FamiLee Life

Hawaii and the Soft Bumps of an Academic Life

It's been over a week since my last blog entry and I have a good reason for the absence. As you can see from the photo above, I was taking surf lessons in Oahu, HI. This is a photo of me after just one day of lessons. Okay, it's not a photo of me (and I did not take surf lessons), but I did take the photo at what is famously known as the Bonzai Pipeline.

I actually was in Hawaii for 8 days to attend a very intimate, very interesting conference on the current state of multiethnic families in the United States with a particular focus on multiethnicity in Hawaii. The conference was limited to around 40 scholars from around the country. Perhaps the greatest highlight (for me) was the opportunity to meet and consult with Dr. Emmy Werner (who has her own Wikipedia entry!), professor emeritus in the Department of Human and Community Development at the University of California-Davis.

Lucky for me, the conference was scheduled from Tuesday thru Thursday. So, in order to get "cheap" airline tickets, it worked out for me to arrive on Saturday and depart on the following Sunday. In other words, I bookended the conference with 2-3 days of holiday before and after. Unfortunately, living in Minneapolis, I had to travel on NorthWORST Airlines and lost a full day of holiday due to mechanical problems with the planes. I arrived at the airport on Saturday morning at 8 AM but didn't depart from Minneapolis until 8 PM! The first plane had frozen pipes and they could not shut the fuel door. The second plane had a right engine that would not turn on. Lovely. I think I spent a total of 5 hours sitting on these two planes. Finally, the third plane was "just right." Of course, I ended up missing my connecting flight out of Los Angeles and had to sleep in a rundown Clarion Hotel (courtesy of Northworst) to catch a Delta flight the next morning.

Once in Hawaii, I was happy and rested. I was over my cold and enjoying the warmth. But there were a few more soft bumps in my trip, notably getting re-sick (likely due to the 36 hours of sitting in an airport and in airplanes) and relatively rainy weather while there. Still, I could not complain and I took full advantage of this early spring break.

On that note, here are a few more photos from the trip. This is a view of Lanikai Beach which is the most beautiful beach on all of Oahu. I stayed here one night and revisited later to go kayaking. It is pristine with the softest sand and clearest waters. If you had to stay at one place in Oahu, this is the place. Plus, I heard from locals that this is where many of the cast members from LOST live while filming. Unfortunately, I did not see any famous actors. However, I tried to do my best pose of feeling lost and looking for other survivors from the plane crash.

Here are two photos from atop Diamond Head which is just Northeast of Waikiki Beach. It is a great view of the city and a fun walk up the crater. Be prepared to climb because there are about 100+ steps to climb to reach the top.

Last is a photo taken from Highway 83 which runs along the North Short of Oahu. It is a beautiful drive along the coast.

You Know You've Made It When...

Ok, I am surfing boing2 and come across this Daily Show video of a friend of mine from back when I taught at the University of Texas at Austin.

I envy his luck! Siva was finishing up grad school at Texas when I started teaching there. We were both involved in getting Asian American Studies off the ground. Now, he is an assistant professor at NYU.

Being cited in Audrey is okay but Siva now defines coolness.

Frozen Tears....Hawaii Surf

I woke up today, opened my blinds and noticed frost built up on the inside of the window pane. I knew from the start that it was cold outside. Driving to work, the dashboard thermometer in my car said that it was 5 degrees below zero (-5). Ouch. But I was feeling okay. I had my smart wool socks on, my North Face fleece and coat, scarf, gloves, and hat. Went to get coffee at the local shop and then smack! I was hit by a cold northerly wind so hard that my eyes began to tear (no joke!). But no tears flowed...why? Because they were frozen tears!!!! Just as they started to trickle down from my eyes, they would freeze. Short on breath, coffee spilling and freezing instantly on my gloves, and cheeks frozen, red and feeling like they were gonna split open from the cold, I finally made it to my office.

That's when I decided to check the weather in Hawaii. Ah...10-day forecast calls for temperatures in the mid-70s. Fantasy? Usually...but not this time. I am lucky enough to have been invited to present at a Multiethnic Family Conference in Honolulu next week. So, I am heading out tomorrow for a week in Oahu. Boy, perfect timing. Here's a photo that I found off google images that I think sums up my upcoming week...

Toby Dawson : Korean Adoptee Olympian

Here's to Toby Dawson who won the bronze medal in the men's mogul ski competition at the Olympics. The NYTimes has a great article on his victory and, interestingly, on his search for his birth family.

