickly following the presidential election,” said Quyen Dang, Seattle president of the National Association of Asian American Professionals. “Regardless of who is president, harassment and hate crimes toward minorities and women are unacceptable and cannot be normalized.”

Many APIAs have talked about the election in terms of loss and grief — containing stages to navigate through and process. A pivotal stage in processing grief is anger.

Le stated that he has witnessed an increase in the number of “hurtful and divisive interactions between colleagues who are on the same side.” He stated that he is also not immune to the engaging in this kind of conflict.

Yet, even as local APIAs grapple with their shifting thoughts and feelings, many have stated that they hope the APIA community — both on local and national levels — will move forward with renewed effort and purpose, and will do so in an inclusive way.

“I think the results of this election serve as a reminder that racism, sexism, and prejudice are still powerful and challenging issues that minority communities face,” said James Hong, executive director of Vietnamese Friendship Association. (Hong stated that his comments do not represent his organization or him as his organization’s head; they are his own personal beliefs.) “I believe it’s an important moment for the API community to pause, reflect, and think about how we can continue to build a movement grounded in the values of inclusion, compassion, and equity.”

“It also requires that we critically challenge our own biases so that we may understand — and appreciate — how to better work in solidarity with other marginalized groups,” added Hong. “Our work must be welcoming and inclusive to all vulnerable people and communities, including Muslims, women, LGTBQ, immigrants, and refugees.

I recognize this isn’t an easy task, and there’s a lot of work to be done. Most immediately, it requires challenging leaders, systems, and institutions that perpetuate fear, hate, and oppression.”

“We will continue our work, which is now even more urgent,” said Le. “We have to protect the progress we have made. … We have to rally even more vigorously to mobilize our communities. We have to prepare now for the next election cycle. Our work to advance civic participation and social justice is more critical now than ever.”

Ultimately, OCA-GS’ stance is this: “It is our hope, however, that Trump’s presidency will awaken the APIA community to fight back against it, get politically involved, and to make him a one-term president.” 

all Democrats. Ruben Kihuen will be the first Latino to represent Nevada in the House, while New York’s Adriano Espaillat will be the first Dominican American.

Fifteen Asian Americans will serve in Congress, including 12 in the House. That’s up from 10 in the current Congress.

湖景墓園

asianweekly

their old seats back: Colleen Hanabusa of Hawaii, Brad Schneider of Illinois and Carol Shea-Porter of New Hampshire.

Attending her first day of orientation Monday, Hanabusa said her experience will help her as Democrats try to wield influence in the minority.

“Like everything else, it’s whether we’re going to be able to maintain relationships more than anything,” she said. 

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Black Americans gain

A record 48 Black Americans will serve in Congress, including 46 in the House, an overall increase of two. Eighteen Black women serve in Congress, including Republican Rep. Mia Love of Utah. Love is one of three Black Republicans, along with South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott and Texas Rep. Will Hurd.

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asianweekly northwest

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NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

DRYWALL from 4 I worked hard for. I’m not going to walk away from my house.”

The home in east Tampa’s Belmont Heights neighborhood should have been a second act for Hendrix, one made up of grandchildren and retirement plans after raising four children as a single mother.

Most of her life was spent in Central Park Village, a blighted public housing project within sight of the shiny skyscrapers of downtown Tampa.

She was already pregnant with her first child, Tara, when she graduated from Robinson High School. She juggled motherhood and classes, while studying for a criminal justice degree at Hillsborough Community College. Then her father died of cancer.

She left home but didn’t go far — an apartment in the same housing project, where she had three more children.

So she worked and raised her kids, imagining one day living in a home where noise from adjoining apartments didn’t intrude, a place with its own yard and space to breathe.

Most of her kids were already grown before she got that chance through a homeownership program offered by the Housing Authority. It was aimed at public housing residents who, like her, had a history of steady employment.

She took the mandatory twice-weekly classes in finance and home maintenance and qualified for a $52,500 grant from the city of Tampa and a $30,000 federal grant.

To make up the rest of the $165,000 asking price for the home on E 31st Avenue, she took out a $89,000 mortgage.

She owed more money than she could picture but, finally, the roof over her head was her own. She said it felt special when she turned the key in the door for the first time.

