Director talks connection between Vietnamese diaspora and euro disco music
Synth-pop beats and teased-up hair are hallmarks of the 1980s New Wave era — a movement that brought together a generation of young Vietnamese refugees in the U.S.
For many kids whose parents fled the Vietnam War, filmmaker Elizabeth Ai said this music scene allowed them to connect with one another — in what were largely white spaces.
"They would find each other through a network of this music where they would go to some party they heard about and they would meet all the other Vietnamese kids at somebody's garage party or house party," she said, "And I thought that was pretty special."
It also provided an escape from the generational traumas left in their families by the war that had caused them to flee to the U.S.
Ai explores the stories of Lynda Trang Đài — a.k.a "the Vietnamese Madonna" — and Ian "DJ BPM" Nguyen, as well as her own family’s history, in her film and book "New Wave."
“I thought that I was just going to explore this first generation and kind of make a time capsule of their experience," she said. "But I realized after hearing so many accounts that this was also my story and that the ripple effect of that pain didn't end with the first generation."
The new documentary is on tour around the country in memory of the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War. Ai decided to embark on the tour for herself after no distributors decided to pick up the film.
“After somebody watches the film, they start to feel like they can open up and it's been so special," she said. "I don't know — I know I wouldn't have gotten this experience had the film been picked up for distribution.”
Elizabeth Ai spoke with SPR's Owen Henderson ahead of a May 28 screening of the film at the Garland Theater in Spokane.
SCD to open all-year farmers market on quarry campus
Many parts of eastern Washington qualify as food deserts.
Those are areas of low-income neighborhoods, both urban and rural, that have limited access to full-service supermarkets or grocery stores.
"We just started looking at the vulnerability of our food security and food access for Spokane, and realized some of our food was being transported in — well, a lot of our food is being transported in, especially produce, from thousands of miles away," Spokane Conservation District Director Vicki Carter said.
"And that leaves you very vulnerable in critical times like a pandemic or even just a bad winter when people can't get over the pass or things like that."
In an effort to address some of that need, the SCD is opening a year-round farmers market on their campus in a former rock quarry on the border between Spokane and Spokane Valley.
"It's a game changer for our consumers and the people that will be frequenting the market because they now have year-round access to fresh food," she said. "But it's also a game changer for our small farms and our vendors that will be here."
Carter spoke to SPR's Owen Henderson about the Scale House Market in preparation for its May 31 opening day.
