Anzu, FGM v. MGM, And Upcoming Watermelon Sushi Events

Hey Hip Hapa Homeez,

I'm so hapa to hear from so many of you! As promised, each week I'll be posting stories and photos about you and your mixed-race experiences.

This week, allow me to introduce Anzu (aka Anzu Kristina Lawson). A very talented Los Angeles-based musician, actress and comedienne, Anzu is half Japanese and half Caucasian. Check out her story and accompanying pix, below:

"This is my parents', John and Keiko Lawson's, wedding photo taken in Japan. I was born seven months after it was taken. My dad was a G.I. stationed in Japan after the Korean war. My parents are divorced now. There was definitely a language barrier between them, but they managed to make two pretty cool daughters. My father fought prejudice because my mother was Japanese and Pearl Harbor was still fresh in people's minds, especially in Oregon. I remember my mother really craving Japanese food and having boxes of seaweed, noodles, pickled radish and condiments shipped from Japan by her relatives. Back in those days, they didn't have very many ethnic food stores like they do today. The ONE thing my parents had in common was that they both loved music. That passion was something they gave me, from both of them, besides their wonderful genes. I have a single out on itunes that is available under ANZU called TWO WRONGS. It's a rock duet featuring Sonny, the lead singer from the band P.O.D. (Columbia Records)."

Now, back to that FGM (First Generation Multi-racials, or Mulattos) v. MGM (Multi Generation Multi-racials) debate. Here's a response from Chancellor Files:

"I read the Watermelon Sushi World blog, and what Yayoi wrote about the FGM and MGM world that you (Kahlil Crawford) introduced her to. There are serious tensions between the two camps. I feel from what I’m seeing and hearing is that some FGM's are frustrated because there are light-skinned MGM's who look just as mulatto, and sometimes even lighter in complexion, than many biracials. They feel this helps FGM's remain seen as black because people are so used to seeing light-skinned MGM's.

Some FGM's are sad because light-skinned MGM's are lighter than some of them and, therefore, seen as mixed when the darker biracials are just seen as black first and mixed second. This is something that needs to be talked about among mixed-race people who are FGM's and MGM's.

This is why there is a forum so people can discuss these issues. This topic will come up eventually again, and it should."

And, still on that subject, I received the following from AllPeople Gifts:

"Hi Yayoi,

After having read your great article found at your website via the following link

http://watermelonsushiworld.blogspot.com/2009/05/susans-story-fgm-v-mgm-rain-brown-girl.html

in which you discussed the matter of MGM-Mixed and FGM-Mixed lineages, I thought you might be interested in learning about and becoming familiar with, as well as possibly joining, any or all of three (3) Mixed-Lineage discussion groups listed below.

Thus, we would like you to view this memo as a very cordial invitation to take a look at and to perhaps also consider joining and becoming a member (via either ‘active posting’ and/or ‘quiet perusal’) of any or all of the three (3) groups --- as we would be very honored to have you join in with us and our online communities."

The groups are as follows:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Generation-Mixed

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MGM-Mixed

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FGM-Mixed

Hey, Hip Hapa Homeez, we're getting close to the Mixed Roots Film and Literary Festival taking place in Los Angeles in June. Don't forget to stop by to check out our Mixed-Race Relationships panel including Sam Cacas, Sachiko Jackson and Ann Carli. If you'd like a program schedule, drop me an email at hiphapa@comcast.net

That same weekend, Watermelon Sushi producers will be auditioning talent for our film. If you haven't already sent us your reels, headshots and resumes, it's too late. But if you'd like to be considered for a role without auditioning, go to the Hip Hapa Homeez group on Facebook for breakdowns. Remember, rapper Miwa Lyric will be in the house!

Oh, and my good friend Amina asked that I post the following:

"Share your experience as a person of mixed heritage with MixedChild.com, an online community celebrating the achievements of multiracial people. All are welcome - from childhood experiences to dating, beauty, family and inspiration for your art/career– tell us your story!

Contact:

info@mixedchild.com

Please include your name, contact details (email or phone number) and best time to reach you . We can either arrange a phone interview or you can send us an essay written in first-person."

Until next time, I am and will always be...

Your Hip Hapa,

Yayoi

Hapawood, Not Hollywood!

Several days ago, I met a man walking around downtown gathering signatures for a petition. He smiled a lot and seemed enthusiastic about life so I started a conversation with him. For some reason, his facial features and body language suggested to me that he was Kenyan.

"Close," he replied when I asked. "I'm from Uganda."

As we discussed politics, we veered towards other topics, like my writing film reviews. Glancing at me sideways, he asked what I thought about The Last King of Scotland. I rolled my eyes before responding, "It was very Hollywood, wasn't it?" adding, "But what do you think? You're Ugandan. Was that a factual story about Idi Amin or even about Ugandans in general?"

The man, Vincent, shook his head. It's not that I don't believe Amin wasn't a brutal dictator, but some of the scenes just made me throw my hands up in disbelief. It's like when The Last Samurai, or Memoirs of a Geisha, was released. I just about gagged watching Tom Cruise's character become an overnight samurai. Come on now, we're talking about a privileged class of people in feudal Japan that one had to be born into. And, here was this goofy gaijin only six months into Japan and already fluent in the language! (Shades of Richard Chamberlin in Shogun.) You could've knocked me over with an udon noodle. Here, I've known my Japanese mother for decades (let's not discuss how many), who speaks a mishmash of broken English and Japanese to me, and I'm nowhere near fluent. Just because you're an Asianphile doesn't mean you're Asian!

