- [Narrator] Coming up on One Detroit.

We're bringing you conversations from our AAPI Story Series in recognition of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month.

We'll hear from an Ypsilanti couple who came to the United States as children and are pursuing their versions of the Asian American dream.

Plus, a Michigan State University grad reflects on a class that opened her eyes to the contributions of Asian Americans.

Also ahead, a Filipino adoptee talks about growing up in metro Detroit, and two local men forge a friendship over their shared experiences as Asian Americans.

It's all coming up next on One Detroit.

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(serene music) - [Narrator] Just ahead on One Detroit.

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month, and we're sharing stories that reflect the lives of the AAPI community in Southeast Michigan.

We'll meet two women who formed a lasting bond at Michigan State University because of their mutual interest in advocating for Asian Americans.

Plus, a metro Detroit man originally from the Philippines talks about his experience growing up in the region, and two local men reflect on what it means to them to be Asian American.

But first up, an Ypsilanti couple invited One Detroit to their home to capture a conversation for our AAPI Story Series.

Kyunghee Kim and Leo Chen talked about how their Asian American identities have shifted over the years and described their versions of the Asian American dream.

In this clip, Kim and Chen recall immigrating to the United States as children and how different their experiences were.

(serene music) - I think, you know, where you were going initially is that the immigration piece, you know, when you came over, when your parents immigrated over here, how old were you?

What was that like?

- I was eight years old, and my sister was six.

It was 1988, and it was very hard because it was, like, three days before Halloween.

And so Halloween happened and my sister and I were like, "What is happening?"

People were dressed up.

People were knocking on our doors trying to get candy.

We don't have any candy.

It was really terrifying and fascinating at the same time.

That's my core memory of moving to the US, and perhaps my feeling throughout, like how terrifying but how fascinating as well.

And I know you have kind of a different experience because you were three, so I don't know how much you remember, right?

- Yeah, so it's completely different than yours.

I feel that at age eight for you, it was a lot.

You were more observant.

You were more aware of your surroundings and just the difference of where you were before, South Korea and then coming to Michigan.

And so for me, I was three, but my parents had left me in Taiwan actually, so my grandma- - Which I did not even know until a couple years ago.

I guess I just assume that when any family comes to America that they just come with their family.

So it didn't dawn on me that, oh, your parents came without you.

It boggled my mind.

- You know, that's just culturally, that's something that everyone did back then in the eighties.

All of them came over to study, grad school, either master's or my dad getting his PhD.

And so I think during that time they were trying to survive.

They came over and they just thought, "Well, it's better for my dad's mom to take care of me "for the next three years."

And so I actually never met my father until I came.

And so I just remember my grandma taking me to Tennessee.

That's where they were initially 'cause they both went to Middle Tennessee University.

And so, first time meeting my dad was shocking, you know?

'Cause I just remember my grandma saying, "This is your dad," you know?

And I just stood there, and I think what won me over, really, was he bought all these toys and then he also bought candy.

And it was just so easy to just give my heart over.

The other shocking part was then my grandma left.

I just remember she came and then she left.

So I think that's something that I have not really reflected on until really more in these years, in my adult years, just as how tragic that was to be with someone for three years and then, all of a sudden, that someone who was safe, someone that I knew and and loved was gone.

With your parents, why did they come to the us?

- I didn't know for the longest time.

And so when I hear your story and even stories of our friends, many of them was their parents studied, came here to study, and I didn't know for a very long time, and I don't know if I wasn't curious or if I wasn't allowed to ask, but I never asked my parents until maybe, I don't know, five, 10 years ago or something like that.

So my dad was a huge accountant in Korea and worked at a big bank and did really well.

But he was tired of that work.

I mean, work culture in Korea is very toxic, and so he wanted something different, so he did a clothing business with my mom.

My mom was a stay at home mom, and that didn't go well.

And so my mom already had family here in America, her sisters, her mom even, and so my mom just thought, "Okay, we need to go to America if we wanna start over, right?"

And so it was coupled with that and then thinking about us, my sister and I and our future and what we could have, they thought, "Okay, this is the best decision."

So they literally went bankrupt from their clothing business, had no money, and just came to America, Michigan, because that's where all of her siblings were at, and we lived with my uncle who is my mom's youngest brother.

