Results tagged “asianamerican”

With his resounding victory as the next City Comptroller (76% of the vote to Republican candidate Joseph Mendola's 19%), City Councilman John Liu is the first Asian-American elected to citywide office. Liu, who was born in Taiwan and immigrated to NYC at age 5, said last night, "The significance of my victory tonight is not lost on me … indeed, this is an historic night for New York City and a milestone for Asian Americans across the nation. ’m truly humbled.” Supporters were excited, with one telling WCBS 2, "He is also an immigrant like me, is not American-born like me, so it's very exciting," and another invoking President Obama's historic win last year, "I see a parallel, for him to make history."

ART: Art, fashion and blogs meet tonight at the Met. In an exhibition entitled blog.mode: addressing fashion, viewers will be able to comment on what they see. It's "the first in a series of shows designed to promote critical and creative dialogues about fashion. The exhibition presents some forty costumes and accessories dating from the eighteenth century to the present." Visitors are then encouraged to share their reactions online or from a "blogbar" of computer terminals in the exhibition galleries. Pictured is one of the dresses -- you know you have comment about it.

After being sued by the U.S. Department of Justice earlier this year over unfair hiring practices, Mayor Bloomberg announced that the number of black and Hispanic candidates has doubled in the past five years. Of the 4,000 applicants who scored highest on this year's entrance exam (22,000 took the exam, 21,000 passed), a third were black or Hispanic, up from 14% in 2002. The FDNY currently has just under 12,000 members; 666 are Hispanic, 337...

This is probably an appropriate analogy with respect to this particular book: I was envious of the length of my fellow cartoonists’ narratives. I can remember reading things like , for example, and just feeling like, “I’ve gotta push myself to at least try something more ambitious than these little short stories I’ve been cranking out.” And I think that’s the way a lot of people make progress: they aim for like, a 10 on the scale of progress, and they probably end up falling way short of that, but it’s still better than nothing.

THEATER: The National Asian American Theatre Company is known for creating adventurous theater with an all-Asian American performing plays that often have little to do with Asian Americans. Their newest production is Blind Mouth Singing by Jorge Ignacio Cortiñas; it uses a watery set and live music to tell a story of an “overly strict matriarch; her young son Reiderico who sneaks out of the house to visit his best friend who lives at the bottom of a well; her sister who treats syphilis patients in the open-air market; and her older son who bullies everything within his reach.” Martin Denton writes: “Authentic magic happens only rarely in the theatre… I'm talking about those rare wonderful moments when we see one thing on stage with our eyes, but our hearts tell us we're seeing something entirely different. Blind Mouth Singing is filled with such moments of magic.” John Del Signore

MOVIE: In the unlikeliest of scenarios, rapper (and jeweler) Paul Wall, his grills, Reggaetón king Tego Calderón and Wu-Tang's Raekwon traveled to Sierra Leone. The outcome is an informative documentary called Bling: A Planet Rock which focuses on "the flashy world of commercial hip-hop jewelry played a significant role in the ten-year civil war" in West Africa.

July 19 - 28, Asia Society

SALE: Our recent interviewees at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden are having a plant sale today and tomorrow. With .50 cent plants for kids and "new and exclusive varieties [of plants] from Monrovia Growers" for adults. Tomorrow at 10am there's a "Houseplants for Sun or Shade: guided shopping trip," so that may be a good time to go!

Workers at Vietnamese restaurant Saigon Grill have gone on strike - and have also been locked out by the owners - for over two weeks. Now, the workers have filed a lawsuit against Saigon Grill for a wide range of labor violations.

SIGNING: Child Magazine honored Julie Andrews with a Lifetime Achievement Award at their 6th Annual Best Children's Book Awards. Today you can meet her and other winning authors at a celebratory book signing.

Of all the retailers to find themselves in a heated debate about immigration, Toys R Us is one of the more unlikely ones. But the toy retailer is under some criticism concerning how it handled a newborn's situation in a New Year's contest. Toys R Us offers a $25,000 scholarship towards college education for a baby born in the new year. The NY Times reports that three babies were tied for being the first baby: One from Bay Shore, NY, one from Gainesville, Georgia, and one from NYC's Downtown Hospital, Yuki Lin.

William Dao, Museum of the Chinese in the Americas

Health scare alert! One in five Asian New Yorkers might be infected with hepatitis B according to the Daily News. Scared yet? OK, so it's not quite that bad, the numbers are probably a bit exaggerated, but the threat is real.

On Sundays, Gothamist runs opinion pieces on issues relevant to life in New York. The views expressed below are solely those of the author.

Thomas Yong,
Producer Tie a Yellow Ribbon

- You know how you weren't worried about the home invasion robberies that seem to happen way too often in Long Island? Well, there might be a Brooklyn crew behind them

The MOMA presents Miramax: 25 Years, showcasing such favorites as City of God, an intriguing and fast-paced look at Brazil’s slum gang wars, Friday @8:30 PM; Kieslowski’s classic Blue, White, and Red, starting Saturday @4:30 PM; Kill Bill, Vol. I on Sunday @ 2:00 PM and Kill Bill, Vol. 2 on Sunday at 5:00 PM.

cast member from his lack of Academy Award accolades this year, but really the continually overlooked one is Sandra Oh.

, screens tonight at Cinema Village.

.

The upcoming release of Better Luck Tomorrow has critics and cultural scholars buzzing. A drama wealthy, Ivy League-poised Asian American teenagers who descend into crime, the film is sparking debate about how Asian Americans are supposed to be perceived. Some feel it's great, finally a way to get people seeing Asians as something else besides the model minority, while others are offended that Asians are being shown in an unflattering matter. At 2002's Sundance Film Festival, there was a heated argument about the film. Roger Ebert wrote about it and his participation:

Common Korean surname, eh? The article is rich with information about that elusive group of funny Asians. More tidbits:

Charles B. Wang, founder of Computer Associates, will have a student center dedicated to teaching SUNY Stony Brook students about Asian culture opening this spring. The building is designed by P.H. Tuan (who happens to a great-uncle by marriage), and the abstracted pagoda, as pictured above, seems more lovely as a form, more so than the building as a whole, but the indoor pool is cool. Learn more about the Charles B. Wang Center at Stony Brook. The opening of the center was attended by Governor Pataki, with master of ceremonies, our favorite Chinese local reporter, Ti-Hua Chang, of WNBC.