University statement on Hong Kong + Iu Mien woman makes history: Your AAPI newsletter
If you value coverage of California’s Asian American and Pacific Islander community, please spread the word about our newsletter and send to a friend. Sign up here to receive this newsletter each week.
It is Wednesday, Nov. 27, and this is The Sacramento Bee’s AAPI weekly newsletter, brought to you by yours truly.
Here’s a recap on the stories I recently covered and issues I’m following:
Students from the nine California universities joined with 49 other colleges across the nation to release a statement urging politicians to address escalating tensions at the Hong Kong protests. Thousands of Twitter users, many from Hong Kong, retweeted the statement.
The statement addresses the standoff between the police and protesters trapped at Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Universities have become the new protest sites amid the sixth month of the ongoing pro-democracy protests in the semi-autonomous city. Two weeks ago, Chinese troops, known as the People’s Liberation Army, were deployed to clear roadblocks outside another university – the first time they became directly involved in Hong Kong political events.
Koy Saeteurn, a first-generation Iu Mien American, was recently named the chief of staff for Sacramento Vice Mayor Eric Guerra’s office. According to records from the office, she’s the first person of Iu Mien descent to hold this position in the city, county and state – and possibly the nation. Saeteurn is the daughter of refugees who fled the Secret War of Laos and the fall of Saigon to the United States. The Iu Mien is a small hill tribe recruited by the CIA to help fight the Secret War. She grew up in the Central Valley with farmworker parents. She moved to Sacramento to earn a bachelor’s degree in political science from the University of California, Davis.
Saeteurn is involved in Sacramento’s Aggie Square project, as well as child care and early learning options in the city to assist families and their ability to work and improve their economic mobility.
Fiona Duong is the owner of Happy Garden Seafood Restaurant, a popular restaurant on Stockton Boulevard in Sacramento serving Cantonese food and dim sum. She shares her story on the challenges and opportunities of being a businesswoman running both the front house and the kitchen, as well as how she loves her work and the legacy she’d like to keep for her late father.
This deep dive by The Fresno Bee discusses the challenges for Fresno police officers on cultural competency and language barriers in solving crimes in the Hmong community, following a mass shooting incident in Fresno last week, leading to four deaths.
Santa Clara County will be the first to open a healthcare service center designed specifically to serve the Vietnamese American community in the U.S., The Mercury News reports. San Jose has the second-largest population of Vietnamese people outside of Vietnam, a local 2012 assessment stated.
Specific designs include a renovation of the exterior of the center to incorporate elements like bamboo trees or outline of the Vietnamese coastline cast, which can make the community feel at home and is “a sign of respect,” said San Jose Councilman Lan Diep. The center will provide dental services, health screenings and educational programs and is scheduled to open in the fall of next year.
Wat Misaka, first non-white NBA player, died at age 95, NBC News reports. Born in 1923 in Ogden, Utan, Misaka was drafted by the Basketball Association of America in 1947 to play for the New York Knicks.
Oakland social-realist painter Hung Liu’s Beijing show in a Chinese museum has been canceled days before its debut, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. Only general reasons were given, hinting a tighter cultural control.
Thanksgiving is Thursday. Read this piece from the Los Angeles Times on how the story behind a simple choice between flour and rice ties back to childhood memories, sense of belonging and markers of identity for columnist Frank Shyong’s family.
The New York Times reports on how Thanksgiving turkeys cooked in the manners of ducks in Chinatown barbecue restaurants have provided an inroad to Thanksgiving for many Chinese Americans.
For things to do in Sacramento, mark your calendar for Hmong New Year celebration at Cal Expo coming Friday.
Finally: What do you want to read about on Sacramento or California’s AAPI population or newsletter? What are you curious about? What topics do you want to see more coverage of? Do you have any questions? Send them to me at tyu@sacbee.com.
That’s it for this week’s newsletter. Thank you for reading!
Theodora Yu covers Asian American and Pacific Islander communities in California for The Sacramento Bee. She is a member of Report for America’s 2019 corps of journalists.