Author Archives: Cherie

9 Things #ACAM350 Taught Me; 1 Thing It Didn’t

… And with our “final cut” finally done, I am extremely relieved yet somehow unsatisfied with the version we have handed in. Now that I have been through the whole process of creating a documentary, I can honestly say that the blood, sweat, and tears behind the production of our film was worth it, mainly because I had so much fun with my group mates (I swear we work when we’re together and not just eat! though twitter might show otherwise). Despite our group being the largest with 4 members, I felt like it was the perfect number to have. Everyone had their roles–– sound (Kaitlyn), main interview camera (Kathy), b-roll camera (Mimi), interviewer (me; excluding Vietnamese interviewees). As we proceeded with our 6 interviewees, we all fell into a rhythm of our own. It was a familiar yet exciting routine that I looked forward to every time, as I would anticipate what would happen when we asked our questions, what would be said, what sort of fun would we have while filming. As the important thing is the journey and not the destination, I would say I thoroughly enjoyed my journey as a member of my group, and as a short-term film student.

the pains of editing

Through the course of these past three months, I have condensed a list of things I have learned while being in #ACAM350.
9 Things I learned from ACAM350, 1 Thing I didn’t (not limited to the classroom):

  1. Editing sucks the life out of you.
  2. B-roll is random but is also not; you need to know what you need, but sometimes what you don’t think you need can become what you need.
  3. Translating is never really truly accurate.
  4. Patience is a virtue that will escape you––trying to find music and syncing the film to it will have you ready to give up.
  5. Interviewee’s opinions are important but ummm… uh…… sometimes it’s not relevant and we need to be ruthless.
  6. There are way too many files and content that naming becomes super important yet super random.
  7. I have FLAGGED1.prproj to FLAGGED8.prproj saved on my harddrive; premier autosave saves lives.
  8. Audio consistency and levels makes a big difference.
  9. Documentary film making is not as easy as it looks.
  1. Setting up lighting was like trying to wrestle with wires and frames.

The technical process of setting up pre-interviews, filming the interview, logging, editing, cutting, music hunting, audio tuning, b-roll filming… That wasn’t as difficult as the creative process. From brainstorming to proposal writing, then interview question making, constructing the narrative, cutting out stories, re-constructing the narrative; all of these took way more time and effort, and gave me an insight into the kind of thinking and analyzing that goes into creating a film. The nuances and the little details of each segment is broken down and analyzed by us to try and understand the film we want to create. There were many times when we would be debating about keeping or cutting a certain part, each of us having their own reasons for their decisions. The dialogues that we had regarding the impact of the interviewee’s voice, to the meaning of their words sparked interesting conversations about our own narrative direction and what we wanted to say with the film.

The learning I have done through interacting and speaking with our interviewees as well as my group members has made me aware of issues I didn’t know existed before. Looking back, my school just did the bare minimum of educating us about history, but what can you do. The struggles and the pain and hurt that our interviewees carry over from Vietnam or from their parents linger within them, and how each of them chooses to express that becomes a personal story about the Vietnamese. Sadly, because of the topic of our film we couldn’t delve deeper into a single person’s story. The use of the yellow flag is controversial because of what it represents, whether it be the “lost” Vietnam, or “Freedom and Heritage”. Our video only brushes the surface of the topic and what the flag represents to the different Vietnamese people in Vancouver. With each interview, I learned more about a history I have never come across, and through the creation of this video have become connected––to people, to history, to culture. And not just the Vietnamese, but also to Canada.

Canada has a reputation for being a nice place, somewhere you can go to for better opportunities, somewhere that’s nice to live. I found this motif to be recurring with a lot of our interviewees; and that really speaks to the kind of place Canada is, and to what Canada as a country has to offer to Canadians, whether they be immigrants or first/second/n-th generation. The conversations about being Canadian and living in Canada made me question what being Canadian means to me, and what do I see Canada as, whether its a country of opportunities, of open discourse, of community, or of beautiful natural scenery.

