Category Archives: Arts and Entertainment

KP & NPH: Together Again (Updated)

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Actor/political liaison Kal Penn, who previously left his White House position to film A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas, will be making another trip back from the Beltway to Hollywood. TVLine reports that Penn will appear in a recurring role on the Emmy award-winning TV comedy How I Met Your Mother, set to premiere its seventh season on September 19.

The move would have Penn play Kevin, a possible love interest for Cobie Smulder’s character Robin Scherbatsky. Working on HIMYM would reunite Penn with a co-star from the Harold and Kumar movie franchise, Neil Patrick Harris (Starship Troopers, Doogie Howser, M.D.). NPH plays breakout character and hypocritical womanizer Barney Stinson, credited for much of the show’s success. The Washington Post’s entertainment blog Reliable Source comments on Penn’s unusual career path. Continue reading →

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Activist, Poet Ifti Nasim, 1946-2011

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KXB’s news post brings to my attention the passing of Ifti Nasim, an out and outspoken gay Pakistani poet who was based in Chicago. Dustin Nakao-Haider’s short film about Nasim captures a bit of his vibrance and humor, at his work as a radio host, at an interfaith community event where he talked about being Muslim, and ends with the poet reciting his How To “Kill” Your Brother With Kindness (Especially If He Is Homophobe).

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Is Suzy Singh the Next MasterChef?

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masterchef.suzy.singh.jpg

Have you seen the Gordon Ramsay-produced cooking show that takes 100 amateur and home chefs and attempts to turn one into a…MasterChef? I watched a few episodes recently and thanks to comments here and stories from the news tab, realized that Chef Suzy must be [Suzy Singh](http://www.suzysingh.com/), a neural engineer from Chicago. Singh, who participated in a brief Q&A posted below, made it into the 100 with a [signature dish](http://www.fox.com/masterchef/recipes/signature-dish/recipe-16) of Tandoori Cod en Papillote with Chai- and Saffron-infused Couscous, and she’s still a contender for the title of MasterChef on the show’s second US season now that the pool of 100 chefs has been whittled down to fewer than 10.

Singh is interesting to watch on MasterChef because she has skills, brings a real enthusiasm for cooking, and wears her heart on her sleeve, leaving no doubt as to how she’s feeling about her chances, her competition or the judges’ comments at any moment. Her style is also on display in videos which introduce viewers to the world’s largest holy kitchen at the Golden Temple and Kesar Da Dhaba in Amristar, Punjab.

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Q&A with Sachal Vasandani: “You Gotta Rock Out or Go Home”

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sachal.jpgAfter hearing jazz vocalist Sachal Vasandani on NPR’s All Things Considered talk about his third album, Hi-Fly, I knew we had to feature him on SM. I mean, have you heard this kid’s swoon-worthy voice? It’s Tony Bennett meets Frank Sinatra meets Cole Porter. Thankfully, Vasandani graciously humored the questions of a jazz noob via a telephone interview.

Sachal Vasandani – Hi Fly – EPK from Mack Avenue on Vimeo.

Q: How often do people ask you, “What’s a young man doing singing such old music? Why jazz? Why not that pop, Justin Bieber-type stuff?”
A: [Laughs.] Well, nobody has ever asked me why I’m not Justin Bieber. There’s a lot of freedom and self-expression in jazz – that’s really what attracted me to it. I just saw the music video for that Katy Perry song, “Last Friday Night (TGIF)”. You have Katy Perry, Rebecca Black and then Kenny G is there, and they’re totally making fun of him. He’s the crazy old uncle sitting in the corner. That’s people’s impression of jazz – that it’s cheesy, corny, old and elitist. But jazz gives me the ability to explore soulfulness in a unique way. Everybody is looking to find ways to reach the soul – my particular avenue is jazz. Continue reading →

Friday Poetry: Dilruba Ahmed

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Dilruba.jpgThis past Saturday, I had the privilege of meeting and interviewing Dilruba Ahmed, author of Dhaka Dust, a delightful collection of poetry that I read and re-read with great pleasure. I first encountered Ahmed’s work in the form of a powerful letter she wrote for the Asian American Literary Review, titled “To Agha Shahid Ali.” In it, she reacts to a statement made by the Kashmiri-American poet:

“I wish all this had not happened…This dividing of the country, the divisions between people–Hindu, Muslim, Muslim, Hindu–you can’t imagine how much I hate it. It makes me sick.” Similarly, we may feel enraged, appalled, dismayed, and frustrated with recent events that emphasize those “divisions between people” here in America and around the world. And as writers, we may find ourselves wondering how to make sense of our impulse to write when other, larger matters seem far more pressing.

She goes on to respond to her own question: “If literature confronts us with our humanity, if it proves to us the shared desires and struggles of our individual lives, then literature, particularly writing by Asian Americans and other minorities, is arguably more important now than ever before.”

Agreed. And in the context of the mayhem that struck Mumbai this past week, even more poignant. Continue reading →

Who are Surinder Singh and Gurmej Atwal?

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Last night, prompted by a tweet from Angry Asian Man, I found myself finally watching the full-length Vincent Who? documentary that Taz blogged about (and appeared in) two years ago. I happened to be home and caught my little brother in an amenable mood, so we spent the next few hours watching first that and then the 1987 Academy Award-nominated documentary, Who Killed Vincent Chin? It just so happened that we saw both documentaries on the very same date, 29 years ago, that Vincent Chin died. June 23.