But she was opening the door to a real estate crash and a housing health disaster, all wrapped into a home built by a company that had already gone bankrupt.

In most regards, the Belmont Heights

WAYNE from 7 up a small plastic pool and filling it with goldfish. Floating on the surface of the water with hundreds of plastic bowls. The point of the game was for kids to buy a ticket, then attempt to toss ping pong balls into the pool. If they landed a ping pong ball into one of the bowls, the kid would win a live goldfish.

The only problem with this game was that it was pouring rain during the fair.

And as the rain poured on top of the booth tent, there was some kind of short circuit that was causing a light above me to spark

CAMBODIA from 5 his alleged mistress, and was sentenced to a five-month jail term for refusing to appear in court to testify in a related case. He has been holed up at party headquarters in the Cambodian capital for several months.

On Nov. 7, a court sentenced an opposition senator to seven years in prison over comments he posted on Facebook criticizing a 36-year-old border agreement with neighboring Vietnam.

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court found Hong Sok Hour guilty of falsifying public documents, using fake documents and inciting chaos.

Sam Soeun filed his lawsuit about Facebook “likes” in March after Sam

project was a success.

Funded through a $35 million federal Hope VI grant, it replaced College Hill Homes and Ponce de Leon Courts, two aging and dilapidated public housing complexes.

Crime in the area fell and the project won awards from the American Association of Architects, among others.

The inclusion of single-family homes amid more than 800 low-rent and Section 8 apartments was meant to give residents a stake in their community. The 12 homes were built on three different streets, but close together. They had small front porches and angular columns.

In all, almost $900,000 in tax dollars helped pay for the homes built with toxic walls.

The Housing Authority hired Michaels Development Co. as master developer of the project, leasing the land to the New Jersey company.

Michaels built the apartments, but bid out construction of the single-family homes to Banner Homes of Florida, a small family company operating out of an office on Busch Boulevard.

Banner’s main drywall supplier was Clearwater company Black Bear Gypsum, said Dennis Mead, a Banner employee whose son David Mead owned the firm.

At the time, many suppliers had turned to Chinese manufacturers to keep up with the huge demand created by the housing boom and two busy hurricane seasons, said Will Spates, principal of Indoor Environmental Technologies, a Clearwater company that has inspected hundreds of homes for toxic drywall.

No one was aware then of the sulfur emissions that blackened and corroded copper coils and wiring and played havoc with smoke alarms.

As many as 30,000 Florida homes may have been affected, Spates said.

Banner Homes would likely have been found liable in court for using tainted drywall, as happened to other home builders.

But that hope vanished for Hendrix and her neighbors in bizarre circumstances.

every few minutes, which is a little disconcerting when you’re standing above a big pool of water and handling bags of water with live goldfish in them.

I kept thinking that the headline for the next day’s paper would be: “Man Electrocuted at Children’s Pool … but Goldfish Are Fine.”

So, you can see why I might be a little hesitant to jump back into the whole Chinese New Year fair thing.

Well, except for one thing.

During the volunteer meetings, I got to meet the executive director of the San Diego Chinese Center. I couldn’t take my

Rainsy accused him of being involved in a plan to boost Hun Sen’s popularity by buying “likes” originating in places such as India and the Philippines, as well as ordering civil servants and soldiers in Cambodia to set up dummy Facebook accounts.

Judge Im Vannak said Nov. 8 that Sam Rainsy acted with ill intentions.

Sam Rainsy, in a statement posted on Facebook after the court’s ruling, repeated his original allegation.

“Prime Minister Hun Sen has been manipulating Facebook figures in order to boast about his [apparently impressive but fake] popularity, which he uses as a political justification to legitimize the ongoing violent crackdown on his more and more numerous critics,” he said. 

34 YEARS

In May 2007, Mead sold a controlling interest in his company to James Harvey, a 64-year-old investor. Harvey installed his girlfriend, Martina Hood, a 30-year-old Russian-born real estate agent, as company president and fired the Meads.

Months later, Banner filed for bankruptcy, long before any of the residents were aware of the toxic drywall. In the years that followed, both Harvey and his girlfriend died, Hood after a leap from her 29th-floor SkyPoint condo in downtown Tampa.