If you visit his website (click here), you can check out his achievements and view his childhood photos which he hopes will help him locate his birth family.

There also is a link to a story about him titled "From Orphan to Olympian" that includes a video interview with Toby in which he describes his experiences as a Korean adoptee.

Driving Blind on Valentine's Day

It's Valentine's Day and it's an icey morning commute. Perhaps drivers are thinking about love or frantically worrying about what to do this evening for their sweethearts. All I know is that there are some bad drivers out there today. I was taking a slow commute to work and nearly got sideswiped by a SUV driver right by campus.

Here is what happened... I was in the left lane preparing to take a left turn when the driver in the center lane began to move into my lane. What she didn't realize and didn't see was me and my car because I was in her blind spot. Luckily, she noticed at the last second and veered back into her center lane. The kicker is the fact that she also is a faculty or staff person at the University. In fact, I am certain that she is affiliated with the U because she pulled into the university parking ramp right behind me.

Anyway, it got me thinking about how so many drivers have their side mirrors improperly positioned! Most people have their side mirrors set to close to them. For example, look at the this image below. People seem to feel more secure to have the side of their car as a reference when they look into the side mirror.

However, the recommended driver position is to move the mirror further out than you would imagine. Look at this image below.

The same applies to the right side mirror as well. Visit this link for a full explanation.

I had learned this little trick from a college friend who was a physicist and very precise in everything he does. At first, I was reluctant to believe him. Then, I gave it a try and immediately agreed with him. Later, I learned that it is recommended by AAA and other driving safety organizations but I suspect few people know about it. For some reason, there is a false belief that we need to see the side of the car from the side mirrors. However, this is not the "blind spot" when we are driving. The blind spot is actually the spot that is not noticable from the rearview mirror and when we turn our head to the left (or right). By adjusting the mirror properly, we can notice this blind spot.

Not to sound corny (though I will) and not to make too much of a stretch with this metaphor (though I will), but perhaps this is much like love. It may seem safe to always have yourself as the reference when in a relationship but sometimes you need to look beyond. You need to be more attuned to the real blind spots in a relationship in order to avoid a crash and burn. Otherwise, you will make the same mistake over and over again because your not focusing on the right things.

So, try it out and drive safely (and love successfully) on Valentine's Day.

Audrey and Me

I was given the heads up by a colleague who informed me that I was quoted in Audrey magazine which is a relatively new 'zine dedicated to the beauty and lifestyle of Asian American women. I had to do some internet sleuthing but found the link to the story. Apparently, I was quoted for an article on Asian American families adopting internationally. Here is a the link to the story.

Here is what I was quoted as saying....

Within the Asian American community, adoption is and remains a taboo subject, say experts. According to Richard Lee, a psychology professor at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, while adoption within the extended family, even between neighbors, has historically been quite common, adoption between total strangers has not. “It’s interesting: in the history of Korea or China, the stigma around adoption is a new thing,” he says. “Prior, informal adoption took place within small villages and towns. A couple was infertile and a family member would offer a child for them to raise. ... The stigma is mostly around blood ties and what it means if you can’t have your own children. These were common stigmas that were prevalent in the U.S. in the 1950s and 1960s.”

What is funny is that I have only a vague recollection of this interview. I think I was interviewed a really long time ago but I can't recall it. Oh well. I guess I am becoming the absent minded professor. Either that or someone is impersonating me.

Electric Football

During my visit to Austin last week, the guys got together at the Dog and Duck Pub near the UT campus to grab a beer and catch up. You see, when I used to live there, the D&D was where we gathered together on Tuesday nights for drinks, darts, and sports. Anyway, one of the conversations that we had revolved around childhood toys. Our conversation got quite animated when we started to recall playing electric football. Electric football is the toy equivalent to Strat-o-matic baseball that I previously blogged about. Well, I was reading ESPN online and came across this article on electric football. Hm....makes me wanna surf ebay to find one for sale.

For the Love of Housekeeping

Over the last decade, there seems to be a resurgent interest in good housekeeping. Sort of a tribute to the days of old, I suppose. Call it, home economics-redux. Case in point -- I bought the book Home Comforts back in 2000 for my sister-in-law because I thought she would be into it (or, at least, I imagined she would be). I mean, this is a woman who loves her glue gun! I had bought a copy for a former girlfriend too but I am not sure if she was really as into it as I was...Hm... Maybe it is the company that I keep but I also have friends, men and women, who are equally fascinated by the "science" of housekeeping similar to the "science" of cooking, such as the popular book On Food and Cooking: The Science and Lore of the Kitchen.

