When I was a little girl, my mom would take my older brother and me to United Noodles a couple times a year.  Even though as a kid I didn’t identify as Asian, I still enjoyed wandering around the store (though it was much smaller back then).  To me, it was like traveling to a foreign land, some place exotic–like [...]

Pssst.  Hey, you.  Come a little closer because I have a secret to tell you.  I hate Amy Tan.  Shocking, I know.  OK, OK, to  be fair, that’s not exactly true.  I don’t hate Amy Tan herself (partly because I don’t even know her), but I hate the trend that she has spawned.  Do you remember back in the day [...]

When I was a kid, I was told by my mother that I had to learn how to play an instrument.  I took piano lessons for a year, but it just wasn’t my thing.  Besides, I’m Asian American, which means I NEEDED to learn a string instrument–it was practically mandated by (unspoken) law.  My older brother had played the violin [...]

So my taiji teacher turned me onto the phrase The Uncanny Valley.   Briefly, it’s a theory on how the closer a robot (or any non-human thing, really) approaches humanness, the more it freaks us the fuck out.  Of course, I looked it up on the intertoobz, and I was relieved to find out that I was not alone in [...]

Hello.  I am going to post my very first review for this site.  I’ve already posted it at my blog, but so what?  Before I do, let me give you the basic parameters of my reviews.  I don’t like movies in general, so I thought it would be fun to review them.  It would be my hook, you see, to [...]

There is one arena in which the Japanese totally kick ass–robots!  They do robots like nobody’s business.  They have created a robot who can teach classes, and Saya, the teacher comes with six basic emotions–happiness, sadness, anger, disgust, fear, and surprise. I have to say it.  I hate robots.  Let me back up a minute.  That’s not entirely true.  I [...]

I love Margaret Cho.  When I grow up, I want to BE her.  I didn’t care for her way back when I first heard her because, oh my god!  She’s so…out there!  Nice girls didn’t say that kind of stuff, did they?  When she got her own show, All-American Girl, I watched out of loyalty.  It sucked, but I started [...]

Wow.  I never thought I’d be so intimidated by a blank page.  I mean, I rant and rave at (great) length on my own blog, so I thought this would be a snap to do (except for keeping the posts concise).  I’m Asian!  Taiwanese, to be precise, so I should be able to channel the culture of my people just [...]