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Thank you again for being here and I would love to introduce my colleague
Ta-Nehisi Coates who is Atlantic senior editor
He will be here for a conversation with author and restaurateur Eddie Huang
and a special congratulations Ta-Nehisi just last week he was the winner at
the National Magazine Award for his essay
"Fear of a Black President" thank you
wow umh
this is a such a great event I have moderated events for the Atlantic
going on five years now and this is the first time
I've done in an interview with a fellow hip-hop head
the Atlantic is getting really edgy here really really edgy here
we actually walked out on stage where with mics me I mean What's really good? Upper West Side
right there you go
So it's gonna be like really hard for me not to take up this next 30 minutes
talking about Kendrick Lamar or Eddie's five favorite hip-hop albums of
all time but I'mma try
not to do that Eddie has a book
and his book is called "Fresh Off the Boat"
and I'm halfway through the book I'm not even gonna front like I read the whole thing
We got confirmed on Sunday
but we do share as crazy as this is we do share the same book editor Chris Jakson
So I'm very familiar with Eddie very familiar with the things he was
working on and what he was working out in there
There's a lot I related to in the book
actually and that the place I want to start this off
is for me like as a young African-American
coming up in the eighties and nineties I feel like I really didn't have much
choice
in terms of like whether to identify with hip-hop or not like it was the
language
and either you spoke the language or you didn't and
I wonder whenever I quite frankly talk to folks who
getting hip-hop or not African-American obviously they have a different choice
what was it that drew you to the culture? You obviously strongly hip-hop identified
in your writing maybe even in your cooking maybe you even go that far to say
What drew you to the culture?
You know, I think is actually even very interesting to me I was looking at the
program
and it said like the race the new New York in America
and and then I have my name and I rarely
see conversations about race where it's like an Asian person that's
that speaking so I think that for me my experience in America growing up
it was black and white especially in the eighties especially the nineties
it was not a brown yellow black white purple situation
it was black and white and so I also saw
a lot of I remember I told Chris just honest answer people ask me like when
was it that you felt like
a kindred spirit to black culture and
the first time it happened was I was in McGruder
in like Northern Virginia DC in the grocery store and I would always like
touch the fruit because my mom we pick out pineapples
or mangos smile the bottom by the stem
and you look for like the syrup and you smell for it and sometimes I get a
little excited and then like
kinda pinch the mango to see if the flesh was soft
and my mom would always smack me and I remember seeing
yeah I remeber seeing I know where this is going Yeah this black kid he was pinching the grapes
in his mom smack him upside the head, too and I was like "What's Up brother?'
yeah and that was it for me it was
at the produce aisle in the in the grocery store yeah
Definitely a culture of mobility there
yeah I'm very very very familiar with that you know
one of the things that I've noticed in the memoir is this
undercurrent of violence in the book you know you talk about some the stuff that happen in your
house you talk about your own behavior
in school and again like I really related to that point you know coming up
in the crack era
you know homicide rates you know really were off the charts to my
hometown Baltimore and cities around the country
and hip-hop really you know being something that addressed the reality port
from that reality
yeah I wonder like in some of your
high jinks in one point Eddie makes a slingshot
out of spam is that correct? and shoot to the people
looks like a lot of fun I wish I had been there I would toatlly been in to that
but in my mind was this sort of concern
always as a child like this or to behavior I was indulging in
it might will give me kill might will lead to jail
and I wander if you had that thing in your background at all
the thing for me is I think there's a big misunderstanding about hip-hop
and that culture right I was drawn to it
and I fell a similarity to it because
I grew up in a home where my parents beat me
right and I talk about it a lot in the book and nobody needs a feel sad or awkward
that's what happens in immigrant home in a lot of times I'm not cosigning that
I think is wrong
but on the thing is is that when I heard Pac talking about these things and I heard
all this music that at many times was laced with violence
I was a little desensitized towards it it didn't put me off
it was not like a barrier to my entry so
I would listen I wasn't listening for the violence though because I think
hip-hop is much deeper
but when that's what you grew up with parents hitting and things like that
that's part of your DNA and fabric whether you like it or not
and a lot of people ask me would you do a different and I said yeah
I won't hit my kids like my father beat me, right?
