Chinese economy surpasses Japan

China is now the world’s second largest economy after it surpassed Japan, according to numbers released Monday (today).  Experts are estimating that it will surpass the U.S. by 2030.

Two thoughts:

1. The article says,

Economists say that China’s economy is too heavily dependent on exports and investment and that it needs to encourage greater domestic consumption — something China has struggled to do.

First, I’m not sure this will be a problem.  Right now people in China don’t yet have the money to engage in consumerism, but once those salaries hit a critical threshold, I’d be surprised if it continues to be a problem.

Second, I’m not sure that I understand this completely.  I guess you can’t have a company like, say, Ikea, if your population isn’t buying home furnishings.  But shouldn’t we be discouraging consumerism for the sake of the environment?  After 9/11, Dubya told us all to go out shopping, and I’m not sure that was such great advice.  Spending and consuming is one way to get the economy going, but if you’re exporting and investing and making money from outside the country, I don’t see what the problem is.  (I may be missing something here, so please feel free to explain it to me.  I looked up this WSJ article that says more consumption will create less dependence on foreign customers, but that doesn’t seem to me to be a reason to encourage your people to spend.)

2. The article says:

Assessing what China’s newfound clout means, though, is complicated. While the country is still relatively poor per capita, it has an authoritarian government that is capable of taking decisive action — to stimulate the economy, build new projects and invest in specific industries.

That, Mr. Lardy at the Peterson Institute said, gives the country unusual power. “China is already the primary determiner of the price of virtually every major commodity,” he said. “And the Chinese government can be much more decisive in allocating resources in a way that other governments of this level of per capita income cannot.”

This is quite interesting.  Does this mean centralized federal monetary and financial policy is the wave of the future?  (Some conservatives and libertarians already think that we have this.)

Posted in Knowledge, News | Tagged , | 6 Comments

Never Let Me Go, in theaters Sept. 15

a) This movie looks okay.
b) The novel was amazing.
c) I was going to write a review of the book, talk about the writer Kazuo Ishiguro’s ungodly skill at storytelling, marvel about the way he jumps into characters in unique situations, become jealous at the way he can write as if almost a stream of consciousness even though every piece falls into place to create a tight story, and talk about the uniqueness and wonders of the characters themselves, but I couldn’t write up anything in a timely fashion that would do justice to this book.
d) The book is awesome, probably MUCH better than the movie, but if you don’t have time for the book, check out the movie.

Posted in News, media | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Building Subcultures and Accepting Emotions

Quest Crew

I’m at the car dealership right now, getting one of the seatbelts on my car fixed. I accidentally broke it while installing a car seat, and now it’s gonna cost me. But man, this waiting room is high tech. Free wireless, free donuts, free coffee, lots of big screen TVs with CNBC. Plus a kids area.

Anyway, a fellow bigWOWO reader e-mailed me a link to a fashion and writing blog written by two Asian female bloggers. I thought it was an interesting blog since it was written by two young Asian women from top-tier MFA writing programs who were interested in fashion.  You can tell the women are very smart by the way they write. These women are the type who read French poetry, get turned on by reading Joyce, and are totally off the wall artsy.  There was a post about Orientalism and fetishism in fashion advertising that the bigWOWO commenter linked. The woman ripped a new one into Christian Dior with charges of Orientalism, and the post was so popular that Jezebel reprinted it.  Clicking through the links and posts–and I wasn’t trying to find this, I swear–but I learned that one of the bloggers is married to yup, you guessed it, a White man, while the other is dating yup, you guessed it, a White man. I won’t link their blog because I don’t feel like pissing anyone off (and I do appreciate that they spoke out against orientalism), but I’m sure you all can find it on Google.