All in all, the film has become a way for me to learn not only about Vietnamese history, but also of the conversations around being Canadian. The technical skills are definitely something that will be helpful in the future, but the dialogues we have had and the stories we’ve shared are ones that I will continue to think about and investigate. I really look forward to the screening, to see how everyone’s films turned out! Thank you for an enjoyable class, and keep creating #ACAM350! (:

A Stamp and A Soul

Because we were talking about oral history, I’ve decided this blog post will consist of my grandfather’s oral history. Maybe this will be the written record of his experiences in English. (:

Story time: My paternal grandfather was a young adult when he made his trek to HK from the outskirts of China. He was in HK when World War 2 happened. He was there at the time when the Japanese occupied the city, and was struggling to make a living after having followed in his brother’s footsteps. He tells stories of when he was young, starting out as a small business owner that sold ivory and the like, including chopsticks and name stamps. There was once when a Japanese soldier commissioned my grandfather to make him a name stamp, and he paid in advance for it too. My grandfather told him to come back in 2 weeks. He waited. The soldier never showed up.

I know of this because of a project I had to do in high school, where I had to interview a WWII survivor and listen and record their stories. I had to transcribe them and present it in a report to the teacher. The ones that wanted their works published in the HK Heritage archive could do so as well. There were many stories that were told, many that were recorded, but also many that was never heard. Having our discussion of oral history and the importance of it reminded me of the project. Through it, I got to know my grandpa and his struggles, his efforts, his toil and his fears (of the world wars, of the communists, of providing for his family). Oral history may be someone’s personal history, but it is history nonetheless. The underlying tensions between the Hong Kong people and the Japanese during its occupation, along with the stark realities of war can be easily understood with my grandpa’s story.

Of course, now that he is older, he constantly talks about the old days, of when the communists came. I always hear him talk about communists this, communists that, but the stories aren’t so clear. He doesn’t talk about it. He talks about other people’s experiences, where the communists come and take everything. According to my father, he was sent to America by my grandfather to start a business in order to have the whole family immigrate to the US. Dad worked hard, and the whole family moved.

I’m always confused at the timeline of everything, because I never know exactly when we were in the ivory business, and when it stopped. Grandpa apparently owned a restaurant too. Apparently lots of people went there. Apparently it was popular. I didn’t know that. It’s not there anymore. I ask my Dad about it too, but it’s not a really satisfying answer. Maybe I’ll ask more when I get back to HK (:

The Truth of a Lie

True or False: Mermaids have been proven to exist.

True, if you consider Discovery Channel’s  Mermaids: The Body Found  and Mermaids: The New Evidence.
False, if you read the post-script at the credits saying that it’s science fiction based on scientific possibilities and theories.


via GIPHY

I remember watching Mermaids on TV because my mother loved animal documentaries, and it just so happened to be on, so I watched it. I remember it being a really big thing because all of a sudden, mermaids exist!! They aren’t just fantasy and they’re real! Oh my goodness!


via GIPHY

Reading the articles assigned for this week reminded me of the mockumentary, and the fact that it generated Discovery Channel’s highest viewership ratings since it’s creation still astonishes me. The reputation of the Discovery Channel as a documentary channel (at least in my perception of it) caused the world to jump in on the hoax, believing in the existence of mermaids even when it was completely made up. The form of the story, in this case a documentary, had a huge impact on its reception and believability. With the production of Mermaids, Discovery Channel used the idea that documentaries are factual and grounded in reality to successfully draw an audience. The seemingly opposing form of the story and the content of the story caused an uproar in the online communities that have watched the film. The effects of this use (or misuse) of form and media generated discussions surrounding the question of viewer and filmmaker responsibility, a question we kind of touched upon in class. Is it the filmmaker’s responsibility to create content that is true, factual, accurate, and believable? Or is it the viewer’s responsibility to fact-check and make sure the content they are consuming stems and originates from credible sources? Where does the responsibility fall? The tensions between a formally represent “documentary” and the expectations of a documentary can be highlighted in a quotation found in our Winston reading Claiming the Real, where Discovery is essentially “grounding the documentary idea in reception rather than in representation” being “exactly the way to preserve its validity” (253).