Well, being the son of dry cleaners, I find the next couple of tricks of the trade to be particularly novel and useful. The first is a popular Japanese video of a woman showing how to make the perfect folded t-shirt. It's like origami for clothing. Click here to view it on google video. The second is a Target site from Australia on how to properly fold a fitted bed sheet. Click here to see the website. I have tried out both methods and here is my quick critique.

With regards to the shirt folding, it works remarkably well and it is very simple to do. The shirt definitely will have fewer wrinkles. It is a good fold for travel, especially when you don't have an iron readily available (but who irons t-shirts anyway? not me). However, I don't fold my shirts this way for my dresser drawer because the fold comes apart easily when you are sifting through shirts.

With regards to the fitted sheet, I have tried this method as well but it is not as easy as the Target instructions suggest. I think it might be easier if your sheets have starch in them and were ironed first. But if you are like me, you usually take the sheets out of the dryer and fold them. When this is the case, it is hard to make the perfect folds. Still, if you don't mind a few wrinkles, it is still a good way to fold your sheets. Then again, if you only own one pair of sheets, this will never be an issue.

Here is another trick of the trade that I learned somewhere...maybe from the Home Comforts book. When you are traveling and need to bring dress shirts, fold them neatly and lay them between plastic bags in your suitcase. I use the clear bags from the dry cleaners. For some reason, the plastic prevents the cotton shirts from wrinkling. Trust me, it does work.

Lowbright

Somewhere along the way in my internet and blogosphere travels, I came upon Lowbright which is the brain child of Derek Kirk Kim, an amazing comic illustrator. Click here and here to read some features on the man and his work. The above comic, Same Difference, can be viewed online for free.

If you visit his website, you can follow along as he illustrates and narrates a daily story, titled Healing Hands.

9 Years Later...

This past fall semester, having just gone through the tenure process, I decided to hit the books once again. Not to research or write a journal article, but to study for an exam. Gasp...why in the name of Waldo would a newly tenured professor be taking an exam? Was I actually short a graduate course that is necessary for my doctorate? Was I respecializing and getting another degree? No, nothing so drastic. Instead, I decided 9 years after graduate school to study for the psychology licensure exam (known as the EPPP).

At Virginia Commonwealth University (Dept of Psychology), I was trained in the scientist-practitioner model of psychology, which meant that I learned the nuts and bolts of the science and the application of psychological research. I had seen hundreds of clients at university counseling centers and community clinics as a graduate student and predoctoral intern. I even had completed a professional postdoctoral fellowship during which time I worked full-time seeing clients for a wide range of psychological issues.

But my plan was to pursue an academic career, not a full-time practice career. So, in 1997, after finishing my postdoctoral fellowship, I accepted a faculty position at UT-Austin. Three years later, I accepted another faculty position at the University of Minnesota. During this journey toward tenure, I had thought from time to time about licensure as a psychologist but I was not very motivated. I had bigger, more pressing issues to tackle. Namely, I needed to get tenure. And to get tenure, I needed to produce. I had to initiate and sustain a programmatic line of empirical research that would lead to peer-reviewed journal publications and, importantly, name recognition. That is, a national (and if possible, an international) reputation as a leading scholar in the field.

Well, fast forward now to 2005. I am now tenured and had the luxury of not having to teach in the Fall semester. Here was finally the opportune time to take the licensure exam. But the question remained...did I really want to get licensed? What is the benefit of it to me? Would I ever practice counseling and therapy again?

When I first started out in academia, I had quietly resolved to not worry about getting licensed. As I moved further and further toward engaging in research, I gradually convinced myself that it was less relevant to my professional development. In the last couple of years, however, I have re-evaluated this position. Being more actively involved in different communities, especially various Asian immigrant/refugee/adoptee communities, I came to realize the necessity of being a licensed psychologist. There is a great need out there. Additionally, I began to question the value of all my research if I was not able to translate it into practice.

So I went ahead signed up to take the licensure exam. I bought the study materials and studied hard for 6 weeks or so. On the one hand, I was confident that I still knew my stuff even though I had been out of graduate school for so long. On the other hand, I was worried that I had forgotten too much. Well, the truth was somewhere in between. I quickly learned that I knew a lot. In fact, I knew much more now in all areas of psychology than I ever did as a graduate student. However, I had forgotten one important thing...how to study!

