Hello ECAASU delegates! This is Calvin Sun, one of the Board of Directors on ECAASU National back from a brief trip at Philly and we’re happy to say that everything is looking good and you’re in for a treat. We figured we might as well give y’all a head start on this conference and give you a little peek on what to expect (i.e. so you DON’T GET LOST!!! We care about you).

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THE BASICS

So you arrive at UPenn…get to the center of campus! Look for something that looks like this:

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Whether you’re coming in on THURSDAY, FRIDAY, or SATURDAY head over to Registration at Bodek Lounge in Houston Hall:

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Most of the conference will take place at or around this beautiful Quad:

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THURSDAY

After registering, stay for the Kickoff Mixer (FOOOOOD) at Bodek Lounge in Houston Hall (8pm):

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After making new friends, go out/go to bed!

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FRIDAY

Rise and shine. Grab some breakfast (FOOOOD) at the Ground Floor Lobby in Houston Hall (9:30am):

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Friday workshops & networking mixers will take place in either Houston Hall or Irvine Auditorium (11am – 2:30pm):

Houston Hall

or

Irvine Auditorium

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Friday movie screenings will take place in Huntsman Hall (2:30pm):

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After a day of walking tours, movie screenings, dance workshops, leadership workshops, and networking mixers (at various locations) head over to Houston Hall’s Bodek Lounge for the Bubble Tea & Mango Lassi Social (6pm):

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After the Social, walk over to the Opening Ceremony at Irvine Auditorium (7:30pm):

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After the Opening Ceremony, go out/go to bed!

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SATURDAY

Rise and shine. Grab breakfast (FOOOOD) at Bodek Lounge in Houston Hall (8am):

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Your Saturday workshops will take place in the following buildings (10am, 2:15pm, 3:45pm):

But to make your life easier, most of the Saturday workshops will take place at Williams Hall:

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In anticipation of the afterparty, hone your/pick up some breakdancing and hip hop skills during the 1st workshop session on Saturday at 10am, which will take place in the Class of 1974 Lounge/Café 58, (inside Irvine, next to the auditorium):

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After the 1st workshop session, send at least 2 delegates (as many of you are welcome!) to represent your school and vote in the ECAASU 2011 Conference Elections in Room G17 at the Claudia Cohen Hall (11:15am):

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After a Colosseum-style election in picking the next ECAASU 2011 host, head to Irvine Auditorium to hear U.S. Congressman Mike Honda speak (12:45pm):

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Go resume Workshop Sessions 2 (2:15pm) & 3 (3:45pm)! Again, most of these workshops will be in Williams Hall:

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After the workshops, relish what you’ve learned and wipe away those tears at the Closing Ceremony at Irvine Auditorium (5:15pm):

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Have your last sobering chance to impress that special someone and say your goodbyes at the Farewell Reception (FOOOOD) at the glamorous Penn Museum (7pm):

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But it’s not over yet! After the reception . . .

Don’t stop, make it pop

DJ, blow my speakers up!

Tonight, I’mma fight

‘Til we see the sunlight!

Tick tock on the clock

But the party don’t stop, no (oh oh oh oh!)!

Take our shuttle bus over to the ECAASU Afterparty at Shampoo Nightclub (10:30pm)! (Shuttle Buses from the Sheraton Hotel will take you back and forth all night). Once you’re there, find me on the dance floor.

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I would tell you to go to bed again, but on an ECAASU Saturday night? That might not happen.

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SUNDAY

Wake up in the morning and feel like P-Diddy. You did it. With a million memories and pictures behind you, it’s time to go home (or come with me and a bunch of other delegations in continuing the ECAASU experience in NYC for 4 more days!).

See you at ECAASU 2011!

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So there you have it: A bare bones account of what to expect at ECAASU 2010! Let us know if you have any questions. See you at the conference,

- Calvin, ECAASU Board of Directors, ECAASU National,and ECAASU Conference Board!

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continued from SERCAAL Recap, Day 1 of 3. . . .

- Saturday, October 10th -

Waking up on the floor of Jo-Ann’s dorm, I remember the Ring Ring Ring’s at 8am in the morning. Yes I was irritable. Yes I was underslept. Yes I didn’t know where I was for a moment. But those ring ring rings reminded me that I had a keynote to do. So off I was in a mad dash waking up poor Jo-Ann to have her drive me and Eugene to the Reitz Student Center as soon as possible. I had 20 minutes until my keynote and already I wanted to curl up in a corner in a fetal position and dream of Tempur-Pedic® mattresses. Beautiful beautiful Tempur-Pedic® mattresses. . . .