The responsibility argument reminds me a lot of the “trigger warnings” that have been a prevalent in social media as of late. The idea of “trigger warnings” suggest that it is the creator’s responsibility signpost their content to protect others from viewing it. Is this the solution though? Is it not a kind of censorship? I ask a lot of questions in these blog posts that I don’t know the answer to. (:

Because Chinese Movies Live in Fantasies

So I was scrolling through twitter, like I usually do, and an ad for an upcoming movie shows up on my feed. The title of the movie is called The Great Wall, starring Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal, Jing Tian, Willem Dafoe, Lu Han, and Andy Lau.

… Hello, Matt Damon! What are you doing in Song Dynasty China? Do you need to be rescued again? Also, Oberyn Martell is wielding an axe!

In all honesty though, I didn’t know what to feel when I saw this. After the representations chat in class, this trailer just rubbed me the wrong way. I didn’t even finish the whole trailer, actually, because I just thought “oh. Another film about a white guy in China that probably saves the world blah blah blah.”
Then I started to think about it. Am I offended?


via GIPHY

Maybe.

via GIPHY

So I watched the whole trailer, and it’s a fantasy movie about monsters on the other side of the Great Wall. Okay, sure. But it still doesn’t satisfy me. Why not, you ask? It’s a fantasy movie, which means everything is pretty much made up anyway, but I’m still not convinced. Even if Andy Lau is in it. Even if Zhang Yimou directed it. Because I feel like Chinese movies have been doing this kind of thing for ages already. Take Painted Skin for example, or A Chinese Ghost Story (omg. translations. why. The Chinese title 倩女幽魂  literally means beautiful girl ghost; if I had to translate the title it would probably be something like The Ephemeral Beauty). These movies are all historical fiction taking place in some ancient Chinese Dynasty, which to be fair, is pretty much the premise of The Great Wall. Perhaps I’m just desentisized to these now, because there have been so many in Chinese cinema and film that I really don’t care for another one, starring a white guy no less.

The question of representation and the insider/outsider status creates space for these types of discussion. Am I offended because an outsider is seemingly infiltrating into my supposed “insider” culture? The 3 out of 5 main cast and the director are Chinese, is this enough of a “representation” of culture? I don’t know. Also, question about subtitles or I guess movies in general: Hong Kong watches English films with subtitles all the time, because it’s “main stream”. What does it take for a foreign film to be shown in theatres here, in North America, or in any English speaking country, without being dubbed over? Do people here read subtitles?

the moral obligation of my human existence

Hello #ACAM350! In continuing the discussion about identity, though I don’t really call myself an Asian Canadian, I am… Let me explain. I was born in Canada then packed on a plane at 3 months old to be raised in Hong Kong. Hong Kong is not China. I have a Canadian passport. I also have a Hong Kong passport. Technically, yes, I’m a Chinese-Canadian, but:  Canadian identity  <<  Hong Kong identity. Complicated, as identity tends to be.

I feel like identity is something that’s fluid, as with all the facets that make up one identity, and that’s why it’s so hard to pinpoint. Anyway, that’s a little intro to me. Moving on!

While reading Voices Rising, I was intrigued by Tanaka’s idea of a moral obligation to community and that “the end of all art should be to bring about an understanding of the community’s being in the world”, while pitting it against the idea of “the artist in Western society” (Li 20). The two opposing concepts of individuality versus community is one that highlights the fundamental differences in Western societies and East Asian societies (cue epic music).

Confucian philosophy and ideologies shape community orient East Asian societies––a way of thinking that resurfaces as “moral obligation to community” in Tanaka’s argument. The difference between his proclamations and the “artist in Western society” then, becomes more than a simple opposition of perspective, but one rooted in the distinction of the differences in cultural perspectives. The argument to “develop a community consciousness” is invariably tied to the idea of an East Asian identity and culture, whether that is Japanese/Korean/Chinese (20).

Going back to the idea of an Asian Canadian identity, how do we reconcile the clashes in ideologies and cultures that make up who we are? What about the idea of “reconstructing” identities, where we unlearn cultural teachings and biases to create a new meaning for being Asian Canadian? I don’t know where I’m going with this but maybe I will at the end of this course (:

My Whole New Mind? I’m Thinking I Don’t Want To Think Anymore

The journey is over. Another term is coming to an end. I’m sure most people have heard the phrase “It’s about the journey, not the destination” or something along those lines, but I am so happy to have reached the destination because Christmas (!!) and winter break! In all seriousness though, the road we have taken in creating design briefs and solutions was an adventure, and I am glad to taken part in it.

