It’s been a rough start to this week in America. Two mass shootings in California, a day apart, targeting Asian Americans, have left many of us unsure how to respond. I know it will be a few days before I have a coherent response other than grief and shock. I also know better than to opine here on specific issues related to the shootings.
From a practical standpoint, my job as a strategic communications consultant has been to help people to speak up, now, where it’s appropriate. I’ve counseled others to get out of the way for other voices. Some of my clients are Asian American and it’s been a privilege to work with them this week.
Not directly related to the shootings, these three inspiring articles stood out to me for depicting remarkable resilience and strength. They are all about Asian American women. So, I wanted to share them with you. I hope you’ll share their stories too, as we move through a challenging week together.
Betty Lee Sung
The New York Times ran an obituary in the paper on Tuesday morning and online last Friday for Betty Lee Sung, a pioneering scholar of Chinese in America. She died at 98. The photo by Jack Manning of Dr. Sung teaching in New York in 1972 dominated the page in the print edition. I looked at it for a few minutes alongside reading the article, and found her bearing very inspiring. I also loved this quote from a memoir about Dr. Sung’s “first 90 years.”
“As the youngest girl, I always knew I was the least important person in our family,” she wrote. “I did not feel less important, and I found it difficult to act so.”
I love it when somebody overcomes people’s underestimations.
Eileen Yin-Fei
The Times also ran an obituary online yesterday for Eileen Yin-Fei Lo, a pioneer in teaching Americans to cook traditional Chinese food. Ms. Yin-Fei died on Nov. 13 at her home in Montclair, N.J. She was 85. Her death was not widely reported at the time. She had no online presence and didn’t cultivate a social media following. Nevertheless, she is widely regarded as a principal authority on Chinese cooking in the United States. And she sounds like she was a joy to be around.
She would frequently take friends and colleagues to Chinatown in Lower Manhattan, where she taught them how to navigate the shops and restaurants and showed them her favorite places to get ginger, sausage or dim sum.
“Everybody loved her,” said Justin Schwartz, who edited a few of Ms. Lo’s cookbooks in the 1990s. “She would get private side rooms you didn’t even know existed on upper floors of restaurants in Chinatown.”
I’m sad I didn’t get to be her friend, too.
Assunta Ng
Seattle Times reporter Daniel Beekman published a profile on Friday of the publisher of the Seattle Chinese Post and Northwest Asian Weekly, Assunta Ng. It’s beautifully written and a testament to Ms. Ng’s energy and dyanism. Here are the first four pars:
When Assunta Ng decided to start a Chinese-language newspaper in Seattle, many of her potential readers and advertisers were skeptical.
Because Ng was an outsider, having grown up in Hong Kong. Because she was a woman with young children at home. Because she insisted she had no political agenda on issues like relations between China and Taiwan.
“The only way I could think to prove myself,” recalled Ng, who subsequently also launched an English-language newspaper with pan-Asian content, “was to come out every week on time.”
So, that’s what she did. Week after week. For 41 years.
I love that last paragraph, there. It’s a lifetime’s grit and tenacity leveraged into 11 words!
Each story is tinged with sadness. The first two, obviously, are obituaries. The piece about Ms. Ng marks the end of the print edition of her newspaper. Nevertheless, I feel very lucky to live in America, where such remarkable women have been able to forge their paths and influence the culture. This country is better for their contributions and for those of millions of other Asian American Women like them.
Have the best week you can, won’t you?