We arrived at the student center and were immediately served brown bag breakfasts (ingenious!). I managed to scarf down a few muffins before going on to deliver my keynote. How did it go? Well, here’s note to self: never write down jokes. I’m funnier — if I’m funny at all — when I’m joking off the cuff. Otherwise, I can’t really say how I did except that my audience looked like they were paying pretty close attention (at least from the pictures, that’s my only evidence). Kudos to them, because it was 8:30am in the morning and if I were them, I would have slept through my own keynote speech. And if you’re reading this and you did end up sleeping (shame on you!), ECAASU was kind enough to put up an edited transcript of my keynote speech online: http://www.ecaasu.org/site/?p=676

I took a few Q&A and then quickly segued into leading the general mixer where all 100-150 attendees got into a large SERCAAL (circle, haha, GET IT?! If you don’t I’ll pat your head and give you a biscuit) and I asked random questions. It’s pretty much  playing “never have I ever” except it’s about 9:30AM in the morning, you don’t have a drink in your hand, and you have to stand up and sit back down if you’ve done it.

I figured some of you might be interested in the results, so here were some of the following questions I asked:

• How many of you took a shower this morning? (about 1/3 didn’t….dirty people)

• How many of you have peed in the shower before?  (about 1/3 admitted they have, and the rest are LIARS)

• How many of you identify yourself as South Asian American? (2 people)

• How many of you have the “Asian Glow”? (1/3 did, 1/3 didn’t, the final 1/3 didn’t know what “Asian Glow” meant)

• How many of you have taken Asian American studies? (about a 1/3)

• How many of you voted in the last presidential election? (about 1/2, the other 1/2 didn’t citing that they were too young at the time)

• How many of you have been in an interracial relationship? (about 2/3 with a good mix of both guys and girls . . . very impressive)

• How many of you have dated/hooked up with someone who was White? (2/3)

• How many of you have dated/hooked up with someone who was Hispanic? (1/3)

• How many of you have dated/hooked up with someone who was Black? (1/4)

• How many of you have dated/hooked up with someone who was South Asian? (probably no more than 4 people)

• How many of you feel your parents would be upset by interracial relationships? (3/4)

• How many of you find yourselves sometimes judging interracial couples? (1/4)

• How many of you have been teased because of your ethnicity? (2/3)

• How many of you have teased others because of ethnicity? (1/2)

• How many of you have ever been ashamed of being Asian American? (1/3)

• How many of you have ever considered being an Asian American politician? (only about 1/5 . . . surprising!)

• How many of you have been victims of a hate crime? (2 people stood up when they thought it meant “violent” crimes but when I said it included hate speech, about 2/3 of the conference stood up. In solidarity!)

We then discussed whether it was surprising that in a ballroom packed with East Asian and Southeast Asian Americans, fewer have dated a fellow South ASIAN AMERICAN than any other ethnicity including White, Latino and Black. We also talked about why many of our communities are mutually exclusive, what was the correct approach to confronting hate crimes, and a few other related topics to the questions I had asked. It was a great way to get a good visual picture of the conference and the overall makeup of our collective experiences as Asian Americans.

Then we were off to the workshops! ECAASU was lucky to fill up all 3 workshop sessions with two topics: “Asian Americans: Sex & Sexuality” and “How to Walk, Talk, and Dress Like a Baller: Social Networking Etiquette.” Both of our workshops packed to the point that SERCAAL staff had to ask groups of 15-20 people to leave at a time. Never deterred, ECAASU presented each topic at least twice, with an extra 4th session facilitated during the conference break for those who got kicked out of our earlier sessions. About 20-30 people attended each workshop, and we were glad to meet everyone on a more intimate basis (you can’t get any more intimate than exchanging personal thoughts and stories on sex & sexuality). However, the 3rd workshop on Sex & Sexuality was like pulling teeth — although it was full, nobody was relating to each other about their views on sex & sexuality except for myself, Rob Scharr, Linda “Alanys” Li, Melissa “Maisa” Reyes (what is with all these nicknames?), and 2 other girls whose names aren’t resonating with me right now (I guess you needed a nickname for me to remember). Rob, Linda, Melissa, and those 2 other girls: Thank you for speaking your minds! I really wished the males could have stepped it up because we need to break this stereotype that Asian American guys are uncomfortable with talking about their experiences with sex and sexuality. Where’s the confidence, amigos? It’s not that hard. (that’s what she [didn’t] say . . . har har har).

