Our Summer Recommendations for you!
Get to know the Ebb&Flow Team: What is a story, habit, or item that has been passed down to you?
“What is a story, habit, or physical item that has been passed down to you?”
Karen: For years, my older cousins have given me nice clothes or shoes that they bought, rarely wore, and then outgrew, and I am always surprised by how well everything fits me. The compatibility of our senses of style, which traverse China, Canada, America, and an entire decade, and the similarity between even the sizes of our feet remind me of our familial bond. It makes me think of them at my age, wearing the shoes that are currently on my feet and bravely taking the steps that molded them into the women they are today.
Amelia: My grandfather was an engineer, but his true passion was art--to this day, he makes a new painting for each member of my family’s birthday each year. I don’t see my grandparents a lot, but I really do feel connected to my grandfather through art; it’s something that seems to hold our two generations together even through all the distance and time that has passed. He sends me photos of his paintings sometimes through WeChat and I send some of mine back to him. It’s something I’m glad to carry with me.
Andrew: My family doesn’t have too many objects that are passed on, but some I remember are the plates that my grandmother buried underground during the Korean War to be saved, and still exist to this day. It makes me think about how long the history of my country is, yet how recently we’ve had to rebuild from the ground up.
Jeanna: My parents’ story teaches me to be grateful for all the life that surrounds me. When they were growing up in China during the Cultural Revolution, they didn’t have a lot of what we take for granted now. Many starved, many were struggled against, and many families were separated. They carry that experience with them in everything they do and have modeled a humble gratitude and appreciation for life that I hope to continue. I have learned that happiness does not come from having many things but rather from our ability to give thanks for the people that love us, for the food on our table, for the birds chirping outside the window, and for the sun shining on our faces. Of course there is still much to be changed and plenty of aspects of society that are not so beautiful. At the same time, we cannot let the good pass us by.
Cindy: My family has very little in the way of tangibles to pass on. They didn’t own much in Vietnam, and they owned even less when they first came here to America. But what we lack in material we make up for in stories — my mother and her seven siblings, my father and the boat he took to flee to America. Sometimes, the only medium we have for inheritance is nothing that can be held. I often struggle with feeling disconnected from my lineage, as a girl born and raised in America who every day is terrified she’s losing her culture and her language, but to be able to know and remember my parents’ lived experiences validates me endlessly.
Grace: It’s the small know hows that have been passed on to me: my mom gripping my wrist to teach me to measure the amount of water to use in a rice cooker with the tip of my index finger or my father rubbing white flower oil on my temples to ease my throbbing headaches. It’s these little tidbits that have uniquely equipped me and many other Asian children for adulthood, such that I always feel a strong sense of kinship and pride when I see Asian creators employing these techniques in videos or social media now!
Get to know the Ebb&Flow team: What’s a medium that speaks to you and why?
Grace: Lyrics have a way of penetrating deeper, ringing out so truthfully, as the singer sing-speaks the story or the feeling(s) or the image in one’s head. I love listening to music where you can tell that the songwriter plays with their words, and considers how each line should be delivered, whether with quiet vulnerability, mellow speaking voice, or loud belts of hurt.
Andrew: I really enjoy short stories, because they’re a special exercise in constructing a compelling narrative and memorable, distinct characters within a believable story arc that is also limited in page count. I’m particularly amazed by writers who are able to fit a novel’s worth of material into such a constrained space.
Karen: What’s incredibly moving to me is how fiction and creative nonfiction draw readers into the depths of human experience, emotion, and thought in a painstakingly crafted way—it all feels raw and true while still retaining beauty.
Cindy: I’m not a poet myself, but I’ve always been in love with poetry and the magnitude of the emotions it can convey. Poetry is unapologetic. It can be tender or brutal, it can break every convention or none of them. And it is palatable, in a way that prose sometimes isn’t, when you’re not in the headspace to digest something longer.
Amelia: I really love film! I think there’s something about the moving image that speaks so closely to who we are as humans. I think you can capture so much in one shot and it really is storytelling taken to another level.
March Recommendations
Literature Recommendation: “Tower of God”
“Tower of God” is a South Korean webtoon about a boy, Twenty-Fifth Baam, who has lived beneath a mysterious structure called “The Tower” for a majority of his life. When his only friend Rachel decides she wants to reach the top of the Tower, Twenty-Fifth Baam follows her, and so their journey begins. This is a suspenseful story set in a fantastical world that will have action-lovers on the edge of their seats.
Film Recommendation: Minari
Minari is the story of a Korean American immigrant family who move to an Arkansas farm in the 1980s. Jacob Yi believes that this move will be a fresh start for the family, and that they will be able to grow and sell Korean fruits and vegetables as a successful business. The complexities of the “American Dream” and what it has meant to the many Asian American families who immigrate to the U.S. are laid bare in this piece that seeks to explore themes of family, failure, resilience, and rebirth.
Food Recommendation: Tang Yuan (汤圆)
Tang yuan (汤圆) are glutinous rice balls filled with ingredients ranging from sesame paste to red bean paste. Tang yuan are traditionally served during Yuan Xiao, which marks the last day of the Chinese New Year, because the name is a homophone for “unity.”
Youtube recipe for tang yuan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t-pop_dGsgc
Song Recommendation: “Not Spring, Love, or Cherry Blossoms” (IU)
“Not Spring, Love, or Cherry Blossoms” (IU) is a sweet, melodic spring song about the itch to fall in love.
“Everyone but me is in love,
singing spring songs
Flowers bloom and sway before my eyes
But I want to hear something else
Something to sweep away everything
Not spring, love or cherry blossoms”
February Recommendations
Poem Recommendation: A Little Closer to the Edge by Ocean Vuong
Excerpt:
“In this version, the snake is headless—stilled
like a cord unraveled from the lovers’ ankles.”
Song Recommendation: 明天会更好
“Tomorrow Will Be Better,” or “Ming Tian Hui Geng Hao,” is a Mandarin song written in 1985 by a group of Taiwanese singers, including Sylvia Chang, Zhan Hongzhi, Tayu Lo, and Dachun Zhang. The song was inspired by “We Are the World,” and was performed by over 60 singers from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Malaysia in honor of World Peace Year. It was aired again in February 2020 as a symbol of unity and hope in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic (Baidu).
Book Recommendation: Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
What happens to those who have been forgotten or spurned by the history we know? In answer, Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko follows a Korean family across multiple generations, where each generation carries the dreams and struggles of those who came before. This is a new type of history, where survivors are not always winners.
Dessert Recommendation: Patbingsu
400 g / 0.9 pounds ice cubes
2 Tbsp sweet red bean paste (or more to taste)
2 Tbsp sweetened condensed milk (or more to taste)
16 mini sweet rice cakes (mochi)
80 g / 2.8 ounces strawberry, chopped
45 g / 1.6 ounces kiwi, thinly sliced
45 g / 1.6 ounces blueberry
45 g / 1.6 ounces pineapple, chopped
This is a very simple recipe, shaved ice and condensed milk being the major ingredients and the other toppings being optional/as one pleases.
Film Recommendation: Always Be My Maybe
Always Be My Maybe, a 2019 romantic comedy released by Netflix, stars Ali Wong and Randall Park (who also co-wrote the film) as childhood friends trying to find their way back to each other. The movie sidesteps the common rom-com pitfalls with its thoughtful storyline, cultural nuances, portrayal of complex parental relationships, and diverse and dynamic cast. Definitely worth a watch in our book!