David Mead left the construction field to become a missionary pilot. He did not return calls for comment.

“Banner Homes is rather an unpleasant memory for him the way it ended,” said his father, Dennis Mead.

Most of the eight abandoned homes have been snapped up at cut-rate prices by developers who have rehabbed them and rented them out.

At least three of them are used as Section 8 housing. That means taxpayers paid to build the homes and are now helping to pay the rent.

While the public and private sector worked together on the Belmont Heights project, neither wants to own the Chinese drywall problem.

Emails show that the Housing Authority knew about problems with the drywall in 2011. That year, it wrote a letter to Michaels saying that as master developer, it should accept responsibility, a position chief operating officer Leroy Moore maintains to this day.

“We didn’t sell the homes. We didn’t build the homes,” Moore said. “If there’s more we could have done, I’d like someone to look at that and tell us where.”

But Michaels has refused to get involved, arguing that Banner Homes should be liable. Michaels employs 1,800 people and manages 360 rental communities nationwide.

“We are sympathetic to these homeowners,” said Laura Zaner, vice president of marketing. “We believe there is pending litigation against the responsible parties — Banner Homes and the Chinese drywall provider. Michaels has no

involvement in this situation other than the initial land development.”

Officials at the city of Tampa, which contributed toward the down-payment grants, heard about the drywall issue, but said they were not contacted for help.

Five years after the problem came to light, the Housing Authority this summer decided to assist the four remaining families in applying for an owner-occupier rehab grant that the city administers.

It was the first contact most of the families had with the authority for several years and came only after local Black activist Connie Burton repeatedly raised the plight of the families at a Housing Authority board meeting.

The grant is unlikely to be enough. The city has received almost 300 applications for the $1 million pot, and the maximum individual award is $40,000.

The four families will get priority, officials said, but builders estimate replacing drywall throughout a home could cost up to $70,000.

The residents’ last hope for full compensation seems to lie in the courts.

They are among 4,000 plaintiffs in a case filed in a Louisiana federal court against Taishan Gypsum Co., the state-owned Chinese drywall manufacturer.

A federal judge has ruled in the plaintiff’s favor and banned the company from working in the United States. But China’s Ministry of Justice has refused to recognize the court’s jurisdiction over Chinese companies.

The legal stalemate could last for years, said Arnold Levin, a lawyer with Levin Fishbein Sedran & Berman and lead counsel for the plaintiffs.

Burton, the activist, put most of the blame on the Housing Authority. It let the residents down by not pursuing compensation from Michaels, she said.

She plans to keep pushing awareness of their plight until someone steps up to help the last four families.

“These people believed in that process, and they were betrayed and led astray,” she said. 

eyes off her. She was the most beautiful girl I had ever met. I couldn’t hardly find the nerve to even talk to her, but I think I managed to ask her out for dinner at some point.

Who was this girl?

Her name was Maya, and we just celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary together.

I may have been nearly electrocuted, but that fair meant the world to me.

So I guess I’m all in.  Wayne can be reached nwasianweekly.com.

at

info@

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

YOUR VOICE SINGLES DAY from 5 such service. The company said its sales passed last year’s Singles Day total at 1:33 p.m. but gave no financial amount.

Singles Day was begun by Chinese college students in the 1990s as a version of Valentine’s Day for people without romantic partners.

The Nov. 11 date was picked to be “11.11” — four singles.

Young people would treat each other to dinner or give gifts to woo that special someone and end their single status.

The spending gives a boost to the ruling Communist Party’s efforts to nurture consumer-based economic growth and reduce reliance on trade and investment.

E-commerce sales in China rose by 26.1 percent in the first nine months of the year. Economic growth for that period held steady at 6.7 percent, but that was its lowest level since the 2008 global crisis.

Forecasters expect the economy to cool further next year SHELF from 7 for them, as well as the lengths they went through to reclaim their country.

“Citizen 13660”

By Mine Okubo University of Washington Press, 1983

As a young woman, Mine Okubo was one of more than 100,000 people of Japanese descent who were taken into “protective custody” after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

Nearly two-thirds of those forced into the internment camps were American citizens, imprisoned without any sort of trial.

as regulators try to rein in a boom in bank lending and real estate sales that is pushing up debt levels and housing costs.

