The ABCs of Being ABC: VOD and Podcast Picks

Among the countless grievances of the COVID-19 pandemic is the surge in anti-Asian racism and xenophobia around the world, with unprovoked hate crimes fomented by online conspiracy theories that scapegoat East Asians as virus carriers — in some instances, even encouraged by political rhetoric. East Asian communities and allies around the world are still reeling from the recent shooting in several Atlanta spas that tragically took the lives of eight people, six of whom were Asian women. Between March 2020 and February 2021, the Stop AAPI Hate reporting center received a staggering 3,795 firsthand accounts of anti-Asian hate, and found that women were 2.3 times more likely to report hate incidents than men.

The grim figures speak for themselves. And while the documented history of anti-Asian violence is threadbare, last year was not the first to see racism manifest in acts of cruelty against the targeted community. Part of the immigrant and diasporic experience — interwoven with all its richness and beauty — is the yoke of generational trauma, and the ongoing legacy of racism and anti-Asian sentiment in our adopted homes. But the mourning period is transient. And perhaps what’s more important is what happens after grief — how to recuperate, rebuild, and reconfigure the trajectory of the Asian diaspora.

This week’s VOD and podcast picks have mastered this balancing act of nursing sorrow and celebrating victories that come as a package deal of being American-born Chinese (ABC) as well as British-born Chinese (BBC), specifically at the unique intersection of being a woman of Chinese descent. Angela Chen’s film short, “Our Home Here,” is about the pursuit of belonging, upward social mobility, and the American Dream for two families. On the other side of the Atlantic, Georgie Ma reflects on her experience growing up BBC on her podcast, “Chinese Chippy Girl.” Another notable podcast is The Babe Brigade’s “Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul: Asian American Stories,” which embraces the hybridity of being part of the Chinese diaspora in the U.S.

While being ABC is not as easy as A-B-C, these creatives enrich and reimagine the collective narrative of the Chinese diaspora. Having to reconcile facets of your identity — that often feel incongruent with one another — is a near-universal experience of every child of an immigrant. Members of the second generation often express the alienation felt from having a hyphenated identity — feeling not Western enough but also not Eastern enough.

This month’s VOD and podcast selections are unencumbered by such binary frameworks, reminding us how arbitrary — and, really, reductive — these definitions of identity are. In fact, they’re not necessary at all.

Here are Women and Hollywood’s VOD and podcast selections.

VOD

“Our Home Here” (Short) – Directed by Angela Chen; Written by Angela Chen and Yumiko Fujiwara

Two Asian American siblings, Rose (Dianne Doan) and Dylan (Brandon Soo Hoo), grapple with their fractured family dynamic and financial hardships. Latinx fast-food worker Celine (Raquenel) is plagued with guilt and loneliness as she toils and saves up for a house.

One fateful night, these seemingly disparate narratives converge, “forever changing the trajectories of their lives, their careers, and their relationships,” “Our Home Here’s” synopsis teases.

Born and raised in Texas, film and commercial director Angela Chen is the eldest child of immigrant parents. She is “drawn to stories of connection and characters who thrive within intricate and flawed societies,” according to her biography. “Our Home Here” was a cathartic project for Chen, who drew inspiration from her lived experience: “It was all about my brother, I watched him trying to be a good man,” she said in conversation with Wong Fu Productions. Much like Dylan, Chen’s brother wished to join the Marines. “He wanted to be part of society in a way where he was dutiful,” Chen reflected, projecting her own experience onto Rose, the older sister.

In 16 forceful minutes, “Our Home Here” synthesizes the parallel lives of its characters to create a poignant, visceral microcosm of the Asian and Latinx diaspora. It also highlights immigrant life in the American South, fraught with isolation from the homeland and aloofness from the chosen habitat — and how these factors create friction in a family unit. The film ruptures the seemingly immutable definition of Americanness, problematizing essentialist beliefs that are often used to justify discrimination and exclusion.

Learn more about “Our Home Here” on its website and watch it on YouTube.

Podcasts

“Chinese Chippy Girl” – Created by Georgie Ma (馬珮瑶)

In “Chinese Chippy Girl’s” first episode, creator Georgie Ma reflects on what it was like being the only Chinese person in her high school in Macclesfield, U.K. She encapsulates her teenage years with one word: tough. She recalled repeated bullying by other students during her school years in the ‘80s and ‘90s, many of whom routinely called her racial slurs — years later, Ma is reliving the pain she felt as a teenager, as she witnesses the rampant anti-Asian racism in her country and beyond.

Ma says that started the “Chinese Chippy Girl” podcast — her parents ran a chip shop — to mobilize conversations about race, heritage, and belonging in a home that can be inhospitable and even hostile.

She divulges the peaks and troughs of her upbringing as a BBC, with the hopes of assuaging the isolation she felt as a teenager that other visible minorities may struggle with now. Ma also invites speakers on her show — the most recent being Scottish actress Katie Leung, of “Harry Potter” fame — including fellow BBCs and other BIPOC guests discussing topics of identity, social equity, and community connection.

“I was brought up being Chinese at home and English when I was outside of home — it felt confusing at the time as I couldn’t find a sense of belonging,” she writes in the podcast description. “Now I am much older, I am proud of my Chinese heritage and I am proud to be British.”

Learn more about and listen to “Chinese Chippy Girl” via Spotify.

“Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul: Asian American Stories” — Created by The Babe Brigade

If you’ve ever had a bowl of hot and sour soup, you know that there’s really no other dish like it. It’s a symphony of spice and tartness that soothes the heart and excites the palate, each spoonful more delightful than the last. The same could be said about each episode of The Babe Brigade’s “Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul: Asian American Stories.”

Described as an “ode to multiculturalism” in its debut episode, “Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul” takes a deep dive into the Asian American experience. The Babe Brigade interviews women from an array of professions about their unique journeys and how their heritage influenced their success. The name of the podcast marries a Chinese staple dish with the self-help book series “Chicken Soup for the Soul,” which represents the host’s harmonious respect for both her Chinese and American identity “without minimizing one for the other.”

“Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul” is also a self-described multisensory media brand that “lives beyond the digital,” as the creator said in the introductory episode. The brand fuses the virtual realm with the material world, curating seasonal collections of handmade jewelry — regal jade and resin rings — along with its podcast. Its products and content orbit around personal identity and the human experience and act as “a love letter to cultural hybridity,” best enjoyed with a bowl of hot and sour soup.

Learn more about and listen to “Hot & Sour Soup for the Soul” on Spotify.