The Price of Admission

Last night, I saw ‘The Heart Sellers’ by Lloyd Suh, a renowned playwright who often explores the experiences of Asians in America. It is directed by Jennifer Chang. As soon as I read its premise, I wanted to see it. Set on Thanksgiving in the early 1970s, the play centers 2 women in their 20s, originally from Korea and the Philippines respectively, married to medical residents who they rarely see, lonely in America, and at first, strangers to each other. They clumsily wrestle with roasting a frozen turkey while they reveal their bewilderment, heartaches, reckonings, and emotions about being an immigrant in the US, being a heart seller.

I expected going into it that it would be hard for me to take in.

I wanted to see the play as soon as I read its short blurb because I assumed it would provide some account of my mother’s own experience. She’s been dead for 5.5 years so for the last 5.5 years, I’ve been trying to understand who I thought she was. Seeing the play was hard because I wondered how much of her experience was being re-enacted before me. And sitting in that theater was hard because all I can do is wonder now, ask all these questions I didn’t think to ask when she was alive, and seek out fictionalized accounts to reveal something to me about my parents’ experiences that I had no significant consideration for before they died.

These moments from the play stood out to me:

One of the women plaintively foresees having a child who would not be able to connect to his/her mother’s experiences of home, and vice versa.

There’s an observation about the smell of rain and how it smells different in America than at home.

There’s references to the various ways the immigrant women are made to feel unwanted, unwelcome.

One of the characters expresses her frustration at staying at home while her husband is at his work. She watches TV to fill time and mostly keeps to her self when she goes out. She bears witness to the lives that are being lived out around her and decisions that are made that impact her. She questions the life she’s living now, what she’s left behind, given up, and what might lie ahead.

I was struck by how so much of what was ‘fictionalized’ in some unnamed American city in the early 70s is still actually happening right now, and happened before 1965. It’s not fiction, watching it is ‘easy’, living it is hard. I wonder what the play will look like 55 years from now about this time in our land of the free.

The Heart Sellers is streaming from March 4-9. Tickets are $20. I’ll be watching it again and I encourage anyone with an immigrant experience in their lineage to take this in, particularly if you are Asian in America.

Blog Post Title Two

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.

Blog Post Title Three

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.

Blog Post Title Four

It all begins with an idea. Maybe you want to launch a business. Maybe you want to turn a hobby into something more. Or maybe you have a creative project to share with the world. Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.

Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.

Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.