We lived with my uncle and his family for a little bit.

So that's why.

I think they just wanted to, or not wanted, but needed to start over and was maybe sort of thinking that, "Okay, this life in Korea is not going to work for us "or for our daughters."

- [Leo] Hmm.

I see.

- [Narrator] Let's turn now to the story of Brenda Hu, a 2015 graduate of Michigan State University.

One Detroit was there when she reunited on campus with her former student advisor, Meaghan Kozar.

The two talked about a class Kozar taught that made a major difference in Hu's life because it revealed the many contributions Asian Americans made to American history and civil rights.

(serene music) - Yeah, I don't know if you see this right here.

I don't know if we can do this.

- Ooh!

- [Meaghan] So this will bring back memories.

- "We must be the change we wish to see."

- [Meaghan] What was it?

2013?

Is it 2012 to '13?

- 2013 to 2014 it says.

- So how did you take that class?

It was SSC 293.

It was a social science class.

Intro to Asian Pacific American Studies.

- [Brenda] Rolls right off the tongue.

- Yeah, 'cause I think you took it as a senior.

- Yeah.

- So do you remember why you took that class?

- I think I heard about the Asian Pacific American Studies program through you and a few other of my friends.

While I was in college, I had a sorority sister.

She signed up for Asian Studies at Michigan State University because she wanted to learn more about her heritage and her identity, her background, her history.

She was born here, raised here, but it ended up being all about Asia overseas, and she was learning about China overseas and their practices there, which is great and that's fine, but she couldn't relate to it because she was like, "I don't know, I wasn't born there.

"I haven't been there in a long time."

And then that's when I had learned about the Asian Pacific American Studies program, and when I first took that class, I don't know if you remember this, Meaghan, but it just, everyone that ends up taking that class just gets so fired up and excited because for the first time in their educational academic careers, they're actually learning about their people and what it was like, right?

- Yeah, so I love it.

It used to be a one credit class.

I think when you took it, it might've been a three credit class I think.

People would not necessarily want to take the class because they didn't feel it was relevant or urgent or, you know, what is Asian American studies?

And so I would always love that challenge of them taking it just because they needed a credit, and then it being kind of this, "Oh my gosh, I didn't know what happened."

It's this, like, life changing moment.

And I really, really relish in that.

I love that.

I love that feeling of being able to open their eyes and wake them up to the injustices, that the perceived Asian Americans didn't have any issues or challenges.

- I brought this because I thought it'd be fun to see what's in it after all these years.

I have it written here.

2015 Brenda wrote, "European culture created the idea of Chinese."

Like even back then, we didn't get to be who we were.

We were being defined by European culture and what they wanted us to be and how they saw us, you know?

Do you remember that lesson about Martin Luther King?

- [Meaghan] Yes.

- And the Selma March in Alabama, I believe it was?

- Yeah, so it's this idea of these historical moments that shape the US and that civil rights, these kind of life changing moments of protests or resistance, and oftentimes Asian Americans are left out of those histories, right?

So the example of MLK and his march to Selma, he is shown with these leis around his neck.

We forget that while Asian Americans were not visibly there, and they were there, but oftentimes there's a snapshot of history that's distorted or very limited.

And it's just that example is that history of how Asian Americans supported Martin Luther King through the simple imagery of the leis.

We don't really talk about that or we leave that absent from our conversations of history.

- Yeah, Meaghan, such a good point, and I think that's why advocacy and activism and policy are so important because imagine if I had learned about that when I was 14, sitting in US history class.

I remember seeing that photo in my history book, and I had no idea where those leis came from until 10 years later when I went to college, and that was the first time ever in my life that I learned about my history and how we as Asian Americans were present, but we're just being omitted.

Imagine all of the children, regardless of their ethnicity who could learn about these histories that have just been invisible and not spoken about.

Because I recognize this.

Oh, wow!

And look!

- [Meaghan] There you are!

- [Brenda] Oh, baby Brenda.

- [Meaghan] That was a decade ago.

- [Brenda] Wow.

I do not recognize myself.

- And this was an amazing campaign, and it was a response to the hate and racism toward Asians in particular on Twitter, but then there were so many things happening in the hall, in the dorms across campus.