but it also they asked me would you be the same person that you are
and I say absolutely not
This is the gift in the curse and I have to be honest about it
I do not encourage people hitting the children but
I absolutely will not be the same person my father owned a steakhouse
I remember this bartender that worked for him and he would always ask me
your dad loves the Magic
but you cheer for everybody that plays against the Magic
every time you when you and your pops sit here watch it's game and he said why
I said "I don't know I just cheer against my dad" and it really wasn't until even
like after the book came out
a couple months ago I started to realize that
I always because my father beat me I wanted to beat him
right and so people would say why wasn't it that
Why didn't you become a cook or a restaurant owner early on you grew up in
restaurants
and my thing is because that's what my Pops did and I didn't want to do the
same thing as him
so when I all the circuitous routes where do we stand-up comedy
streetwear hip-hop I went I got a law degree pass the Bar at one point
but in the end food was what I loved that's what I grew up with and
in a way it wouldn't let my Pops take that from me but
we get we on good terms we cool You written something that's really really important to me
and that is like it made me wonder whether
like if you grow up in a I wouldn't say home but a culturel suffused with violence
I always tell you I learned to swim by being thrown into the deep end
you know so many of the lessons of my life came through violence
so when you hear music with violence is a is a big part of it
I mean you just said you can almost look right past it's your life
and also makes you feel less weird right right because
even if it's wrong and you don't like it's alright well at least he's having
the same experience
right right, I wonder if that's one of the things one of the reasons why is
always been the sort oppositional oppose between America
and the music even as it becomes the pop music of America
yeah its it's really in opposition to
immigrant culture I feel in a lot of ways because I
I don't I don't think that we fully understand the culture of immigrants
I think we're very
we consume the cultural of immigrants
we tried to be politically correct and legislate
to protect the culture of immigrants but do we truly understand it?
do we really live amongst each other ?
I don't think right that face yet you know
Obama being elected is fantastic but I think a lot of people were very eager to see
America's post-racial and I don't see that
nor do I see the global's post-racial You talked earlier about how to you
discussions of race mostly focus on black and white
just a dumb question did you feel left out? Do you feel left out?
yeah I felt very left out but
as funny as it sounds it was little little kid the smallest things that people
may not even realize with the biggest things to Asian people like myself
I remember watching
Berry Gordy's the Last Dragon and like
related to the I related to Sho'nuff that was martial arts that's what we
involved in when you saw
Black Panthers brothers in Harlem wearing Kung-Fu shoes like
that was it and of course the biggest one was in 7th Grade I remember
this this Indian kid was driving me to school and he puts
Wu-Tang 36 Chambers into the tape deck of his car
and you just heard those drops from the Shaw Brother's movies and
that changed my life
cuz I was like somebody else *** with us besides
us somebody else appreciates this culture and sees value in it
besides me and my parents and our community and that was very special to me
so I felt like
at least Kung Fu people really were about it
So the interesting thing about that to me is you know I was a huge Wu-Tang fan
I actually always worried that like Oh these cats ain't never really been to China
somebody else's culture like is it like you know
some guy in Sweden making like a rock band
around the culture of like black face or something like that
When you see RZA's movie like The Man with the Iron Fists and I believe is the name of that I saw
it's you just like damn man
you should get back in the studio but
I think the intent with RZA and those cats is very real
is very real the intent is real and there's a real
genuine appreciation intend to understand
and I've heard GZA perform live and I seen him
you know talk about the philosophy of Wu-Tang and Wu was
the tongue and and the wind is the sword so they're very into the eastern philosophy
I also thought the food was one of those things
that Americans consumed and it was a gateway into our culture
and that's actually why I decided to cook for awhile I would not cook because
even though I knew I was good at it and people would come to my crib
they love what I did
12 dishes for Chinese New Year I cook into karaoke parties or whatever
I didn't want that to be my job because
it was so stereotypical to me but then I finally realized and
I believe as Booker T Washington like Cast Down Your Bucket
sort of a way
I cast my bucket down in the restaurant and
I did it because I knew people wanted my pork bums like they
like they wanted the food that sounded really dirty yeah
like I knew thats they would come for that
right but I really just like any bill passing the legislature
I had mad attachments to it
like you were gonna come listen to the music I listen to
we were gonna dress the we dress
you were gonna we were gonna serve you the food the way we serve it
and hire the the staff that we had
and so in a funny way
we tackled race relations through
through a sandwich thtough a 4 dollars sandwich so
Has your dad been to your restaraunt? yeah yeah yeah my parents come
they were really upset that I did early on because I was an attorney and quit
and that was just they couldn't understand it Did they see it like a downgrade?