China has the biggest population of internet users at 710 million, according to government data. Some 410 million people shop online for goods ranging from clothing and groceries to manicures and plane tickets.

“Online shopping is getting more and more common,” said He Mei, an employee of a health products company in her 30s, who had waited for Friday to buy an indoor air filtering machine at a discount.

“Young guys, especially those in their 20s, don’t really go out to buy things, and they buy pretty much everything online,” she said. “It’s so easy and it saves time and money.”

The migration of Chinese consumers to online commerce and entertainment is squeezing traditional retailers, cinemas, and other businesses, forcing them to improve service and add offerings.

E-commerce has risen from 3 percent of Chinese

In “Citizen 13660,” a graphic memoir with a title that references the number Okubo and her brother were assigned as a family unit, Okubo gives readers a glimpse of what life was like while living in relocation centers in California and Utah. Okubo chronicles everything, from the time she spent in Europe when England and France declared war, to when she and her brother arrived at Tanforan Assembly Center, to the day-to-day life in the camp.

In her memoir, Okubo not only tells readers about her life, she shows us.

Through her illustrations, we see the conditions the Japanese and Japanese Americans were living in, and we see how crowded it was and the little thought the American government put into the camps that were supposed to be for their protection.

While much of what Okubo includes in her memoir depicts the struggles and difficulties of camp life, she also shows how they pushed through it all to find some semblance of a normal life for themselves.

From creating schools and churches to building a lake and establishing recreational activities, the Japanese and Japanese Americans did not let their circumstances keep them down.

In describing her experiences, Okubo keeps things pretty straightforward and sticks mostly to the facts. She limits emotion she includes in her telling. By doing this, the effect is that readers are left to react and feel however they feel in response to her experiences. She doesn’t force her emotions onto others, giving readers a more real feeling of what it would be like if they were in the camps.

MURRAY from 1 which includes Seattle and is the state’s largest, voted overwhelmingly for Democrat Hillary Clinton. Seattle was one of several cities that saw protests following the election and some high school students walked out of classes Nov. 9 to protest the election results.

Murray, who as a state lawmaker led efforts to legalize gay marriage in Washington, said the gay community would not give up the progress made on same-sex marriage.

“The president-elect has said he wants to turn back

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By Stacey Lee G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, 2015

At 15 and living in Missouri with her father in 1849, all Samantha wants to do is move back to New York, where she was born.

But the young Chinese American girl’s dreams are quickly dashed after her father dies in a fire that burns down his dry goods store, and she is forced to kill their landlord in self-defense after he tries to rape her.

With no other choice but to flee, Samantha teams up with Annamae,

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northwest

13

consumer spending in 2010 to 15 percent last year, according to Boston Consulting Group. It forecasts online spending will rise by 20 percent a year, hitting $1.6 trillion by 2020, compared with 6 percent growth for offline retail.

Researchers attribute the rapid rise of Singles Day to demographics and timing.

University graduates who adopted the holiday earn more and shop online. Also, Singles Day comes as people receive monthly paychecks and need to buy winter clothes.

Unlike other events such as the Lunar New Year, China’s biggest family holiday, it involves few other expenses, such as travel or banquets, leaving more money for gifts.

This year, Alibaba hired actress Scarlett Johansson, football star David Beckham, basketball legend Kobe Bryant, and pop-rock band OneRepublic to appear at a pre-sale gala that was broadcast online to drum up attention. 

“Under a Painted Sky”

our rights,” Murray said. “We will not lose the gains we’ve made, the rings on our fingers.”

Murray also urged the city’s liberal residents to not condemn people who voted for the Republican candidate, but to “understand and move forward.”

He said the country and the world had yet to recover from a global economic downturn and that it had produced anger in the United States and within Seattle.

“The Great Recession has dislocated the politics in our country and across the globe,” Murray said. “The political landscape has shifted, and shifted massively.” 

asianweekly

a young slave about her age, who has plans to run away toward freedom. To hide from the authorities, the two teens disguise themselves as Sammy and Andy, two boys traveling to California for the Gold Rush.