Twenty-nine years ago, on June 19, the night before his wedding, Vincent Chin went with a few close friends to a strip-club in his town of Detroit, Michigan. There, an altercation occurred between Chin and two men. According to witnesses, Ronald Ebens, a Chrysler plant superintendent, told Chin, “It’s because of you little motherf*ckers that we’re out of work,” a reference to increasing pressure on the American automobile industry from Japanese manufacturers. Later that night, Ebens and his stepson, Michael Nitz, hunted down Chin and beat him viciously with a baseball bat. Nitz held Chin down, while Ebens administered the fatal blows on Chin’s skull. Before slipping into a coma that he never recovered from, friends say Chin whispered, “It’s not fair.” Continue reading →

Caught on Tape: The Art of Aakash Nihalani

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This gif, Through, is from a series of self-portraits called Once Upon a Wall, by Brooklyn-based artist Aakash Nihalani.

Through.gif His brightly colored geometric art made of electrical tape has been made and displayed on the streets, in galleries and on mixtape covers. As with his self-portraits, there’s a playful and interactive aspect to most of his work. To see that in action, watch Nihalani create and install Stop, Pop and Roll.
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Upma on Top Chef Masters: Breakfast of Champions

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Floyd Cardoz is America’s Top Chef Master. He won the show’s final challenge despite LA traffic leaving him with the least cooking time of the finalists, and he did it his way. His menu featured upma in addition to rice-crusted snapper in broth and an Indonesian dish called rendang a Malaysian beef stew called randang. It was exciting to see a familiar-to-me-from-home-not-restaurants desi food like upma on the screen in the finale on the kind of show that often has me looking up its mentions of French foodie terms.

upma.flickr.jpg (Photo by ukanda)

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California’s DREAM ACT too late for some?

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Here in California, there has been a lot of news and commentary around the possible passage of the The California Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act. It was featured on a recent NPR story:

Illegal immigrant students in that state’s colleges may soon be eligible for state-funded financial aid. A bill called the California Dream Act is working its way through the state legislature. It would allow students who attended at least three years at a California high school to apply for financial aid.

NPR’s Carrie Kahn has our report.

CARRIE KAHN: Sofia Campos came to California when she was six. Her parents brought her and her two younger siblings from Peru. Campos said she had no idea her family had overstayed their visas. She didn’t find out she was here illegally until she was ready to go to college.

Ms. SOFIA CAMPOS: When I was 17, I tried to apply for federal financial aid. So I asked my parents for the Social Security number, and that’s when they had to tell me that I didn’t have one. [link]

President Obama is on the record as supporting the DREAM act nationally and it was introduced (yet again) in the US Senate in May of this year.

This bill would provide conditional permanent residency to certain illegal and deportable alien students who graduate from US high schools, who are of good moral character, arrived in the U.S. legally or illegally as minors, and have been in the country continuously for at least five years prior to the bill’s enactment. If they were to complete two years in the military or two years at a four year institution of higher learning, the students would obtain temporary residency for a six year period. Within the six year period, a qualified student must have “acquired a degree from an institution of higher education in the United States or [have] completed at least 2 years, in good standing, in a program for a bachelor’s degree or higher degree in the United States,” or have “served in the armed services for at least 2 years and, if discharged, [have] received an honorable discharge.”[3] Military enlistment contracts require an eight year commitment, with active duty commitments typically between four and six years, but as low as two years.[4][5] “Any alien whose permanent resident status is terminated [according to the terms of the Act] shall return to the immigration status the alien had immediately prior to receiving conditional permanent resident status under this Act.”[6] [Wikipedia].

But this might all be too late for Mandeep Chahal. Deportation day could be Tuesday. You might want to write a letter against this if you have a minute today:

Mandeep, a DREAM Act eligible student, and her mother face imminent deportation on Tuesday, June 21, 2011. Mandeep grew up in Mountain View, California and attended Santa Rita Elementary School and Egan Junior High School. She graduated from Los Altos High School in 2009 and is now an honors pre-med student at UC Davis.

Mandeep came to the United States in 1997 when she was six years old, and only discovered she was undocumented when she was 15.

If Mandeep and her mother are forced to leave, their family will be torn apart and Mandeep’s two U.S. Citizen siblings will be left without their mother. [link]

Kids shouldn’t pay for the “sins” of their parents. Especially if they work hard and have the potential of making our society better. Enough with the out of control “enforcement only” way of dealing with immigration.

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Name-ache

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I think it’s safe to say that our names play a big part in how we define ourselves and how others perceive us. This seems true whether a) people get your name right every time, b) you conduct a lesson on pronunciation each time you meet someone new, c) you go by a nickname, e) you go by your Starbucks name, or e) [insert your story here]. In a rhythmic reflection on his name called Ache In My Name Vivek Shraya asks “Is a name how it’s pronounced or how I pronounce it?”

ACHE IN MY NAME (short film) from Vivek Shraya on Vimeo.

If Shraya’s name sounds familiar then maybe you’ve heard his music or read his short stories. His alterna-electropop musical history includes collaborations with members from the groups Tegan and Sara, and Marcy Playground. Shraya, who grew up in Edmonton, self-published his first book last year, God Loves Hair, an illustrated collection of short stories about a queer desi youth growing up “as he navigates complex realms of sexuality, gender, racial politics, religion, and belonging.” It’s on the American Library Association’s Rainbow List and was selected as a finalist for the 2011 Lambda Literary Awards. Continue reading →