I was talking to the aforementioned bigWOWO reader, who is an Asian female, and I pointed out that once again, the AFCC was recruiting members like sugar to fire ants.  I know, I know, politics and personal are not supposed to overlap.  But it’s hard for an Asian male to read through a rant about how bad White men are against minorities because of colonialism, sexism, Orientalism, and god-knows-whatever-other-isms, and then see that it comes from women who are both married or serious with White men, to the exclusion of the many single Asian guys out there.  And yes, there are lots of single Asian men out there.  Figure in the fact that artsy Asian women who rant non-stop about these -isms almost always limit their dating pools to White men, and it becomes hard to hear for an Asian brother.  In stock market terms, it’s like pump and dump.  “You are against White racism?  Great!  But you won’t date me because you’re only attracted to White men?  Ch*nks need not apply? Uh…great, I guess.  I’ll support you.  Sure.”

Anyway, my co-commenter and I were talking about artsy, Wei Hui types, and how they almost ALWAYS date White men, occasionally mix it up with a Black or Hispanic men, and, in the words of the ever eloquent tokyolovestory from the Fighting44s, “avoid Asian cock like it was the plague,” and my co-commenter said to me, “Well, when you were single, and if you were younger, would you date an artsy woman like this, or would you judge her?”

I said I would definitely date someone like that, and she said, “You wouldn’t see a woman like that as wife material.  Very few Asian guys would.”

Maybe.  Okay, she’s right.  They’re not my type to begin with.  I think I’m more of someone who wants to be a community builder rather than a rebel.  In my case personally, though, total artsy Asian women are usually completely turned off by guys who like me anyway, guys who are in fields like banking and who read angry writers like Frank Chin and Malcolm X.  If an Asian brother had any chance at all, he’d have more luck if he were holding a book by Dostoyevsky or Proust than one of the rabble rousing men of color.

Anyway, two thoughts:

1. Logically, Asian men should support women who speak out against Orientalism, regardless of who the women marry or what their sexual race preferences are.  But I do think Asian men are justified in the feelings that arise when said speaking out comes from AF/WM, given the history of the pairing, and given the fact that y’all are still shut out.

I mean, Asian men are human.  We are emotional beings.  The fact that an entire demographic (artsy Asian women) shuts us out is reason enough for us to experience negative emotions when getting involved in activist endeavors among demographics that shut us out.  If we were all like Spock–which is something I sometimes feel the Kingstonians want us to be while they run off with Captain Kirk or Scotty while stepping over Sulu–we could act rational about this and keep our emotions separate.  But I don’t think we should aspire to become Spock.  Spock’s lack of emotion was one reason that Captain Kirk was above him.  Captain Kirk had to “translate” by explaining to Spock what the rest of the crew was feeling because Spock couldn’t figure it out himself.

The answer, I think, is to express our emotions and to accept them.  I think we can do this without offending people.  It’s the Buddhist way of accepting what you’re feeling.  Take logic as logic is, and acknowledge the logical points that people say.  It’s not because we disagree with what they’re saying or whom they date, it’s because we Asian men have a growing desire to experience life and to be recognized as full human beings across all demographics. It’s a perfectly natural human reaction to gravitate more towards that which validates you–both in the political and personal realm.

2. I think there need to be active subcultures.  I’m not a super-artsy type, but we need to encourage super-artsy Asian male types to succeed and to find themselves.  Asian men and women come in all shapes, colors, and sizes, and it’s important that we encourage diversity of thinking and lifestyles within our population.

(Pic from here. I have no idea who Quest Crew is, but it’s another subculture that we need to encourage.)

Posted in Activism, Asian American, Features | Tagged , , | 282 Comments

RiceDaddies Founder on the Today Show

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Check out Jason Sperber, the co-chief of RiceDaddies, on the Today Show above. I think he is quickly becoming the most prominent Stay at Home Dad in the country. First RiceDaddies, then NPR, and now the Today Show with Matt Lauer. And neither he nor his wife is part of the Celebrity Club. I smell a book deal in the works!

More power to SAHDs. More power to SAHMs. When Pod or Gun gets sick, I often fall into SAHD mode, and I know it’s not an easy job. I’ve got all the respect in the world for those who can do it. I think Jason and Michelle have an ideal setup.