As they journey westward, the two girls forge a strong friendship and learn to rely on each other, as they struggle to survive on the open trail — from making sure to stay ahead of the authorities, to hiding their gender from others (especially the group of cowboys they meet and travel with along the trail), to relying on their wits to make sure nature doesn’t kill them.

“Painted Sky” is a story about two strong teenagers, who do what they have to do to survive. In a time when females, as well as people of color, are seen as lesser — especially in Annamae’s case — Samantha and Annamae do not let this hold them back. They know how low their standing is in society and they do what they can for a better life.

The two heroines are strong, resourceful, and definitely not damsels in distress waiting for someone to rescue them.

This is also a story about friendship, and seeing the relationship between Samantha and Annamae grow throughout the book is a powerful thing.

They start out as two girls who barely know each other, coming together out of necessity, to becoming friends who know they would be able to bet their lives on each other.  Samantha Pak can be reached at info@ nwasianweekly.com.

asianweekly northwest

14

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

SOCCER from 4 Darby said that, at least while he himself was in Laos, the fourth player — a goalkeeper — was not playing regularly at the top club level.

“He has made a rapid rise from about eighth choice to becoming the national team keeper,” Darby noted. “You have to ask how this occurred.”

Darby has seen it from a rival team’s perspective. In 2014, nine players of Vietnamese club Ninh Binh were found guilty of match-fixing in an AFC Cup match with Malaysian club Kelantan, which Darby was coaching at the time.

“It is hard to accept when it is you that is being cheated,” Darby said. “Like in all southeast Asian nations, there are rumors — some you think are feasible, some outlandish. You don’t know who is fixing.”

Southeast Asia has long been regarded as a hotbed of matchfixing. Singapore, home to high-profile alleged match-fixers such as Dan Tan, has made recent progress in tackling the problem, according to Chris Eaton, FIFA’s former head of security and now an independent sports integrity adviser.

“Singapore has taken decisive action to contain locally-bred match-fixers,” Eaton said. “Singapore ultimately realized that it has a duty of care to all nations for its home-grown criminality.”

The problem is by no means contained to one region. In 2011, South Korea had a major scandal of its own with more than 50 players and coaches, past and present, charged with rigging matches.

The country’s leading club Jeonbuk Motors, which is prepar-

34 YEARS

ing for the final of the 2016 Asian Champions League later this month, is under the shadow of its own scandal.

In September, the team was stripped of nine competition points by the K-League authorities after a club scout was convicted of bribing referees in 2013. The punishment cost the club, which denies any knowledge of wrongdoing, a third successive domestic title. It is also possible that the AFC will bar Jeonbuk, champion of Asia in 2006 and finalist in 2011, from entering the 2017 tournament.

Chinese soccer had periodic outbreaks of corruption until the authorities got tough in 2010, jailing officials and referees.

“It has done a great deal over the past five years to address the problem with significant criminal prosecutions of players and referees,” Eaton said, although adding that some level of fixing still exists.

Eaton said if the Asian Football Confederation had really adopted a harsher and more proactive approach to fighting matchfixing, “that will not only be good for regional football, but global football also.”

In a statement released to the AP, the AFC reiterated a “zero tolerance” to match manipulation and said it was determined to stamp it out.

But Darby said while catching the players is necessary, more needs to be done to bring the orchestrators of corruption to justice.

“They have caught the foot soldiers, but need to catch the generals,” he said. “If the players are guilty, there is somebody above them, they cannot do this on their own.”

He points to illegal gambling as a major problem. Eaton

agrees.

“Match-fixing is absolutely and clearly holding Asian football back,” Eaton said. “The only way to drive organized crime out of sport is to deny it the money.”

He said reforming sports betting by legalizing it would help ensure it was regulated properly at “national, regional, and global levels.” 

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YOUR VOICE

■ ASTROLOGY

asianweekly northwest

15

Predictions and advice for the week of November 19–25

By Sun Lee Chang Rat — Sticking to the script is much harder than it sounds. It can be very tempting to veer off on a tangent.

Dragon — Are you only looking in one direction right now? To the extent that you can, survey the conditions from multiple angles.

