I went to San Francisco for a very quick work trip, visiting the set of my Christmas movie. I was excited, but also really nervous. Throughout the pandemic, it seems like San Francisco and the Bay Area have become a massive danger zone, especially if you're Asian. Since I was only bringing a carry on, I realized I wasn't going to be able to bring my pepper spray, and I worried. Thankfully, I also have a self-defense alarm and I also thought about how my big heavy water bottle could also serve as a weapon if needed. This may seem overdramatic, but I was very concerned about being Asian and a woman, walking around this once charming city.

​Well, I can tell you now that the city is still charming, and though it's still important to be cautious and attacks against Asians are still a regular occurrence, I found that especially in Chinatown, I felt safe. And Chinatown looked more beautiful than ever.

While I like to think of every day as a day to celebrate Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, May is officially AAPI Heritage Month. That means, it's a month to learn about, celebrate, and support our beautiful and rich community. So, to kick-off this month, I'd like to share a few AAPI businesses you can support. 50 to be exact.

Eating long life noodles on my birthday or for someone else’s birthday is probably one of my favorite Chinese traditions. No matter where I am or what I’m doing on my birthday, I have to have my long life noodles. It doesn’t matter if it’s Chinese noodles, Japanese, Thai, or Italian—I just have to have long noodles. Otherwise, I get superstitious about it and I feel like I’m going to have bad luck for the year. I also eat long life noodles on the birthdays of my loved ones, even if I’m not with them. It’s my way of celebrating them, and wishing them a long life and good health.

But my favorite noodles to have on my birthday, is zha jiang mian…

I grew up in a family where my parents called each other's parents "mom" and "dad." Well, "mama" and "baba" in Chinese. For me, that was the norm and what I expected to do should I ever get married. And I like that, because to me, it suggests a closeness and warmth in the relationships. When I got engaged, I asked Chris if it would be weird for me to call his parents "mom" and "dad" or some version of it. It feels weird to me to call them the same thing I call my parents--it's just so personal. But I wanted to build a closeness with them, especially as I felt it must be hard for them to have their son permanently move an ocean and a country away. So, it was helpful we could go British with the terms, since Chris' father is British. But I was surprised by Chris' response. He said, "It's old-fashioned, but I think they'd like it." Old-fashioned? Up until then, I thought everyone did it. Then just a few weeks ago, I learned something interesting about Chinese culture that I didn't know before, and I decided to survey my friends to see how everyone addresses their in-laws.