Sidenote: What made this conference run like a well-oiled German machine was the fact that everything…EVERYTHING (keynotes, workshops, mixers, performances…) was on one floor. For you future conference hosts, take notes.

Sometime in between the 2nd and 3rd workshops we took a lunch break where we hung out and chatted with Mandeep Sethi. What started off as a 5 minute conversation about what it was like growing up in our respective communities, turned into a 30 minute dialogue about the possibility of uniting the East and West Coast for future networking and collaboration. And thanks to a long lunch break, a scrumdiddlyumptious Floridian “chee-burger” that fell apart when I tried to eat it (delicious hot mess nonetheless), and the eagerness of Eugene, Mandeep, and myself, we left the conversation knowing something unique was about to brew; keep an eye on Mandeep and ECAASU because some amazing things are about to happen! (As I’m writing this, Mandeep just facebook chatted me inviting me out to San Francisco State University for a big West Coast conference coming up….Free trip to California? ABSOLUTELY.)

We then finished our lunch and listened to 3rd keynote of the conference, Dr. Beheruz Sethna, the first person of Indian origin to serve as President of an American University (University of West Georgia). Quite a big deal, and his keynote was no less impressive; Dr. Sethna was able to uniquely present his argument that the idea of the “melting pot” or a series of “separate enclaves” of communities is unsuitable not only for the optimization of diversity, but also ineffective for in business environments and living conditions. Dr. Sethna proved his point by asking (and demonstrating, literally): Would we rather eat a taco salad when it’s blended as a drink or when its separated into its individual ingredients? Although I have heard this speech given over and over in the last couple of years, I never saw someone actually manually blend a taco salad into a drink. On a side note, as this nuclear waste/liquid turd was being passed around, I unwisely decided to take a sip of it. . . . All I remember is that thinking how this would be the closest I would get in knowing what a male foot tastes like.

After Dr. Sethna’s intriguing and fascinating speech and the aforementioned packed 3rd and (impromptu) 4th workshops, the ECAASU team were immediately rushed by our dedicated stalwart brother-in-arms, Brandon Magtalas, to his house for a quick shower and change for the SERCAAL’s closing banquet dinner. Naturally after giving a workshop on social networking etiquette where half of it was discussing dress code, I couldn’t let SERCAAL down; I busted out my newly tailored suit and came in there rolling in like a baller, or at least I tried my best to . . . because no more than 10 minutes after sitting down  and listening to Jim Toy deliver an impassioned speech of what it was like growing up as a LGBTQ Asian American since 1971 (quite interesting . . . and I’ve heard Jim Toy speak before about this topic . . . he’s been through a lot), Brandon rushed me out of the banquet hall again to change into a frumpy set of T-shirt and jeans. Apparently I was scheduled to dance with a bunch of other b-boys while Mandeep would go up to perform; how could I possibly turn that down?

So we did our tricks and we did our flips. Naturally, for someone who hasn’t practiced since March, I tried my best to not fail too miserably or break my neck. But it did feel good to perform again.

Finishing a quick cypher, I dashed out the ballroom to change back into my suit. So before anyone could realize I was gone for too long, I was back in my suit finishing my chicken and rice. Clark Kent is overrated.

Sidenote: Shout-outs to the wonderful people at my table: Eugene, Arienne, Eva, Long, Lai Ling, Linda, and Thao! Thanks for making me feel way too self-conscious about my table manners, especially since I forgot to discuss it in my workshop.

The conference then wrapped up with another edgy performance by Kate Rigg including an impassioned disparaging of the Hot 97 racist “tsunami song,” a musical piece on the Asian Fetish/Yellow Fever phenomenon, and a rehash of “Rice Rice Baby.” My praises of her shall not go unsung; we best get her ass to ECAASU, stat! She’s amazing!

A few subsequent thank you’s from the SERCAAL staff (HOLLA FOR A DOLLA!!! YOU DID IT!) signaled the end of the 2 day whirlwind of a truly fantastic conference, and I had the enormous pleasure afterwards to meet many attendees one-on-one as we took pictures, joked around, and gave a lot of hugs. Goodbyes are painful, but hugs make them easier. And ECAASU loves hugs.