Monkey — An ongoing concern is going to be resolved soon. Now that there is clarity, you can finally move forward with a higher degree of confidence.

Ox — If you aren’t satisfied with what you come up with on your first attempt, then there is nothing stopping you from trying again.

Snake — Take an early exit as an opportunity to explore other avenues that you would otherwise have been too busy for.

Rooster — Being in close quarters can cause some irritation. It would be worthwhile to consider another arrangement.

Tiger — You may not be privy to all the details. What you have heard so far is likely only a piece of the whole story.

Horse — Having flexibility is a freedom that should not be taken for granted. The less you have of it, the more you realize how essential it is.

Dog — Balancing many interests can be challenging to say the least, but you should prioritize those that mean the most to you.

Rabbit — While hope is important, you need to do more to increase the odds of a better outcome in your favor.

Goat — How well or not your message will be received could hinge on a great deal on the way it is delivered.

Pig — Once you start seeing what is really there, the reality of the situation will set in. It could cause you to alter your plan significantly.

What’s your animal sign?

Rat 1912, 1924, 1936, 1948, 1960, 1972, 1984, 1996, 2008 Ox 1913, 1925, 1937, 1949, 1961, 1973, 1985, 1997, 2009 Tiger 1914, 1926, 1938, 1950, 1962, 1974, 1986, 1998, 2010 Rabbit 1915, 1927, 1939, 1951, 1963, 1975, 1987, 1999, 2011 Dragon 1916, 1928, 1940, 1952, 1964, 1976, 1988, 2000, 2012 Snake 1917, 1929, 1941, 1953, 1965, 1977, 1989, 2001, 2013 Horse 1918, 1930, 1942, 1954, 1966, 1978, 1990, 2002, 2014 Goat 1919, 1931, 1943, 1955, 1967, 1979, 1991, 2003, 2015 Monkey 1920, 1932, 1944, 1956, 1968, 1980, 1992, 2004, 2016 Rooster 1921, 1933, 1945, 1957, 1969, 1981, 1993, 2005 Dog 1922, 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006 Pig 1923, 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995, 2007

*The year ends on the first new moon of the following year. For those born in January and February, please take care when determining your sign.

and furniture revival company featuring one-of-a-kind pieces. Louie had previously worked at big name companies like Free People, Ralph Lauren, and Eddie Bauer.

“At Free People, I learned to appreciate vintage clothing. At Ralph Lauren, I learned to honor and respect authenticity in clothing and design. At Eddie Bauer, I learned the importance of holding on to heritage and brand value rooted in rich history. What I’ve learned is my true passion for all things vintage, Americana, and preserving our history,” Louie explained.

Louie decided that she needed a change in her life when she began to feel trapped in her routine.

“Routine might be the number one killer of creative motivation. The higher you move up in the fashion design world, the less ‘creative’ you become and more time is spent with emails, charts, and meetings,” she said.

Purchasing their home and restoring it themselves reminded her that working with her hands was when she was at her best.

She loved the restoration process, curating space from top to bottom.

Vo, who started his own land development and homebuilding company, spends a lot of time thinking about construction since it’s his day job and helps with restoring their home during his off hours. It’s been an interesting balance.

“It takes a lot of commitment, but mostly it’s because I love what I do, and there is nothing more rewarding than building your own company and building your own home with your two hands. Both projects need my love, sweat, and tears. My business is a balance between time, budget, and creative conviction. Our home has little balance. It is a culmination of how we feel and what we love, period. It’s more a test of endurance,” he explained.

Louie said that the experience has been positively consuming. It has managed to strengthen her relationship with Vo and changed the trajectory of her creative career. The love of their home spiraled into the love of architectural salvage, then turned into a love for furniture repurposing and grew into a passion for curating beautiful spaces.

“The vintage clothing that I loved in the fashion industry transformed into hunting for vintage home goods and furniture. I love salvaging materials that other people have discarded and restoring [these materials] to their former glory with a modern twist,” Louie added.

The gratification of finishing a room

Photos from The Hudson House

DIY from 1

Jessica Louie and Alex Vo breathe new life into a claw-foot tub, which is a part of their renovation project, the Hudson House.

together with their bare hands and learning new home renovation skills really motivated them to continuing renovating the house on their own.

