To anyone who’s been asking how I’ve been: I’ve been on a Netflix binge. I needed to know that a half-Japanese kid like Paxton Hall-Yoshida (played by actor Darren Barnet) could be the most popular boy in high school like in “Never Have I Ever.” I needed to know that an Asian girl like “Never Have I Ever’s” Eleanor Wong (Ramona Young) could be the lead in her school play. I needed to know that Asian American girls like “Never Have I Ever’s” Devi Vishwakumar (Maitreyi Ramakrishnan) and “To All the Boys I Loved Before’s” Lara Jean Song Covey (Lana Condor) could star as the romantic leads in their own TV shows and movie trilogies. And I needed to know that I belong. That Asian stories are also deeply American ones.
As much as this past week/year still hurts, I’ve found a place of belonging. I fit with those bruised by little tiny baby everyday microaggressions. I fit in with the girls whose family’s origins are the subject of guessing games. I fit in with the community who dreads questions on where they are from because the asker doesn’t really want to know where you grew up. I fit in with those who laugh it off or stay silent when an acquaintance mispronounces their name because it’s gotten to the point where it’s too awkward to correct them. And I fit in here, somewhere in these cartoons:
📺 Comfort shows:
“Never Have I Ever” (Netflix)
“To All the Boys I Loved Before,” “TATB: P.S. I Still Love You,” and “TATB: Always and Forever” (Netflix)
“Bling Empire” (Netflix)
“Avatar: The Last Airbender” (Netflix)
“Kim’s Convenience” (Netflix)
“Fresh Off The Boat” (Hulu)
“The Mindy Project” (Hulu)
“Crazy Rich Asians” (HBO Max)
Queued this week:
“Feeling trapped in an American tragedy while being denied the legitimacy of being an American”
Being a “blank screen on which others project their stories”
The definition of bad days
This 20-minute meditation
This children’s story
And this pep talk that inspired the graphic below