Life is a journey, not a destination. It's up to us to connect the dots.:

I had an epiphany when looking at the Compelling Experience Map when it was being taught in class, where I caught myself thinking “THIS is what I’m talking about!”. The questioning is where pain points and solutions present themselves, and being someone that prioritizes efficiency and presentability, the map gave me a way to name the process I intuitively carry out, while also providing me a detailed, step-by-step questioning that can help me refine the process. My group would always come back to the big WHY, the HOW, the WHAT as well. The Compelling Experience map evolved into what our design solution eventually embodied, taking the form of a data mapping system that placed emphasis on touch points at every interaction between the client and Creative BC.

 

Creating the design brief was the most difficult part of this whole project, because our topic of “sustainable business model” encompasses the entirety of Creative BC and its clients, the creative sector. The reading from A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the World categorizes our journey really well during the first phase of problem finding, because we essentially had to steer away from the left-brained thinking (facts, logic, analysis) to concentrate on the right-brained thinking (bigger picture, synthesis, emotional expression). We spent a whole afternoon trying to map out the possible design brief ideas, finally coming to terms with the scope of our topic by successfully envisioning and piecing together the whole picture. If we were too caught up in all the information and details of the project, we would definitely be swept away by the sheer amount of factors that contributed to the problem, instead of spending our time creating a solution. We decided to categorize everything we’ve learnt of Creative BC into key phrases to help us with our organization. The result was a presentable design brief, but even with all the information condensed into a 10 minute presentation and report, there was so much that still could be included. I feel this speaks to the cooperation or the simultaneous workings of left-brained thinking and right-brained thinking, because you can’t help but consider all the details, but synthesizing the data is what brings solutions to the table, tying everything together nicely.

[I’m right-brained, apparently. So… when do I get to rule the world? (; ]

Our process in collecting the necessary information for the design brief and mapping our possible solutions led to the simple and understandable design solution we provided Creative BC. The design brief was where we completed a large portion of the groundwork, and the ease of creating the solution was all thanks to that, and the experience mapping. The realization of left-brained thinking and right-brained thinking reminds me of the convergent and divergent thinking we talked about in the beginning of the term: the brain is constantly zooming in and out, focusing on the details then the big picture, but you need an equal balance of both, or the photo will simply be out of focus… So, what did I learn after all this? I learned that good design, really good design, solves problems (smartly, beautifully, easily). (:

 

problems become one, two, three, ta-da!

The “funnel” essay model––where big concepts are “funnelled” and become a single idea (thesis), which is then supported by several arguments, and is then followed by a conclusion that widens the scope once again. I think the funnel captures my way of thinking and information processing rather accurately. Whether it’s assignments or everyday problems, the model has become so ingrained into my thinking by English teachers throughout the years––thank you very much––that I naturally think through the steps of the funnel without realizing it. The idea of thoughts going from “big > small > big” mirrors the “general > specific > general” thinking that our minds go through everyday. Even in the realm of business, I think everything, whether it be products or services, is “concepts > details > concepts” turned into reality.

If I need to explain my thinking in terms of divergent/convergent thinking, I think my initial answer is selected from a quick diverging of possible options. This then converges into one single point to then diverge again to explore the array of solutions within that one point before converging again into a concrete answer… I’ve come to realize through this assignment that the way our brain processes information happens so instantaneously that explaining it step by step is a rather grandiose task. Nevertheless, I will attempt to explain the way my brain handles problems, how it makes its selection among the possible solutions, and how it decides to present that information.

screen-shot-2016-09-16-at-9-40-54-pm

Infographic of my thinking process

My thinking takes shape in the form of writing, if scribbles count as actual writing? My mind map isn’t so much a map rather than just blocks and points of sentences and thought segments that continue itself down the page. I guess you could say I organize myself with words rather than with pictures or by visuals (English major, go figure). Despite this, the way I present my thoughts could end up being very visual, as with the infographic I created in an attempt to explain the way my brain processes information (I hope it helps). As much as thinking and analyzing is involved to create a single idea, the effectiveness of transmitting the message is key if I want people to actually understand what I am thinking. No matter how efficient or how brilliant my ideas are, if I can’t translate that into comprehensible data, then all is for nought. Because of this, I consider being able to think through how to create an easy to understand and effective presentation is just as important as the whole thinking process.