It took a while but after 4 weeks of struggling to find my rhythm I finally remembered how to study. Two weeks left before the exam and I found myself nervous but excited. It was oddly "fun" to study again. To learn new things and to connect the dots between brain activity, child development, and psychopathology or between career assessment, personality, and employee productivity. Yes, the geek in me re-emerged.

Well, I did take the EPPP and I did pass (phew!). However, I am not yet a licensed psychologist because I still need to take the Minnesota ethics exam and get my postdoctoral training hours approved by the MN Board of Psychology. I'm in no rush but will likely be licensed by my 10th year out of graduate school.

Some things take time but fortunately time is still on my side...

Eyes of Texas are Upon You...

This past weekend, I went down to San Antonio, TX for the Expert Summit on Immigration sponsored by APA. My colleague, Sumie Okazaki who teaches at University of Illinois-Champaign-Urbana, had invited me to speak about international adoption for a symposium on Asian immigration. Needing to escape the Minnesota winter (despite it being "relatively" warm), I jumped on the chance to head south.

I also was looking forward to seeing some of my colleagues from the Asian American Psychological Association who were attending the Summit. One of the most important professional and personal developments has been the friendships that I have formed with these people. We all met as graduate students attending the annual APA and AAPA conventions and over the years we have formed good friendships and collaborations. I credit much of my success in academia to these folks because we have been there to support each other's careers, challenge each other's thinking, and teach each other new things about psychology and research. Amazingly, it has been over 15 years ago since I started my graduate training and began these collegial friendships. Here is a photo of us all (Will Liu, Christine Yeh, Alvin Alvarez, Sumie Okazaki, me, and Bryan Kim) sharing a nice meal in San Antonio.

Another reason why I wanted to go down to Texas was to visit my friends in Austin. For three years (1997-2000), I taught at the University of Texas at Austin in the Dept of Educational Psychology. During the new faculty orientation, I met two new faculty both coming from California (like me). They were Archie Holmes (Electrical Computer Engineering) and Kelli Keough (Psychology). Being new to the area, I set up a happy hour for new faculty and am so glad that I did because I was able to become good friends with both of these people. Through these friendships, I was able to meet many other cool Austinites.

Since leaving Austin, I miss a few things (besides the warm weather). First, I miss the Saturday football games with the great faculty seats on the 50 yard line. Oh, it was a wonderful day when Texas beat USC in the Rose Bowl for the BCS Championship. Second, I miss Amy's Ice Cream which has the best ice cream ever. My decadent favorite is white chocolate with fresh strawberries and grape nuts mixed in. What did I do when I first drove into Austin? Headed straight to Amy's for ice cream. Third, I miss Texas bbq, specifically the Salt Lick. Last, I miss my friends, so I try to visit them once a year if possible. Here is a photo of the whole gang down at the Salt Lick.

The University of Texas has a school song that they teach all new faculty. It is called the "Eyes of Texas." It's corny that they teach this song to new faculty but it does stick with you. Although I now consider myself a Minnesota man, through and through, I still remember this song because of all the good memories associated with my first teaching job. I guess it's a lot like your first love, you always remember her...even many years later.

Finding My Religion

My friend Peter over at Free Loose Dirt tipped me off to this funny website that lets you generate your own church sign. I am seriously thinking of adding this mock photo to my blog banner.

The Steel Curtain Prevails!

The Final Score of Super Bowl XL -- 21-10. The Pittsburgh Steelers, led by MVP Hines Ward, captured their fifth Super Bowl championship. Ah, a great win by my childhood favorite team. Having grown up in the 70s, I loved the Steelers who had won the Super Bowl in 1975, 1976, 1979, and 1980. It was good to see the Steel Curtain rise again.

I also was happy to see Hines Ward win the Most Valuable Player award. Ward is the son of a Korean mother and an African American father, born in Seoul, South Korea, and raised in Georgia where he played for the University of Georgia Bulldogs [LATimes story]. He has an amazing childhood story to share about what it means to be an immigrant and a biracial person. Winning the Super Bowl and being named the MVP of the game, it is the American Dream. Congratulations, Hines Ward!

Constrata

One of my favorite local painters, Brad Geiken, is exhibiting some of his new work this weekend at Macalester College. Unfortunately, I am out of town on business (at the Expert Summit on Immigration in San Antonio). If you have time and want to check out some wonderful paintings, head over to St. Paul!

Constrata:
artwork by David Wyric and Brad Geiken

February 3, 2006
Macalester College
Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center

7:00 PM Constrata Artist's Reception
7:00 PM - 9:00 PM Gallery
A reception will be held for the artist's participating in the exhibition Constrata. The event is free and open to the public.