yeah they saw it as a downward assimilation and even
even the Taiwanese newspapers and Chinese television stations
they still come all the time in the restaurant and the first question is
"Are your parents still mad?" ***
"Do you want to still be a lawyer?" like they can't get their head around it
and it's super hilarious to me because they can't see that
but the work we're doing culturally in terms of Asian identity and
just immigrant identity in america like which is why I called the book
Fresh Off the Boat
becasue I think people can relate to that is it because
like today see it as unstable like not like I you know if your lawyer you get a
salary do this you has a certain status in America
you know buy a nice house have kids blah blah blah is it that?
they see it as work with your hands physical manual work
they don't see it as intellectual work just like how you know you
you know you see players playing basketball football you want them to be
in a coaching position
my parents don't see me as a coach they see me as a player
yeah I understand when you were young you know you talk a lot about
in the book you know being in the comics being in the wrestling being in hip-hop
I felt you are right and right for me yeah Razor Ramon yeah
yet WWF was like the racial crucible of America Saturday mornings man
There're some beef stuff going on
the crowd don't even realize they don't even know
what was culture for you when you were a kid? was it those things that which
you said this is what culture for me?
yeah you know and I talk about academics syntax time sometimes
we chose to write the book in my voice the way I talk to my friends
the way talk to my family we chose to do that because so many books
it's almost like you go to write you
you embark on a literary endeavor and you expect okay now
I got to use a semicolon I gotta have complex sentences I gotta use SAT words
and I was like nah like I
clean myself up I've been in situations
for thirty years of my life where I had to go business casual or
or had to have my hair certain way I they made me take the part out of my hair
when I was at a law firm
and I was like you know what this is my story this is my memoir
if there's one thing in this world is mine is this book
because it's like it's Joel Santana from me to you right you know
and and so I chose
o not change my language but then
I'm sorry the question you had? My bad It's okay It's alright I was
asking you whether my work culture was to you but let you know yet so culture
okay that's what I was getting to my fault is that is that
there certain cultures that you're expected to know and you expected to
quote in certain situations
my thing was I always want to flip it on people I wanted to talk about
the classes civilizations but using examples of the WWF
as opposed to like the Middle East and i felt that
there was room for a common person like myself
who just sees these concepts and theories at work because I went to
college and I saw it
but I was like you making it too complicated
this is as simple as Hulk Hogan against the Iron Sheik
not is interesting because I think like I mean or Rocky IV you know like that's the cold war
I hate to put you on the spot with this but this like
is an interesting connection here
Eddie, I don't know his most famous is but he definitely when people talk about
Eddie they talk about his review of
Marcus Samuelsson's restaurant up in Harlem Red Rooster
and it was interseting that I was reading through the piece and to be honest like a lot of
times I don't you know
it had been presented to me as a takedown and I'm always like "I don't know about that"
but what I really really liked about the (?)