In less than a year, they’ve already remodeled the entire second level of the home. In addition, they removed all of the wall plaster, vaulted the master bedroom ceiling, replaced the flooring, added a master bathroom with a restored claw foot tub, subway tiled the guest bathroom from floor to ceiling, exposed the brick chimney, refinished the original doug fir flooring downstairs, restored the original hallway that was turned into a storage unit, paint strip the stair handrail, re-shingled the roof, and painted the whole house.

They have found architectural salvage material from Earthwise Seattle, good furniture finds from Habitat for Humanity stores, as well as the Offer Up app.

Despite their progress, there is still much to be done. Their next projects will be the powder bath and kitchen.

How the kitchen will look in the end is still a mystery to them, but they know it will have some combination of marble, subway tile, and a front apron porcelain sink.

They’re taking their time to work out the

details because they believe the kitchen is the heart of the home, where they will share wonders, worries, and laughs.

All this progress didn’t come without its challenges though.

Louie explained that one of the biggest challenges of DIY has been the endless number of trips back to Home Depot because they forgot something or messed up.

Not only have the two grown more patient with each other, but they have learned new things about one another that they never knew before.

“Alex surprises me with his ability to talk to anyone about everything! I’ve learned that, in construction, the personalities involved can be challenging, from contractors, to realtors, to city inspectors.

Alex impresses me every day with his patience and charm and his amazing ability to win over the toughest audience,” Louie said.

“I learned that, above all else, Jessica refuses to compromise on any aspect of design vision. And I believe that it’s because she has an incredibly keen sense of what feels right and what doesn’t, and that is the separating factor of what makes our home special and unique,” Vo said.

Louie added that you don’t really know your spouse until you’ve worked with them.

That being said, she wouldn’t recommend it to everyone.

“It takes specific personalities, but for us it works. To be honest, I was worried at first that working with Alex on our home and in both our businesses would create unnecessary stress in our relationship, but it did just the opposite. Now we share our worlds on every level, and the person you trust the most can now help you navigate through the toughest work decisions, which ultimately always affects both parties.

Our love has become multifaceted, and it goes beyond, ‘What’s for dinner?’” she explained.

In addition to restoring the Hudson House, Louie works on creating home goods and reviving furniture for her company, Hudson Louie.

“Sometimes when you can’t find exactly what you want, you just have to make it yourself,” Louie said.  For more information on the progress of their home and other DIY projects, visit hudsonlouie.com.

Jessica Louie installs white subway tiles in the Hudson House

Nina Huang can be reached at info@ nwasianweekly.com.

asianweekly northwest

16

34 YEARS

NOVEMBER 19 – NOVEMBER 25, 2016

PHAM from 8 “And,” Pham added, “many voices, unified, is stronger than just one voice.”

After landing in a refugee camp, Vietnamese refugees typically had to wait to be processed — sometimes for months, sometimes for years — often getting shuffled around to other camps in Southeast Asia as they await news on where they’d ultimately end up. Pham and his family were sponsored by a Floridian and they landed there, after a stopover in Seattle, the first port.

“He wandered around for a weekend down there,” said Julie. “And he knew he couldn’t live in Florida, so he borrowed money to come back to Seattle.”

Pham started life in the United States delivering pizzas and newspapers to maintain cash flow, while he and Hang Nga attended college. (Hang Nga later had to drop out to raise Julie and her two siblings, Andy and Don.) The lingering dream of owning and running a newspaper for the Vietnamese diaspora continued to become more and more tangible.

“He wanted to do something that had an impact, something that meant something beyond working for a big corporation,” said Julie. “So he started the newspaper.”

Growing

In Northwest Vietnamese News’ early life, Pham would work at the paper’s Rainier Valley office (the paper is still headquartered in the Valley today) until midnight before he headed home to get a few hours of sleep, then getting up for a 6 a.m. start time at the shipyard.

Today, Pham is also his paper’s editor in chief, its guiding editorial voice, and he has been the Vietnamese correspondent for Voice of America, a U.S. governmentfunded multimedia news source with international reach for the last 30 years.