Of course, showing is always more effective than telling, and luckily I have some outlines of previous papers lying around my desk. Exhibit A: Photo evidence shows an example of an outline to a research essay I had to write for an English course. The left page is my initial scribbling and brain blabbing on the possible arguments and theses, while the right is a more organized, well defined and explained version of the scribbles. Those are both incomplete as I suspect there was a third piece to the puzzle, but alas it is lost among the chaos of term papers and finals. Notice the use of colours too––I get bored easily and using colourful pens makes it easier to cope while making my thoughts easier to organize as well.

img_0657

Exhibit A: My research paper outline

I look forward to the Business Innovations course as a way to further refine my way of thinking and problem solving, as well as finding effective and creative ways to present information to the world outside my consciousness. I am always for simple, beautiful and effective types of engagement, and if I am able to learn about design processes during my time in this course, I will for sure take advantage of this chance to further improve my skills.

As a wise woman (a.k.a my mother) once said: “We never focus on the effects of the problem, always on how to solve the problem. Because what is the point of getting emotional when you can do something about it?” And I truly believe this has affected my way of thinking way more than any other methods I was taught, because part of the fun of constantly thinking through problems is the smile on people’s faces once you’ve solved them, rather than being upset over how much the problem is well… a problem.

 

The Roaring Map, Unheard

Lesson 2.3; Assignment 2.6 –– Colonialism

3) In order to address this question you will need to refer to Sparke’s article, “A Map that Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation.” You can easily find this article online. Read the section titled: “Contrapuntal Cartographies” (468 – 470). Write a blog that explains Sparke’s analysis of what Judge McEachern might have meant by this statement: “We’ll call this the map that roared.”

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

After going over the short account of the case pertaining to the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en claims to ownership of land, as well as the judgement of McEachern, the “map that roared” is referred to by Sparke as one that “evoked the resistance in the First Nations’ remapping of the land: the cartography’s roaring refusal of the orientation system, the trap lines, the property lines, the electricity lines, the pipelines, the logging roads, the clear-cuts, and all the other accoutrements of Canadian colonialism on native land” (468). In short, it is a map that carries the roars of protest and unrest of the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en people with regards to their claims of the now “Canadian” land, and Judge McEachern who heard its spirit, and yet did nothing.

I’ve been drawing and colouring and labeling the map of Canada for as long as I could remember––being from a Canadian international school, more often than not we would be given the Canadian map and asked to something with it. All of those times it had to do with the land as the Europeans saw it: label the provinces and territories, the capitals, draw the resources of each part of Canada, draw the major trade routes, etc. What the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en map showed was a different Canada, one that they have been drawing over and over again. It’s a view of the land in their eyes, and when represented in court, discounts all of present Canada as everyone else sees it. It’s unknown, strange; it’s not Canada, it’s the First Nations’ land. The map stands as a depiction of the tribes and their settlement as well as their livelihood, and to accept it would mean to accept their claim to the land, one that is blatantly refused. This highlights the very issue of stories and the land, of who was here “first” and who had to rights to something when the very nature of the idea of “rights” are contested by two different groups with differing meanings of the word.

By producing their own map, the Gitxsan and Wet’suwet’en are pronouncing their entitlement to the land in some way, or to show that this is what Canada is supposed to look like, not what is depicted by the settlers and the colonizers. The redrawing of the land is akin to the First Nations’ reclaiming their land, as if an illustrated representation on paper marks the physical land in the same way. A map of the same land, but also a map of something foreign, roaring for legitimacy.

––––––––––––––––––––––

Works Cited

Sparke, Matthew. “A Map That Roared and an Original Atlas: Canada, Cartography, and the Narration of Nation”. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 88.3 (1998): 463–495. Web. 02 Mar 2016.

Contact: Land and Stories, The One “True” Version

Unit 2.2, Assignment 2.4 – Origin stories

Q1) …Why does King create dichotomies for us to examine these two creation stories? Why does he emphasize the believability of one story over the other — as he says, he purposefully tells us the “Genesis” story with an authoritative voice, and “The Earth Diver” story with a storyteller’s voice. Why does King give us this analysis that depends on pairing up oppositions into a tidy row of dichotomies? What is he trying to show us?