Eugene and I then hung out with Kate Rigg and the ambitious AASU Presidents of UF, Philip Cheng and Vanessa Kwong, on how they can get involved with ECAASU. Kate Rigg expressed interest in working for ECAASU as a consultant, while Philip and Vanessa were considering an actual bid to have ECAASU hosted at UF in 2011. We literally spoke to them for a good 2 hours about this so all I can say is that the competition is on, and you better bring your A-game if you want ECAASU to come to your school. UF’s got some serious connections.

. . . Then the afterparty. It was a lot of fun. That is all you need to know.

- Sunday, October 10th -

The morning after I was awoken to melodious karaokeing by my wonderful hosts Kim Sabilona and Jessica Concha. Their dorm is like a freaking hotel…and I won’t tell you where they live because I don’t want everyone to know where the best place in Florida to stay is.

We had a nice breakfast and then decided to drive to Lake Wauberg; at some random point last night I had demanded that I wanted to swim. There was an FSA potluck event going on, so I got to eat from a grill. For a New Yorker, that’s a big freaking deal.

Enjoying an hour or two listening to people sing much better than I ever will (people in FSA apparently love to sing), I dove into the lake for a swim with fellow aforementioned buddies Brandon Magtalas and Melissa “Maisa” Reyes. Brandon showed off his somersault dives, I showed off my racing dives, and Melissa fell into the lake. I swear, If I could have stayed a little longer I could have turned her into a pro diver (next time, Melissa). Of course, this being Florida, I must mention that I was told “not to go too far out” because there were alligators roaming around who wrestle me away via a bloody mess. That’s nature for you.

I took a few dives, laps, and a 20 minute canoeing around the lake before I realized it was time for me to go home. The goodbyes were even more painful because I knew I was never going to swim for at least another 8 months. Just kidding. It was painful because saying goodbye to Christy, Melissa, Brandon, Vi, Diana, Shakila, Merancia, Pauline, SophieAnn, became a terrible ordeal. Never will I meet such a great group of people who were willing to laugh at all my bad jokes.

After taking a few pictures and many more hugs, Kim and Jessica began to drive me to the airport in Jacksonville. We played music and sung in the car all along the highway and almost got lost. After breaking a few speeding laws, they got me there about 30 minutes before my flight was about to leave, which is how I like it. After a few last hugs and goodbyes to a group of wonderful souls, their car pulled away and before I knew it, my adventure was over.

Looking back, I think it was difficult for me to write about SERCAAL without recalling the amazing number of people I’ve met at UF. Missing was the self-indulgent snobbery you would find on the Northeast as nobody I met at UF was “too cool” for school and everybody was willing to get to know you. I think it was one of the few conferences where I was able to remember many people by their first names because they created such a personal and intimate atmosphere throughout the weekend; people actually wanted to be your friend, not because they had to. In any case, I can’t thank the SERCAAL 2009 staff enough for not only pulling off an amazing conference in the nick of time, but also providing me with the unique opportunity to befriend what possibly could be the most down-to-earth group of people I could ever meet face to face. I’ll miss you all terribly. Stay classy, Florida.

pictures courtesy of Alan Ho & Long Nguyen.

written by Calvin Sun, ECAASU Board of Directors.

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As I’m typing this in the comforts of the regional Metro-North railway, bundled up in my winter coat and scarf, I can’t help but pine for Florida weather. Because only about a week ago I was there, enjoying the comforts of greasy sunblock and algae-filled lakes, those blissful diversions from the maddening jungles of NYC. But if I really think about it, it was more than the nature-lovin’, tree-hugging activities there that made my weekend so meaningful. And I promise I’ll do my best attempt to write thoughtfully without delving into dramatics (after all, being emo is overrated). . . .

Before I begin, let me describe my task at hand: I have to write about what happened at SERCAAL while leaving out all the un-kosher details. That’s easy. But I can’t write a sentence further without mentioning the people that I’ve met there. Even though I’ve spent quite possibly every day of my life debunking stereotypes and generalizations, you cannot deny Floridian hospitality. It’s the real deal, and I guarantee there were a special bunch of gentle souls that made me want to stay a tad bit longer . . . but this is where I can get emo, so I’ll stop here with the feelings and you can stop feeling sorry for me.