Posted in Asian American, News, media, parenting | Tagged | Leave a comment

Why Am I Doing This? (Review)

“Why Am I Doing This?” trailer from Tom Huang on Vimeo.

bigWOWO rating: Asian American Silver

Thanks to Alpha Asian, who sent me the DVD for Why Am I Doing This? by Tom Huang.  I was interested in the movie after reading Alpha’s review, and I’m glad he sent it.  Even though it was a bit hard to get through at times, I was happy to have seen it.

The story is about two best friends–a black guy and an Asian guy–who are trying to make it in the entertainment business.  The black guy, Lester, is a parking meter cop who does stand-up comedy at night.  The Asian guy, Tony, is a party entertainer/actor who is trying to land roles other than the stereotypical Asian roles.  In this movie, Lynn Chen plays the love interest of the Asian actor, while Sheetal Sheth plays the interracial love interest of the African American stand up comedian. Clyde Kusatsu, Tamlyn Tomita, and James Kyson Lee (who really should just go by the name “Kyson”) also make brief appearances.  Dion Basco plays the actor’s younger brother.

I’ve seen a number of reviews for this movie, and I agree with most of them, although I did enjoy the movie altogether.  Most normal film critics will think that the movie is too long, the quality of shot placement and storyline editing is spotty, and the jokes are often laborious.  The dialogue, even the dialogue around race, is stilted and feels forced.  I winced at some of the really horrible karaoke–which, even if it happens a lot in real life, is not fun to hear unless you’re drunk.  In the end, there was one quality above others that saved this movie–ambitious goals in creating racial dialogue.  It’s for this reason that I gave it a Silver.  There simply aren’t enough Asian American filmmakers directly addressing race, and for that reason, this gets a WOWO silver.

As Alpha said, the one stand out actor in this movie was Lynn Chen.

Tom Huang and Lynn Chen, in the scene where they deliver "the line"

Lynn Chen is the best actress I’ve seen in the Asian American romantic comedy genre.  Of course, I’ve only seen two AA romantic comedies and she happened to star in both, but even with that fact, she’s very good.  Her acting skills are awesome.  I really do think she has star power.  As I said in my post about “White on Rice,” she and Kyson created the most believable AA couple in film to date.  (Tom and Lynn, pictured above, had a lot less chemistry, partly because of the stilted storyline.)  Not only can Lynn Chen act, but she can sing too, as shown in the following deleted scene from White on Rice (I read another interview, and it seems that it’s her real voice):

Anyway, in the ferris wheel scene (two pics above), the couple discusses IR.  The character Tony mentions that he has only dated non-Asian women, while Lynn’s character says that she’s only dated Asian men.  Tony asks why she has only dated Asian, and she says because it “just felt right.”  It was a really bizarre dialogue/line.  I don’t know many Asian women who date mostly Asian (or Asian at all), but the ones who do usually don’t talk like that.  The line seemed very very very strange.  Even more than that, it was a strange line for a screenwriter (Tom Huang in this case) to include since it really added nothing to the movie and didn’t seem real.  I wondered if maybe Lynn suggested it based on personal experience, so I google searched to see if she was in the Asian Female Celebrity Club.  I got my answer.  Bottom line is that she’s a great actress who does a lot for the community.  I will check out all the films she makes.  I still have no idea where the screenwriter got that line or why he included it, which again dovetails with other bloggers’ criticism of the way this movie was written and planned.

One real criticism that I really have about this movie is distribution. You generally can’t see it unless you buy the physical DVD.  I think it would’ve been good if Tom Huang could’ve done the YouTube rental thing, the same way I saw Children of Invention.  (I don’t know how easy that is to set up, but it was convenient for me.)  So I recommend this film, but I don’t know how you all are going to be able to see it unless you’re rich and can lay down the money for a purchase.

Posted in Asian American, media | Tagged , , | 14 Comments

UFC 117 Sonnen vs. Silva Recap

I finally called a winner correctly.  Anderson Silva beat Chael Sonnen with just under two minutes left in the last round.  Many were predicting a submission as Chael has had all of his losses by submission and is somewhat susceptible to triangles.  I called for a KO because, well, I wanted to see a KO, but it just didn’t happen that way.  Instead Anderson caught his with a triangle/arm bar combination.

