Here’s an article I wrote for Tokyo Weekender (April 2018). The piece is about the short feature film, Born With It. The movie follows Keisuke, an African-Japanese boy growing up in a small Japanese town. He’s the new kid and the only black one. I talked to director Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour. He made the film in 2015, but its still getting recognized. Next month Born will air on PBS and later streamed online. Watch the trailer below. Sorry for the long absence. …
Category: Culture
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Culture
Just wrote an article about raising my daughter, Kantra in Japan. It’s up here. Watching her has inspired me and its forced me and my wife to grow in unforeseeable ways. Nothing humbles you like a determined child who doesn’t give a single solitary fuck about what you doing, what you need to do, or what you was about to do. “Daddy, play with me.” Got an essay that’s getting published. Hopefully it’ll drop soon. Won’t say who yet, but …
Writing about Black Panther and googling it while trying to avoid spoilers is like boxing yourself. But learning about Wakanda’s king still got me hyped. A lot of themes came out of writing this Black Panther post for Tokyo Weekender. The movie is a treasure trove of symbolism and possibility. Here, the cultural and social impact of this film is epic. For kids like my four-year-old daughter and parents like me who worry about their child’s mental health and safety, …
Want to say “nigger” without taking the chance of getting beat the fuck up? Are you a white liberal tired of white guilt? Feeling a little transracial? Does everything about you seem black, but your skin? Do you sketch self-portraits using a brown crayon, instead of peach? Find yourself tweeting #blacklivesmatter, but still getting bussed to the #alllivesmatter side of town? What about that blackface frat party you always wanted to throw? Want to get shot for no reason? Can’t …
To commemorate the 25th anniversary of 2Pac’s debut album 2Pacalypse Now, I wrote something for L.A. Weekly about how that record influenced me as a kid. Pac’s career only lasted for a five-year blink-of-an-eye span. He was twenty-five when he passed. This year he was nominated for the Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame. He wasn’t a saint or an infallible icon. He was a man that made a lot of mistakes like most people, except his faults were publicized and broadcasted for the whole …
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