- Friday, October 9th -

I flew into a clean and well-designed Jacksonville airport on a Friday afternoon, where I met Jo-Ann Gonzalez. Her generosity was unmatched — she was willing to drive a good 2 hours each way to pick up a dude she never met and for a conference she couldn’t even attend. While driving back to the University of Florida, we managed to exchange numerous stories of our lives while swapping good music. After I was generously prepped with the basics of what to expect from the life of an average UF student, I reunited with ECAASU Co-Vice Chair Eugene Mok and ECAASU Student Taskforce Chair, Clara Ng-Quinn. Eugene and Clara flew in from Philadelphia, PA and Ithaca, NY respectively, and like me, braved a 2 hour drive from the airport. From there I was given all my materials and instructions by the thorough and fantastic SERCAAL Co-Programming Chair, Kevin Chiu, who then handed me off to SERCAAL Outreach Committee Member Diana Nguyen as our handler-for-the-day. We gave Diana a lot of grief just for fun (like making her run around the student center in her heels), but she remained a good sport. If her future career as a chemical engineer doesn’t work out, she’ll have my top recommendations as a professional chaperone.

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Excerpts from Calvin D. Sun’s (ECAASU Board of Director) Keynote Address at SERCAAL

University of Florida

Saturday, October 10th

9:00 A.M. EST

SERCAAL might have made a terrible mistake by inviting me because I don’t belong here. How many of you are between the ages of 21 to 23? OK, half of you in this room probably are just as young as I am. Note that your keynote speaker before me was highly renowned new media designer and filmmaker, Lina Hoshino. She has been making films for 15 years; 15 years ago I was 7 years old and watching the Power Rangers. Your keynote addresses later today will be delivered by Jim Toy, longtime community activist since 1971 — which is 15 years before I even existed — and Dr. Sethna, the first person of Indian origin to serve as the President of an American University. Me? I’m just proud to be first person of Chinese origin to serve as mascot of my high school swim team. The Trinity Tunafish.

It just so happens that I’ve been incredulously asked to be one of your keynote speakers and all I can do is acknowledge how awesome you guys are — not as a mentor or an advisor 20 years ahead of you, but as a peer. You made a big step just by being here and you should all applaud yourselves for taking such an initiative.

. . .

I grew up in a predominantly Caucasian neighborhood in New York City. At home, I toiled under the strict Chinese values of my parents while at the same time I took on the lifestyle of American living. However, both sides still viewed me as the odd one out. I was the Americanized bastard son at home and I was the token Asian guy at school. To make matters worse, both sides thought my eyes were too small. I didn’t fit in anywhere and I was sad. Like a platypus. . . . Then high school where I transferred to Trinity School. I remember my first meeting with the Asian American club and saw that the only thing they did was have dinners and touch each other. In fact, the name of the group was the “Asian Appreciation Club.” What the hell are you supposed to do in an “appreciation” club? “Look, there’s Asian lookin’ folk here, let’s appreciate them!” Think how awful it was to be marginalized without having even a cool name for our club.

. . .

Back in the early winter of 2002, my older brother from the Bay Area sent me a trailer for Justin Lin’s Better Luck Tomorrow. With my crappy 56k modem — remember those days? — I waited 2 hours for a 5 minute trailer to load. And then I saw the images. Young Asian American faces, speaking fluent English and being tough. They were flirting, they were kissing, and they were in high school. I didn’t know what the movie was about and frankly I didn’t care. Here was a film with major American studio backing that was showing off young Asian American talent in non-stereotypical roles.

Within a week, I started hijkacking the Asian Appreciation meetings and started hyping up the film. I called up friends at other high schools and told them to rile up their local Asian American clubs. And if they could, they should talk to their friends and their friends of friends. In all of this, I learned that simple genuine enthusiasm will get people to listen, as long as you’re not drunk. Once they’re sold, they’ll start doing the work for you. Within 2 months, I had a list that plateaued at 300 high school and college students and a handful of New York City theaters wanting to do business with us.

I decided to settle for the AMC Empire in Times Square who offered us their biggest theater . . . but on the condition that we could sell out all 600 seats. If I failed, I would be banned from ever coming back. So did I tell the manager that I was a junior in high school and I had never done this before? You bet your [redacted] I didn’t. I took the risk and tried to figure out how I could fill the last 300 seats.

. . .