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

In The Truth About Stories, King tells of the two creation stories of the pregnant Charm falling through the sky, and of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden in Genesis. He distinguishes the two stories by describing how he tells them differently and pitches the two against each other as representations of two separate ideologies of religion or thought processes inherent in the natives versus the Europeans. I think King presents this dichotomy in an effort to have his readers consider the ideas beyond––a way of saying that the dichotomies exist, I have shown them to you, now what is underneath that?

King talks about the authoritative voice he uses in his retelling of the Genesis creation myth, and how that is the basis of the European thinking related to hierarchies and power dynamics evident in the culture associated with royals and nobles versus peasants and slaves. On the topic of authority, there has been psychological studies which have identified individuals feeling powerful when in an authoritative position. Studies such as Milgram’s Shock Study and Zimbardo’s Standford Prison Study presents authority as being an idea which could cause people to act wildly out of the norm. In Patros et. al’s report of the “Underlying Effects of Authority: Past to Present”, they state that “[a]n unequal balance of power in a group setting can lead otherwise normal human beings to behaving tyrannically”. If, in such extreme cases, authority has been proven to have such adverse effects on people, then the effect of the “authoritative voice” used by King to tell the story of Adam and Eve is one which establishes power and dominance over the more peaceful and balanced Charm creation story. As Lutz writes in “Myth Understandings: First Contact, Over and Over Again”, “stories function to redress power relations between the native and newcomer” (13), and this is made apparent in King’s address of the difference in style of the telling of the creation stories.

The dichotomy between the two is not so much as a dichotomy but rather, perhaps, a pyramid, because there always needs to be one “true” story, and the one with the most authority, the one which seems to hold more power and command sits at the pinnacle whilst the plethora of other tales are spread underneath and creates a base of which the authoritative story has power over. In short, because of the nature in which the Adam and Eve story is told, it is unconsciously being labeled as a “true” story for containing authority.

King uses this distinction to highlight the inherent differences in the stories and therefore the opposing ideologies of a power driven culture versus a balance driven culture. Through the dichotomies he presents to readers, he is able to also emphasize the parts which do not fit so tidily into the row of dichotomies, of the influences and interplay of histories and stories of natives and Europeans outside of the obvious contrasts. By doing so, King paints the larger picture of the dynamics of the relationships between the two different peoples and the complexity of maintaining and managing such relations when the other is presented as otherworldly.

–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Works Cited

Cherry, Kendra. “The Milgram Obedience Experiment.” About Psychology. about.com, 16 Dec. 2015. Web.

     19 Feb. 2016. <http://psychology.about.com/od/historyofpsychology/a/milgram.htm>.

Lutz, John. “Contact Over and Over Again.” Myth and Memory: Rethinking Stories of Indignenous- European

      Contact. Ed. Lutz. Vancouver: U of British Columbia P, 2007. 1-15. PDF.

Patros, Jennifer, et al. “Underlying Effects of Authority: Past to Present.” URC. Undergraduate

     Research Community, 5 Nov. 2006. Web. 19 Feb. 2016. <https://www.kon.org/urc/v6/

     patros.html>.

“The Stanford Prison Experiment.” The BBC Prison Study. N.p., 2008. Web. 19 Feb. 2016.

     <http://www.bbcprisonstudy.org/bbc-prison-study.php?p=17>.

Revelations of Home

Assignment 2.3 –– Read at least 3 students blog short stories about ‘home’ and make a list of the common shared assumptions, values and stories that you find.

After reading the posts of my fellow students, I realized the ones I read focused on the idea of home as constantly moving, or rather, uncertain. Because I am an international student, that idea resonates with me, as there is always a discrepancy between the “home” in Hong Kong and the “home” in Vancouver. There is the struggle where family or friends try to assert that one place is your home, but you’re not sure yourself, because you belong to both places yet neither of them at the same time. There is also the knowledge of a distant home, but not being able to identify with it or being unable to feel comfortable because there isn’t the same sense of security as opposed to the one you grew up in, even if that “home” is supposed to be the home.