Funny aside: Chael tapped from that triangle choke/armbar, and then seemed to claim that he hadn’t tapped after ref Josh Rosenthal broke it up.  It was like his first fight with Paulo Filho where Sonnen turned to the ref and screamed after being caught in an armbar, and then tried to act like he never intended to submit. The Gracies call it “the Brazilian tap:

People were surprised as Sonnen was ahead of Silva for almost the entire fight.  As Sonnen predicted in his pre-fight interviews, he took Silva down, almost at will.  I personally was surprised that Sonnen was able to land some shots on Silva from the standing position.  Because I’m a big Silva fan, it was a bit hard to see Silva dominated like that, although I suppose it would have made quite a splash if Silva had lost.  It was also hard to watch given the nonsense that Sonnen had been spouting beforehand.  I know he was just trying to hype the fight–no one would care otherwise–but I would’ve liked to see him get it handed right back at him.

Now you’re going to read some things about this fight on the web about how Sonnen “dominated” Silva.  I guess that’s somewhat true if you feel that the top position is necessarily better than the bottom, but let me set the record straight on a few things, particularly with respect to the claim that Sonnen was beating up Silva.

First, people need to take the context into consideration.  Silva was in a very tough position.  He had Dana White threatening to fire him for not going for the finish.  Exactly why he gets threatened for not finishing while Sonnen never finishes his opponents is not really something I’d speculate on, but that’s some enormous pressure there.  Most guys get graded on results, but for whatever reason, Anderson gets the unfair burden of having to be exciting too. He couldn’t set the pace because Dana White was threatening to fire him.

Second, as Silva said after the fight, he was injured.  He had been training with Lyoto and judo Olympic gold medalist Ishii, which is why he wasn’t his usual self.  I think it was clear that he wasn’t moving as quickly as he usually does.

Third, it’s incorrect to say that Sonnen has been pounding on his opponents.  People need to examine what’s really happening in Sonnen’s fights.  Sonnen is good at Lay and Pray, NOT Ground and Pound.  He’s good at sitting on top of his opponent for three or five straight rounds and preventing his opponent from getting up.  But that doesn’t mean he’s inflicting damage.  His Marquardt and Silva fights were exactly the same–Sonnen spent oodles of time in the “top” position, while his opponents battered away on his head from the bottom.  He was bleeding all over Marquardt, and his eye was almost zippered shut by Silva’s elbows.  Both Marquardt and Silva looked clean after the fight.  Even after absorbing what Joe Rogan called “bombs” through twenty plus minutes of fighting, Anderson Silva’s face looked untouched.  There’s a reason why he has 0 knockouts in his UFC/WEC career.

In any case, it was a fun fight to watch.  Not as satisfying as I had hoped, but at least I called it right.  After the fight, both Sonnen and Silva showed class. Good work and congratulations to both men.

Also, I’m not usually a big Matt Hughes fan, but he had a really cool looking modified Anaconda Choke. Check it out.

Posted in MMA, News | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Raising Happiness by Christine Carter, Ph.D. (Review)

I sometimes put my name on the waiting lists for popular books at the library.  I requested the book Raising Happiness by Christine Carter probably three or four months ago.  I was #25 or #26 in line, and my turn finally came up just last week.

This is an excellent book, both for children and parents.  I don’t know what the rest of you think, but I know very few parents who consciously raise their kids for happiness.  Success, maybe, and confidence, maybe, but happiness?  I think many parents view happiness as a fleeting kind of state, one which pales in comparison to more concrete goals like achievement or academic skills.  I think Western cultures view happiness as more of a temporary state than a goal.

Which could be one of the reasons Carter includes quotes by the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hanh and other Buddhist teachers throughout this book.  Carter focuses on harmony by encouraging parents to:

1. Be happy themselves

2. Build a community/village around their children

3. Focus on the process, not the results

4. Teach gratitude, forgiveness, and optimism

5. Raise emotional intelligence

etcetera.