As for Memoirs of a Geisha...three modern Chinese actresses playing very culturally specific roles that takes even Japanese women who aspire to such a career years of careful preparation. Need I say more? (Sorry to dis you Gong Li and Michelle Yeoh! I'm a huge fan of both, but...)

The question is why does Hollywood feel entitled to take such liberties with inaccurate portrayals of a people, or a culture, or a race that they don't intimately know. The answer's simple. Because they can.

I remember once complaining to the editor of a screenwriters magazine about Tina Fey. He had organized a Q&A with her following a screening of Mean Girls which she wrote. After seeing the film, I was livid that all the Asian American high school kids had thick accents and even spoke some Asian language, Vietnamese, I believe. So, I mentioned to the organizer how appalled I was by those scenes. Instead of asking me to substantiate my claims about Fey creating stereotypical images of Asian Americans, he dismissed me by telling me I was wrong. Further, he added, the Asian Americans in the film were authentic and Tina Fey had them pegged because a lot of Asians in high school aren't Native English speakers and would revert to their own language when fighting with other students--in California! Now, hold up. Do you need an instant replay of that?

This organizer, by the way, is not Asian American (he's Jewish), and Tina Fey certainly isn't Asian American, but I am--at least half of me is--and I was told point blank that both of them know more about Asian Americans than I do. How, exactly, does that work? Should I write a script based on Jewish or Caucasian American characters and when a representative from their group tells me they are offended by my inaccuracy, argue with them?

In times like this, the realization hits home. We are truly the minority because if we had any kind of pull at all, Hollywood would not be able to cast Angelina Jolie in blackface to play a mixed-race black woman in 2007 (A Mighty Heart). But it goes beyond actors because until writers and directors of color are as visible as minority movie stars, we are just not going to get our authentic stories onto the silver screen.

Something that's been really bugging me is the glut of documentaries about impoverished folks, mostly of color, around the globe that are rarely made by people of color. But when you think about it, that makes sense. Who can afford to go to film school these days? Few people of color. And even if their families do have money, the kids aren't encouraged to pursue arts because there's the perception (especially in Asian families) that making movies is not real work or that it has no fixed future. So, we get a proliferation of white filmmakers who not only have the technical know-how to make movies, but who also have the opportunity to make the all-important contacts that will propel them into careers either with the studios or with independent producers--a growing force. It is they who ultimately make decisions about how we, so-called ethnics, are portrayed onscreen which, in turn, is how the world will perceive us.

Several years ago, I was in Honolulu when former Tri-Star/Columbia producer Christopher Lee hosted the writers and director of Final Fanstasy for a talk at University of Hawai'i at Manoa. Of course, being studio guys, they were all white. And, young. And, male. As they looked out over the audience of locals (mostly Asian, Asian-mixed, Polynesian and Melanesian folks), one of them said, "You guys should be telling your own stories." I snickered. He said it so matter-of-fact, as if we had the resources and connections, as if we'd even be allowed. But wait, you say M. Night Shyamalan is a Hollywood fixture and he's a minority and he's telling his own stories. Oh, yeah? What kind of stories? True life depictions of the Indian American experience? I think not. That would be left to a white filmmaker who, picking up a camera and some grant money, visits M. Night's family and soon produces a documentary of epic proportions like, dare I say it, Born Into Brothels.

Even though I give it props for being a spectacular doc with an amazing story, some scenes in it veered so closely to a "big white filmmaker saves little darky pickaninnies" theme that it made me downright uncomfortable. After all, what could a British Caucasian woman (the co-producer seen onscreen) know about the souls of the Indian children whose lives she uncovered? It was her country that colonized them, thus, contributing to their current state of being. But to be fair, I think the film exposes some very important issues about Calcutta's redlight district children of prostitutes. And, I happily salute the filmmakers for giving those children hope and visibility. So did the Academy which awarded them an Oscar. Still, I felt a sense of entitled opportunity in Zana Briksi's efforts; some feeling of "let's film some impoverished children in an emerging nation or third world country" flavor-of-the-month bid that made me cringe. That's when I wondered had a native made the documentary instead, with an imprint stamped "authentic", would s/he had been able to create a film that didn't come across so anthropological and studied as if s/he had been standing at arms length? And, would that native filmmaker been able to raise the kind of funds or garner the kind of publicity and accolades that the Caucasian filmmakers did?

All that wondering contributed to my pleasure upon recently viewing a documentary called Lakshmi and Me. Made by an Indian filmmaker, the story about her maid is so in-your-face, there's no doubt it's all real. But, the true tenderness of the filmmaker is in her humble admittance of her role as oppressor by virtue of her higher caste--something I doubt Briski and company is capable of acknowledging about themselves.

Which leads me to this: We need to start a movement, and that movement will be Hapawood. It's time to overthrow Hollywood and create our own. If you've been reading me for awhile, you know that I believe the word hapa is just a Hawai'ian mispronunciation for the word half and all of us blendies and mixies should call ourselves that. Now that we have a name we should build on it. I've already created the t-shirt (http://www.cafepress.com/hapateez) so let us begin by writing and producing our own films about hapas. All we need is a sound plan, a solid foundation, and a commitment to cohesiveness and authenticity.

Let me know. Hollah.

Your Hip Hapa,

Yayoi

Before I could finish writing this blog, I got an email from Anzu Lawson. Half Japanese herself, she's performing a reading of her script Full On this Sunday afternoon. If you're in L.A., stop by Raleigh Studios at 4 pm for the Screen Play Lab and an authentic hapa experience. That's Anzu, above, singing hapa birthday to me a few years ago at my favorite Santa Monica Thai Restaurant--Siam Place.