The idea of the APA studies class is to empower students.

It's about, you are, this is not you're learning about something else.

You're learning about yourself, about your history, about your culture, about your traditions within the US.

That doesn't mean that you can't celebrate your ethnic cultural traditions, right?

So you can embrace being Vietnamese and Chinese, right?

But your experiences within the US intersects with so many communities of color.

It's very US specific, right?

You have your likes, your hobbies, that influences popular culture, but we often don't talk about that, right?

It's when we talk about Asian Americans, it's Asians in Asia.

In Asia, it's you're Vietnamese or you're Filipino or whatever, right?

So the idea of the US I think it's also exciting, too, is that regardless of your specific ethnicity and your culture and traditions, we share this identity of activism, of resistance, of fighting back.

So that goes back to your view of us being viewed as submissive.

We have consistently fought back, resisted, but we aren't taught that, so that's what is key into the foundation of why APA studies or ethnic studies programs are important, to tell that whole story, not a distorted history.

And it's often students who have the privilege of going to college get that opportunity, right?

And it's like, it's an extra.

It's not part of it.

It's like, "Oh, you happen to come across it."

Since I've been here.

Like 15 years.

Yeah, but maybe this is, it's calling, you know?

Well, all the things that are happening now, maybe it's calling for us to revisit and do something like this in a united way.

- [Brenda] Isn't that crazy?

11 years later.

You think more would change, but not much, huh?

- [Narrator] Our next AAPI story focuses on Dan Moen, an adoptee from the Philippines.

He grew up in a loving family in metro Detroit, but was always curious about his past.

He sat down with his partner, Joe Hunter, to talk about exploring his identity.

Here, he shares about his experiences growing up as a Filipino in the Romeo area.

(serene music) - Diversity and culture is always what has driven you, sir, Mr. Moen, who comes from 23 Mile and Van Dyke in the probably one of the more Caucasian areas of the map.

- Well, yes.

Well, I grew up in an area up in the Romeo, Washington area and it is like 90 some percent white out there.

This is the National Honors Society drawing that I did.

- Weren't you the diversity in your classes?

- Me and the other adoptees.

Class of 2006.

There was a group of kids when I was in high school that flew this really gigantic confederate flag around our school, and I remember they used to interrogate me and they would interrogate other people, and it was really scary because it was that feeling of kind of like, as soon as you leave the house, and this is something that, I went to an adoption heritage camp not too long ago and we talked about this to other white parents who adopt children of other ethnicities.

You may raise a child one way in every possible shape and form with all the love and care, but you have to understand that the minute they leave your house, they're not seen as your children.

They're seen as a BIPOC person, as an LGBT person.

They're seen completely different.

I just remember that feeling of needing to belong was definitely something that kind of felt off.

Now I'm just speaking for myself.

I don't speak for all adoptees by any means, but it was just that feeling of kind of like, you know, you're not white enough to be white, but because of how I look, it was always like, "Where are you from?

You're so exotic.

"Are you from the area?

And I'm like, "I live at 29 Mile Road."

- Exotic.

- I had people touching my hair.

I had people- - Oh, oh, oh really?

Okay.

- Yeah, I remember one kid was just kind of like, "Poofy hair, poofy hair!"

But back in that time I didn't have the words and the language to explain what those feelings were because I didn't understand what microaggression was or aggressions were.

I didn't understand any of that, so I just thought it was just kind of like bullying, so I buried a lot of that growing up to where it was like, "Oh, it's just bullying."

'Cause that's what people told me.

"It's just bullying.

"They're mean, move on."

But it embeds into you.

It really embeds into you throughout most of your life.

And again, I don't speak for all adoptees, but for adoptees who come from different cultures, it's like you go into one circle and it's like, "You're not white, so we're gonna teach you this way."

But then sometimes you go into your own community and they're like, "What kind of a Filipino are you?

"Don't you know this and this and this?"

And it's like, no, I wasn't raised around Filipinos.

I don't speak this language.

I don't do these things.

So it was very difficult with that.

- I can only imagine.

It's funny 'cause I know that during the course of our relationship kind of teaching you the language around all of those things has been quite the journey for us.

Just because me being a Black man of color, I know about microaggressions.