He grew Northwest Vietnamese News enough to be able to quit his job at Tacoma Boatbuilding Co. Northwest Vietnamese News became the business that paid for the college educations of his three kids. More broadly though, Northwest Vietnamese News — with more than 100 pages spread out over two editions a week, with television broadcast association (Saigon Broadcasting Television Network, a 24-hour Vietnamese programming network based in the United States) and media partnership with The Seattle Times — has become a vehicle for empowerment for Vietnamese Americans.

“We’ve extensively covered Sound Transit, the Seattle’s First Hill Streetcar, the proposed development of Little

Photo from Julie Pham

A dream

Kim Pham with his children, in the 1990s, from left: Julie, Don, and Andy

Saigon,” said Pham. “Because Vietnamese and Asian people will be displaced with these construction projects, whether due to road changes or closures or because existing small businesses cannot afford to keep their stores open after shopping centers have been ‘upgraded’ from one-story mom and pop storefronts to eight-story complexes.”

“Similar things have happened historically — like how Chinatown residents were pushed out and displaced with the construction of the Kingdome (1979),” he added. “I want to raise awareness so that people know that they don’t have to stay quiet as they get pushed out of their homes and businesses. I want people to have a place in their city and a voice. And I feel a strong responsibility to build cultural awareness, to keep our community unified and strong — undiluted.”

The person behind the camera

Pham’s a quiet and soft-spoken man with a camera always in hand — sometimes covering his face. He is still very much a workaholic. Beyond his regular duties writing, editing, and managing the newspaper, he is a constant fixture at events, forums, meetings — anything warranting news coverage — yet, according to Julie, he hates networking.

“So that he doesn’t have to mix and mingle, he looks for a story to cover, for a person to photograph or interview,” said Julie. “That’s just like him — to promote others and never himself.”

Nearly every bit of his awake hours are devoted to the paper. And even though Northwest Vietnamese News is a Vietnamese-language paper, Pham spends much of his time interfacing with non-Vietnamese community and political leaders.

“I talk to people about the paper, and I give them a copy,” said Pham. “Even if they can’t read it, they know that this community is involved and is concerned with certain issues.

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When they see my face — the Vietnamese voice becomes more tangible to them. When they see me with this paper, it’s not like they’re just seeing me as Kim Pham, but they are seeing the Vietnamese people.”

Civic-mindedness is a prominent concern of Pham’s — it’s what he wants to talk about the most and what he keeps visiting and revisiting when he was interviewed. He kept softening certain declarations — stating that political alignments and the conflicts that can arise from disagreements aren’t important, nor are they productive. He kept repeating that collaboration between disparate communities and people is very important, and he kept advocating positive action over complacency.

And — as is a common tendency among first generation Vietnamese Americans who have lost a lot in their lives — he often veers into the darker side of things automatically, unconsciously. Along with bragging about his kids and the successes of his community, he will also touch on regrets.

“It’s been 30 years,” he said. “I thought we would leave something very strong for our children — but sometimes it’s hard. Vietnamese people in Seattle — we don’t have a senator or a councilmember or someone high up in political office to voice this community’s concerns. Sometimes there are things we face that are insurmountable. Sometimes despite our best efforts, we become dispersed anyway. And I don’t want to pass the buck onto the younger generation — so we just have to keep on pushing for more.”

“My two wishes are that we have a strong voice, so that people know that we are here, that we are devoted to this country. This place is our home. My other wish is that Vietnamese will broaden their vision for themselves. Parents need to teach their kids the importance of having a voice and of civic involvement — there’s more to life than just being a doctor or software engineer or just chasing jobs that bring in financial success. That kind of financial success can foster a private, insular life.”

“We have people with the talent and endurance to be community and political leaders,” added Pham. “We need to encourage them because when we teach people to just allow life to just happen to them — it’s a loss and a waste. We need more representation.”  Kim Pham will be honored on Dec. 2 at the Northwest Asian Weekly’s annual Top Contributors Awards Dinner, held at the House of Hong Restaurant in Chinatown.

For more information on Northwest Vietnamese News, visit nvnorthwest.com/en.

Stacy Nguyen can be reached at stacy@nwasianweekly. com.

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