and what I can tell you know from told you that you have a very
I don't wanna call it a pop sensibility but an agressive sensibility
of what I thought you were talking about that piece is this guy
comes to Harlem
and he is tryna dress Harlem up Harlem is fine Harlem's food is totally fine
so check in Londel's and which Londel's is great Amy Ruth's like
you don't need to dress Harlem up to make Harlem
presentable to the world I thought that said something about your whole
a aesthetic you know even like
how you do food you know? yeah I feel like
love is worth nothing to me if I have to change myself to get it from you
Do you know what I'm saying like you know for Harlem for me for anybody
so we got to all these to get people to come Harlem yeah if I'm faking
the funk it's not you are not really
I'm not getting your love getting the vapors right so
yeah but no I feel like we have to be confident
as immigrants and anyone of subculture
we have to be confident in who we are like the Ramones you know I like
whether it's punk rock hip-hop
you know white Brooklyn right white Brooklyn might as well be an immigrant
community in a funny way right
it nobody understands urban beekeepers but you
but like you gotta
you gotta own it right and that is one very telling thing about the
power structure in America
is that you know white Brooklyn is able to proliferate because they have the power
power
being from dominant culture to proliferate so its interesting like
white brooklyn is a very interesting place to study and see like power at work
Where you live in right now from there? Stuy-Town the white projects
I live there cuz it's by the restaurant
yeah and there's a basketball court
you know I'm one of the interesting things just tell you is last time I go back to this but
Harlem is always struck me as immigrant community Yes, absolutely a great deal of
the black folks there are whether from West Africa
from down South you know came up and so you
it I was not surprised after looking at it
Why would be offended by the way you know this sting is stressed out to make it presentable
yah and I thought it was I knew the people there would be back last because
it's a
it's a person of Asian descent defending
native Harlem residents. it's very strange It's a really weird thing if you look at it on it's skin deep level
but if you go a little deeper
you can see the kinship it's very strange but I hope that there is a day where
you know if you look at the history a Chinese people we aren't
we aren't ethnically one people there's Han Chinese but
you know China was a melting pot and and we have no idea how to trace back
you know beyond those dynasties but I hope that there's one day we can
all speak about communities and neighborhoods that we care about
and that we have a kinship with and that we love and and I wanted to test people
I wanted to see
if I spoke logically if I reasonable arguments
whether they would look past my face and listen when you interview people to another piece that's another thing
you talk to other people it wasn't just you know
yeah I haveharlem residents and natives and things like that so yeah I brought other
people in because to
to be honest the sentiment I had was a sentiment that a lot of my friends from Harlem
had been talking to me about and but
you know its it's the kind of a is the rules within
a race right they didn't want to take another brother down so
and that's not that was not my goal my thing was I didn't feel like that
restaurant was furthering the neighborhood or the identity
I think I saw you on parkas and you were talking about
may be going back to Taiwan as an older person
the beauty and the unity you see in everybody looking like you
I've often heard Jewish folks talking about going to Israel and feel sort of the same way
Being surrounded I know going to an African-American historically black university I felt the
same way
are one difference story I'm doing I'm
been bless with the opportunities in teaching up in MIT this semester
a large for percentage of MIT student population
is Asian or Asian American and it was the first time that I had to face the
fact that
in America I don't know what the population of Asian and Asian-American is
here's in America but its relatively low compared to other populations of other minority
and yet when you're talking about China you're talking about Japan
or Taiwan you actually talking about
like billions of people in a large percentage
disproportionate percentage of humanity yeah and what you are saying is
when you went over you realized I'm actually not the minority yeah
most a disproportionate number of people look like me
it was it was very strange because I realized I had almost been kept in like
an aquarium
or an exhibit like I was the DC Panda
Do you know what I mean? Because I look around like lions tigers bears like
there's one panda and we're all dying
but then you go back to Taiwan to China and you're like
Pandas' everywhere
There's a lot of pandas Yeah a lot of pandas man and you know
went back there
I loved it and I was a watershed moment for me to realize
there are Asians in mountains there's Asians in lakes there's asians
unfortunately
in UGG and rollerblades and
I was like we could be anything we wanna be and so I came back to America
really where the mentally free and
Yeah man that was super liberating and you definitely hit it on the nail like
I have friends because I went to Yeshiva that went on birthright
and I went on Taiwanese birthright they call it "Study Tour Love Boat"
because you know you go back and you see the country
and it's life-changing it's really life-changing to be
kept it in kind of like this exhibit all your life
not around a community not around the culture that you come from
not around the country people who look like you until one day like be released back
it's really crazy so did like did you feel
like this urge to quote unquote "represent" like was that like because that
always been on you is that you kinda loss when you were over there
Was it like the burden of I'm Asian and I'm representing you know good question
I always had a burden to defend myself as an individual growing up
when I went over there I came back and felt the burden
to defend us as a group like-minded individuals
people you know not like my but
people facing similar problems I think that's that's
to meet the definition of a community I mean the short form
is people who have shared problems
right your answers may not be the same methods may not be the same be a facing
similar problems
after I wrote the book
that burden was lifted I really after I wrote the book
I mean I wanted to write it at that moment though I wanted to write it
people asked why'd you write a memoir
at the age of 29 30 and I told them because that's lightning in a bottle
never feel that way again
I don't feel the same way today that I did a year ago before the book came out
why did you wanna write a book? who wanna write a book?