Check out this book if you’re looking for a good book on parenting.  If more parents focused on their children’s happiness, the world would be a much happier place.  Some may think of “happy” children as those who sit around playing video games and not achieving, but Carter focuses on encouraging a child’s intrinsic motivation to succeed and to contribute to society as a means of achieving happiness.  She talks about praising effort as a means to encourage children to do their best.  How often do children these days see the glass half full rather than half empty?  I think it’s a worthwhile goal that could do wonders for our children.

Posted in Reviews, books, parenting | Tagged , , | 14 Comments

Should Lyoto retire?

This is an interesting video.  ESPN talks to Lyoto Machida’s father Shinzo and asks if Lyoto should retire.  Shinzo says that Lyoto should retire, that he has spoken with the rest of his family about his opinion but has yet to raise the issue with Lyoto.

I think part of the reason Yoshizo wants him to retire is that Lyoto is Yoshizo’s son.  It must be hard watching your son getting beaten up by a fighter like Shogun Rua.  The interesting part for me, however, was at the end, when Yoshizo talks about spirit, and how physical injuries heal quick while injuries to the spirit can take years to recover. This was exactly why I was calling for Machida to fight someone very easy in his next outing.  (This, of course, is pretty hard to find.  That 205 division is stacked with talent.)

I think what great parents do for their children is to build up their spirit.  A person with a strong spirit can always find a way to get knowledge or experience that he needs to succeed.  A person with a weak spirit can only react.

Posted in Asian American, MMA, parenting | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

David Brooks: Well Planned vs. Summoned

David Brooks nails it again.  The guy is a national treasure.

In his latest column, he writes about two different ways in which people plan their lives.  The first he calls the Well-Planned Life, and he references this article by Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen (It’s a brilliant piece in itself, so please check it out.  Actually, I was thinking of blogging about this article by itself, but time constraints are preventing me.  I might do it in the future.  Maybe.  No promises.).  Christensen planned his own life by spending an hour a day thinking about “why God put [him] on this earth.”  Through dedicated effort, he found his purpose.  Brooks correlates this mindset with Christensen’s Christianity.  This to me was very interesting since Kobukson recently spoke about how Christianity affects culture.

The other way of living one’s life that Brooks describes is one that he calls the Summoned Life.  Brooks describes it as follows:

This mode of thinking starts from an entirely different perspective. Life isn’t a project to be completed; it is an unknowable landscape to be explored. A 24-year-old can’t sit down and define the purpose of life in the manner of a school exercise because she is not yet deep enough into the landscape to know herself or her purpose. That young person — or any person — can’t see into the future to know what wars, loves, diseases and chances may loom. She may know concepts, like parenthood or old age, but she doesn’t really understand their meanings until she is engaged in them.

In this style of living/planning, one accepts what comes along based on circumstances and context.  Someone who practices the Summoned Life makes decisions based on where he or she can fit within the current context.  As Brooks notes at the end, the Well Planned Life is popular in America, while the Summoned Life is common in other (non-Christian?) places.

For most artists and maybe even activists, I think there needs to be a little of both.  You don’t know what you can or cannot do until you actually step foot in the arena, but at the same time everyone needs goals.

Posted in Strategy | Tagged , , | 19 Comments

A Great Wall

Does anyone remember this movie?  (Sorry, the video above has some issues with the audio.)  It was called “A Great Wall,” and I remember seeing it on an airplane way back when in the mid-80′s.  I think it was the first Asian American film I had ever seen. What a load of fun!  The one scene I remember most is when the father says, “We’re going to China,” and the son turns to his Caucasian girlfriend and says, “Did you hear what he said?  We are going to China!”  Good times.

Anyway, I saw a comment on Asian Male Revolution’s Facebook that came from Kelvin Han Yee, the guy who played the son, and I was reminded of his movie.

Posted in Asian American, history, media | Tagged , , | 3 Comments