ECAASU 2007: Breaking Through!

50 volunteers + 900 participants + 3 days = lots of fun!

ECAASU stands for East Coast Asian-American Students Union, a conference that was founded at Yale in 1977 to encourage activism and promote dialogue between all participants, not just Asian-Ameicans students. ECAASU returned to Yale for the 30th anniversary, so it was a great chance to get involved in this bit of history. Being a volunteer (and still going to class Thursday/Friday =P), I didn't get to participate in everything, but here's a sampling...

Friday night: LiNK Dance-off & Divided We Fall screening
First major event was the dance-off with teams from Rutgers, Columbia, Northeastern, and Mt. Holyoke as well as Yale's Rhythmic Blue and Jashan bhangra team. Check out Jashan's winning entry!


Valarie Kuar began Divided We Fall as a Harvard student, documenting the wave of violence against Sikhs after 9/11 because they fit the projected image of terrorists: dark skin, beards, and turbans. I especially remember about a month after 9/11, a Sikh man published a letter in the local newspaper explaining how he wore a turban for religious reasons but that it was a completely difference religion from Islam. At that point I didn't know any Sikhs in person (my Indian friends were all Hindu) but it was still really disturbing that people had found completely innocent scapegoats to blame and punish.

Divided We Fall screening in SSS 114

Saturday morning/afternoon: Breakfast & Workshops
Saturday morning we provided a continental breakfast for the delegates...the juices were half-frozen, we ran out of cream cheese and bananas, but overall we (thankfully) had enough food =P At one point the line stretched all the way around Dwight Hall, which had us worried but it turned out ok. Saturday afternoon we had a bunch of workshops with topics ranging from the fashion industry and filmmaking to LGBT issues and Asian-interest Greek Life.

The breakfast crew =P

Psychology professor Marvin Chun speaking about stereotypes

William Lee, producer of The Five Points, talking about Asian pop culture

Saturday night: APA Rhythms concert & Afterparty at Alchemy!
We had a huge concert in Woolsey Hall featuring spoken word performer Giles Li, Filipino dance group Kinding Sindaw, R&B singer Vudoo Soul, and rapper Jin. For me, it was especially interesting to see how Filipino dance was so similar yet so distinct from Chinese dance, using similar props but with very different movements.

Giles Li

Kinding Sindaw

Vudoo Soul (check out a video clip here)

Jin (check out a video clip here)

After the concert was an afterparty at Alchemy - no photos because I didn't want to risk my camera in the craziness, but it was a lot of fun =D

Sunday was pretty quiet by comparison, but I still got to see Master K and the Silliwops at the Valentine's Day musical brunch!


Time to go study for my upcoming physics exam *sigh*

A 'typical' weekend

There was so much going on last weekend: Mixed Company's "Snow Job" jam, the YSAC Winter Arts Festival, the YSAC Winter Show with comedian Lewis Black (Drama alum '77), and of course, Superbowl parties in every college Sunday night. I think I took the road less traveled (but still lots of fun), as you'll see below =)

Friday: Comix 101
As some of you might have seen from Nedelman's post, Art Spigelman came to give the Hersey lecture (sponsored by the Yale Writing Center)...despite the cold and the rain (and the Lewis Black show starting a scant half hour later), the University Theater was packed. I remember reading Maus in junior year of high school for US History, and it still boggles my mind that now I've met the author in person. Then again, I didn't think I'd ever meet people like Arthur Levine (American Harry Potter editor) or science writer Carl Zimmer either, but that's just one of the awesome things about Yale!

Saturday 8 PM: Purple Crayon "Ted" show
Axel, Ned, and the rest of the Purple Crayons put on an awesome show with this guy named Ted, who auditioned for them, but then they found out he was already a college graduate with four years of improv experience! The show began with Ted getting a random word (alphabet), which he expanded into a rambling story about third grade, learning to write in cursive, a weird teacher, etc. The Crayons then took this story and turned it into an hour-long series of hilarious scenes, one of which you can watch here (photos are also online here:


Saturday 9 PM: YBDT "Fire and Ice"
Since the Purple Crayon show was in the Davenport-Pierson Theater, it was convenient to hop to the Pierson Dining Hall for the Yale Ballroom Dance Team's "Fire and Ice" party. Members of the team circled around giving one-on-one lessons depending on what song was playing at the moment...I learned a bit of cha-cha, a little rumba, and a bit of swing...I'm used to dancing from Phoenix and all, but only now do I appreciate how difficult it is to coordinate with a partner!


Sunday: Birthday party and Superbowl!
My friend Elisabeth's birthday is today, so last night her suite organized a dinner in Pierson plus a massive ice cream cake from Ashley's (half banana, half cookie dough ice cream with crumbled Oreo bits and icing, mmmm). We thoroughly embarassed her by singing "Happy Birthday" in the middle of the crowded dining hall, but it was all in good fun. Later that night, even though we don't have our own dining hall, Sillimanders gathered around a big-screen TV in the common room with subs, pizza, chips and salsa, and lots of other yummies to watch the ridiculously rainy game. My friend Neil was really happy this morning (he's from Indiana) =P

Happy 21st birthday, Elisabeth (in the red shirt)!

On a semi-random note, Silliman has been doing awesome in winter IMs so far: A-hoops, C-hoops, inner-tube water polo, and ice hockey are all undefeated so far, and everyone's participation help us keep racking up the points! A few photos from women's volleyball and C-hoops against JE last week:

Go Sarah! (FYI: The ball's going up...)

JE Spiders can't stop Howie!

Funmi's killer underhand serve (really.)

So much stuff is going on this week too! There's the huge ECAASU conference (over 1000 students from all over the East Coast descending for three days of workshops, panels, a gala banquet and a MTV-sponsored dance party at Alchemy!), the Harvard-Yale blood drive challenge (I'm going to be donating for the first time on Weds!), the Proof of the Pudding "Jam Noir" concert, the Society of Orpheus and Bacchus' spring jam, a Purple Crayon "Wild 'n Out" rap-off with 108 Tongues, the OTYC's production of Hansel and Gretel...the list goes on and on! I seriously need a Time-Turner to go to all the stuff I want to see!

But first, time to go study for Cell Biology quiz tomorrow morning...