I just felt that no one was telling our story this way
there was you know the Woman Warrior there's the Joy Luck Club there's things
like that
you know but I couldn't relate any of that I I was
just like this character and I told Chris
you know why I wrote the book was it's like you play Street Fighter
and like I unlocked the character writing that book
like now you have to play this character in the game and
I felt like before I did it that nobody knew that character existed
do you think we'll get any I hate to ask you to be a spokesperson here
No I'm not. I only speak for just like weird Asians that look like this
Good, I love that
you better than me I embraced the spokesperson will speaking as a black person
but I wonder if you feel like
will get any better in terms of representations like
you know black folks we always complain about not enough black folks in the
movies not enoght black folks on network TV
and 'till you start thinking about other minor
you realize how bad it really could get Do you think we'll get better in terms of
our representations and pop culture I absolutely think it's getting better
you see it's even funny little things like Gangnam Style
right like that guy that Korean character its like "What is this?'
So does that make you feel good or do you feel
like folks areappropriating
do you feel like stop buying or you absolute like that one on that one I was like oh man this
is gonna be like a YouTube now the sensation people wanted to stand
but I was actually very impressed with the way people grappled with the lyrics
that he was talking about because he was talking about
an affluent society almost like the Hills in Korea
and that was what the songs about Jeremy Lin was somebody that like
really needed to come around right you know that kind of like
Jesus loving Taiwanese kid like we all went to Chinese school
and whether we agree or not like he had to be yet to be represented
I don't necessarily want people to come speak for all of us I want all the
weirdos in the village to stand up
I just want to see everybody stand up it's funny because we overlay our own
stereotypes so other people you not to
you know putting anybody downhere but David Brooks wrote this infamous column
a few when Jeremy Lin was you know really hot here in New York
and they say Jeremy Lin is different because he's a Christian athletes like "Dude have you
ever watched basketball? You never heard of A. C. Green?" Yea no for real
because he was so different you know what I mean his religiosity he stood out
in the way that all these (inaudible) only *** in the NBA: A. C. Green
that was insane same and he played on the Lakers
that was just insane
he is on the Showtime Lakers that was crazy
and I mean even when they talk yeah that article is funny because
at that same moment you had Tebow and Jeremy Lin
in New York at the same time I was like they may form like Voltron
right right yeah and we are
We are quickly losing seconds here
Eddie, where you eat at? how about that you know I like the classic
restaurants you know I like Lugar's I like Rao's
I like the classical Il Cantinori in the East Village
I eat a little Poland on 2nd Avenue
I eat at Bauhaus I mean I never get sick of it
Nom Wah for dim sum I go to Oriental Garden in Chinatown
Nan Xiang Xiao Long Bao in Flushing the best xiao long bao
soup dumplings yeah and
El Malecon in the heights yeah Puerto Rican Dominican Jewish Italian Cantonese
food in New York is unstoppable
thank you guys. Eddie Huang