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My First Asian Friend · Asian Adjacent

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: My first Asian friend. I think about this the other
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: day because we reconnected online. We haven't spoken, but were
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: reconnected online after forty something years. I'm not gonna say
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: her last thing, just because I don't supposed her identity
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: out there or not, so I gonna do that. But
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: her first name is Ellen, and I'm gonna tell you
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: a little story about her. So when I was young
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: in the seventies, and I went to school in back
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: then it called the Wilshire District of LA I went
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: to the school on wilsh that actually was the Olympic
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Boulevard and you can look at it was Wilstercrest Elementary School.
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: And I went there, and I and and that area
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: and that time was heavily Jewish, Korean, with a few
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: black people. This is the seventies. So one of my
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: friends first friends in kindergarten, her name was Ellen. She
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: was Korean, and we just you know, I'll go where
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: kids gravitate to each other. We stayed friends in the
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: third grade and then I left. But we're going to
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: her house, hanging out with her family, having Korean food,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: and as you know, coming from a Chinese Japanese, it
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  Speaker 1: was different food. It was different, the food was I
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: was like, oh, the food's different, and the writing is
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: different and the language is different. I remember her being
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: my friend and I had another Asian friend named esme
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: O Gemma as May was her mother and Gemma was
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: and was her name, And remember going to her house
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: and playing with her and then us drawing, and I
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: had a fifth birthday party where I lived and Ellen
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: came to that and she was smart. I was smart,
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: and she makes such a strong impact on my life.
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: It's crazy. It's just it's really crazy that I remembered her.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: And I remember only a few people from mine and
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: I have pictures of us from that time period, but
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: the only a few people I remember from that time
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: period active memice. I was young to be active memories.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: And so we went about life. Life went on. Never
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: talked to her when I came in Eaglewood bed talk,
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: I left La whatever, and about two three years ago
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: I just talked going on Facebook and looking for her
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: and I found her and she's back east. That's a
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: cool job. And we just spoke a little bit on Facebook.
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: So I guess she remembered me too, So there you go,
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: and gonna check her out. But I'm gonna reached out
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: to her again and talk to her. We won't get
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: her on the show, feel like, get her on the show.
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna reach out to her. Yeah, we
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: went to so stay tuned. This could be a part
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: one of several parts because just see just doing this episode,
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: which is looked to the quick episode, I was like,
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: oh my goodness, I'm thinking about how she actually has
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: a job that probably be fun for the show. Also,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Jenny Chan, we'll be back. We were talking about we're
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: to talk about this this month, but this month like
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: escaped me. It went by so fast and I had
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: so much going on. And I guess she did too,
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: because I didn't hear for her until recently. So but
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: you are, we're sitting. We're going continue that. We're gonna go.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: And I want to say she sent me the loveliest
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: message the last time, just thanking her for thanking me
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: for bringing her to my show, sharing her stuff. I
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: just she's a joy and I just thought that was
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: so very It was so very nice note she sent
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: to me afterwards, and it was great. And we're gonna continue.
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: We're gonna continue. So that is coming up soon and
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: side note, I had some almond cookies for the first
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: time in a long time. My mom used to always
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: give them to me. They used to make them a
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: little pink boxes and everything. And then I just, you know,
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: I just I when I was somewhere recently and I
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: was like, oh, all my cookies they taste good. I'm
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: not even a big almond fan, but all my cookies,
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: I do love them. It's funny things from childhood, right,
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: things from childhood. You remember, I'm James Eugenius Asian adjacent
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: and I said a longer more involved in for so
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: coming up next time by