And on Saturday April 12^th, 2003, I can safely say 600 Asian Americans and their friends attended a sold out screening in Times Square. The director, Justin Lin, who now directs the Fast & the Furious movies and indie flicks like Finishing the Game, came out along with Sung Kang, Parry Shen, and Julie Asato herself.  And it was partly because of our screening and other similar efforts on the East Coast that Better Luck Tomorrow made the highest average ticket sales per screen than any other big-budgeted Hollywood film that weekend, including the Adam Sandler/Jack Nicholson hit Anger Management which opened on that same weekend. (and just to compare: Anger Management made $11,889 per screen while Better Luck Tomorrow made $27,751 per screen).

For a 16 year old high school junior, that night taught me two things. First, I didn’t do it because I consciously wanted to represent Asian American pride; before this I had no experience with Asian American issues. I did it because I just felt I had to. There was no other choice for me. I saw a cast that looked exactly me and I felt that was enough to become part of a groundbreaking movement. And it was after this screening when I knew for fact I identified myself as an Asian American and I was proud of it. The second thing? I learned that it doesn’t matter how old you are to get [redacted] done. Passion knows no age limits.

. . .

Each of us in this very room is capable of doing great things. By the very nature of being here, as part of an Asian American community, the chance for us to succeed is multiplied. The next Kal Penn or Helen Zia could be you, you, or you. All it matters is discovering that passion and seizing the opportunities. And I think that by all of you being here today, a little bit of that passion is coming out.

. . .

How many of you here identify yourselves as East Asian? Southeast Asian? How about South Asian? Notice that the proportions here are drastically skewed. It is the unfortunate fault of both the establishment and ourselves that we have come to accept the notion of Asian American to refer to really, East Asian American. Well, we NEED our South Asian brothers and sisters in this fight. Without them, we only hurt ourselves.

[In working with the South Asian American community] I got to discover many new ways of outreach and bridge building while promoting the goals of the Asian American sociopolitical movement. Diversifying the face of what it means to be Asian American only gains you even greater support because it grants a legitimacy to the fact that we’re not a self-interested or exclusive community. So to the South Asians, we told them: your fight is our fight.

. . .

I realized that by being self-exclusive, we lose potential allies that can tip the scales in our favor. That’s where student government came in. I admit, I ran for student government back when I was a freshman because I thought it was the cool thing to do. (But l was also a tool). When I got elected, I was pretty much the only Asian American on student council. I felt a little whitewashed at that moment, but instead of just going along with it, I decided to change the game. I fought hard to encourage other Asian American students to step outside of their shells and run for class president or vice president. Even though some of us may have negative attitudes about student government, being on it gains you constant, daily access to the University administration and allows you to send class e-mails to the entire student body. Do you know how much good work you can accomplish with that?

. . .

I was just one person and despite my efforts, being on student council still made me part of the establishment. How could fellow student activists trust me if I represented a University administration that historically were so neglectful of issues like ethnic studies? I don’t have a clear cut solution to this problem because there really isn’t any. They were right; the reason activism exists is because it highlights something unjust with the status quo that needs to be fixed. I was representing that status quo by being on student government. But at the same time, nothing can be fixed unless we have allies within the establishment listening to us.

. . .

I want to stress the danger of being too activisty to the point where you become blind to the opportunities that present themselves when they take the form of allies that will be surprisingly — part of the establishment. If you start drawing the lines in the sand, it becomes Us vs. Them. People can’t work together in that environment. Although sometimes that method is necessary if there’s no other recourse, most times it’s overly combative. So if you refuse to listen to people because of their titles or the organizations that they represent, you yourself will contradict everything that you’re fighting for. Nobody will want to hear you out; nobody will want to work with you. So you can yell loud and proud, but don’t forget to listen. Sometimes the unlikeliest of allies might be the opposition and sometimes it takes working with the opposition to change it from within.

. . .

The important thing to realize is that we are on the right side of history. But most importantly, we’re also on the same side. That includes other students of color, students of all religions, white students, yes even the South Asian students and student government. You can find a kernel of hope in each of these communities if you try. All you have to do is to appeal to their ability to listen, so they can empathize with our struggles as Asian Americans. Befriend them, party with them, buy them a beer, gain their trust, and then not only will they be willing to work with you, but they will want to work with you. And if all else fails, join their community and see what you can do from the inside. Run for student council, join the bhangra team, enlist in the Black Students Organization. Because we have the responsibility to take a proactive role in trying something out of the box when something isn’t working, because frankly, we got nothing to lose except our egos. And what better way to shatter a stereotype and prove our confidence when we become future Asian American leaders.