There have been quite a many a times where I've had to deal with it, and so I know that that's like a lot of our relationship, a lot of how we connected has been me kind of seeing a situation and letting you know, "You know that what just happened "to you was messed up, right?

"Let me explain it."

- And it would go over my head all the time because, again, I didn't have the language to explain it.

I didn't know the wording of it.

I remember in high school I had a group of guys literally play off my Asian heritage as kind of a joke, and it wasn't until many, many years later that I realized I was basically like an entertainer to their amusement.

And it was humiliating.

In fact, I actually kind of buried that story most of my life until more recently where I talked about it.

- I'm sorry.

- Yeah, it was, whew, that was not a good memory.

But again, it's sad because it's like, it's a prolonged experience and there's that feeling of shame when you learn something a lot later in life.

But at the same time, I don't shy from it.

It's part of who I am, which is what fueled me to want to find my biological family.

- Yes!

- [Narrator] Our last AAPI story involves a conversation between writer and artist Jack Cheng and community home builder Paul Pham.

The two met at a mutual friend's house in Detroit, and that encounter grew into a long-term friendship.

The men connected over their shared experiences as Asian Americans, some of which they had never talked about with anyone else.

In this clip, they talk about their definitions of what it means to be Asian American.

(serene music) - I wonder if the sense of belonging that we started talking about, this conversation talking about, and maybe like how your definition of belonging has changed over time, and maybe what connection does that have to your being Asian American?

- Growing up, I think I wanted to fit in a lot.

And so I was very concerned with what other people thought of me and not very concerned with being Asian.

If anything, I probably pushed it away, and that continued for a long time, probably into my thirties when I finally sort of saw a lot of strength from it and saw that my parents had made a lot of hard choices as well.

So I guess it's like, yeah, finding belonging in an unfamiliar place or in the process of making it familiar and maybe never being completely part of it.

This may not be related, but I also had some resistance even to having this conversation.

I thought about calling it off and saying, "Well, I don't feel comfortable talking about it "because it involves interior difficult feelings "that I feel like would reflect badly on my family "or Asian culture in general."

It's like, maybe this is like a stereotype.

And then I realized that also is like, I think being part of Asian American is like bearing difficulty and not necessarily calling it out or making a big deal of it.

So that's knowing how much to say, how much to reach out for help, but also knowing that people care about each other, but they not may not be overly emotionally expressive like that's in a western way about it.

What about you?

How do you relate to being Asian American?

- I think it's actually taken me some time to even call myself Asian American.

Growing up in school, I'd always refer to my friends and myself as Chinese.

Being Asian American to me is about inhabiting that in between space and that it's about looking at that in betweenness as not something that's on the path to something else, but more of like expanding that so that it's like a place, its own place that you can inhabit.

And I think, we're living in Detroit.

We're living in the city that's dominated by cars.

It's like, there's a boulevard out the window that is like four car lanes wide, and it's like a pedestrian, you know, it's like for people.

There's all this circulation that takes us from one place to another.

I think that's been my experience of Asian Americanness almost.

It's like that I feel I'm always heading somewhere else and I'm always in motion towards something.

And I think really owning that label is more about thinking about how do I transform this road into its own place that is meant for human beings to inhabit.

- Oh, that's good.

I like it.

Like you're in a thoroughfare, and if you stop, that doesn't feel safe or comfortable.

- Yeah, like how do we turn the old freeway into a park, right?

That's sort of kind of like the question that I ask.

- [Narrator] That'll do it for this week's One Detroit.

Thanks for watching.

You can find more of our AAPI story series at onedetroitpbs.org/aapi.

Plus, follow us on social media and sign up for our weekly newsletter.

- [Announcer 1] From Delta faucets to Behr Paint, Masco Corporation is proud to deliver products that enhance the way consumers all over the world experience and enjoy their living spaces.

Masco.

Serving Michigan communities since 1929.

Support also provided by the Cynthia and Edsel Ford Fund for journalism at Detroit PBS.

- [Announcer 2] DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit PBS.

Among the state's largest foundations committed to Michigan focused giving, we support organizations that are doing exceptional work in our state.

Learn more at dtefoundation.com.

- [Announcer 1] Nissan Foundation and viewers like you.

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