Another misconception of activism is associating it with constant negativity. You can protest something all you want, that’s great, but without making an equal effort in positively supporting Asian Americans, like their presence in the mass media, you’re gonna end up looking like a group of Debbie-Downers. People don’t like working with Debbie-Downers. We’d rather work with glue-sniffing teletubbies than Debbie-Downers. That’s because we’re all naturally drawn to enthusiasm of positive activism. And positive activism is still activism.

. . .

There are just so many ways to get involved without being so angry and losing 15 pounds. You just have to find those ways.

. . .

And for the minority of you out there who are at SERCAAL but don’t feel the activist vibes stirring within you, I’m gonna warn you all about the plagues of complacency. You all may be great leaders at whatever you do, but don’t forget you’re a leader because you’re serving a community, a constituency, a group of people, and never yourself. So what’s just as bad as an inability to listen to potential allies is the inability to care for the allies that we already have. Being aware of this, remember this quote by Peter Drucker: “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” That quote is so sexy I wish I could take credit for it.

. . .

So I like to impress upon you 3 things today: Find your passion, understand that potential achievements have no age limits, and think outside the box when working with communities outside your comfort zone. If we are able to stand united and commit to those ideals, our achievements will be remembered sooner than we think.

. . .

So to the ladies and gentlemen of SERCAAL: Know why you are here. Know that you are needed. Know that you are capable. You all have what it takes to do great great things. Our community is sorely in need of Asian American leaders like you. We can’t look anywhere else for help because the spotlights are on us. And we’re going to tell the world that we’re here and we’re not going anywhere.

I tell you this not as someone who’s a generation or two ahead of you, but as a companion who’s going through the exact same things as you’re going through. I’m right there with you, guys. So expect me to stay in the good fight. Because I hope to be working with all of you someday, maybe even as soon as tomorrow. And, I’m looking forward to that. Thank you SERCAAL so much for your time and thank you for having me!

Delivered by ECAASU Board of Director, Calvin D. Sun, at 9:00AM, Saturday October 10th at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida.

Advocacy, Events & Conference, Fun Stuff, News & Videos, Op-Ed, Uncategorized, Updates

This week’s interview features Carlin Yuen. Enjoy!

Fun Stuff

Hello all! This week, we feature Nilam Patel, our National Board’s Conference Liaison.

Fun Stuff

Hello all!
We apologize for the lapse in time since the last picture interview. In any case, this week, we have for you our very own Calvin Sun and his… obsession with Thor?

Fun Stuff

Hey all!

I’m going to be periodically posting written interviews with people. This way, we can all get to know each other better and have fun in the process!

The interview process is a grueling 2-hour ordeal, where we try our best to ask awkward questions and mandate meaningful responses (lol we wish, but it comes close).

This week’s installment features Miss Tiff Su. Enjoy!

Fun Stuff

Just wanted to say Congratulations to Rutgers for putting up a fantastic conference last weekend. Huzzah!

-ECAASU National

Events & Conference, Fun Stuff, Updates 2009, congratulations, ecaasu, rutgers

We began our day with wind chills and freezing temperatures, congregating at MTV Studios in Times Square. Upon introducing ourselves as bloggers and writers, they apologized and led us outside to wait in line of BoA fans. Having selflessly worked for MTV in the past 4 years as a regular on-camera panelist for “The Freshmen” and a dancer for their HD screen in Times Square (both Winter ‘05 and Summer ‘06!), I was not at all used to having been demoted to mere spectator by MTV. But I had to accept that my work with them ended after graduating, even though at ECAASU 2007 I was given a lap dance by MTV World’s very own Simon Yin in from of 1,500 delegates at Yale.

So I deserved at least a free cup of coffee.

But as much as I’ll try, this entry is not about me. This entry is about BoA. She’s the same age as me, but she’s much better looking, so I didn’t mind getting to see her in person. Unfortunately, neither did the mob of fans outside in front of me who descended upon her as she arrived.

Read more…

Fun Stuff, Updates asian, boa, calvin, cold, debut, entertainment, iggy, j-pop, jpop, k-pop, korea, kpop, market, mtv, soho, us, world