Okay, I'm ready.
I'm ready too.
I have my go to.
Can I have pho dac biet.
A small?
Yeah.
Can I get...
Anything else for you three?
No, I think we're good for now.
Thank you!
Columbusing is when white people claim to
have discovered something that has already
been discovered or has been in a culture for
a long long time.
Right.
For example, pho.
And for example, Bon Appetit.
Right.
And it's not okay to columbus something because
you're not understanding...
It's not, you know, if you want to make pho
and you're white, that's fine.
You can make pho.
There's nothing against that.
It's just that if you are telling us and the
public how to eat or that you have discovered
something new that's trending and it's now becoming
this huge thing, that's columbusing and that's
not okay.
Yeah.
Um..
I completely agree.
I think, you know, when I was in Vietnam,
the broth in Vietnam differs from the South.
Here in America, the pho is largely influenced
by the Southern way of cooking.
But if you go to the North or if you go to
the Central, they have a different way of
making pho.
And so, I think what was problematic was saying
that pho is a trend without understanding
the background of where pho comes from and
understanding pho comes in a different variety.
So comparing any food from a different culture
to another one is completely erasing the nuances
and particulars of one culture in replacement
for another.
People are just like, "Oh what's the big deal,
we're comparing two noodle soups?"
But it's not.
Like, in saying ramen is like pho and pho
is like ramen is like creating that false
hegemony.
Yeah, it's like creating this umbrella of
"Asian..."
Exactly
... instead of but what within Asian cultures,
so the differences within Asian cultures,
and not just Asian.
And I think people have this misconception,
"Oh it's just a bowl of pho, why are you getting
so offended over a bowl of pho?"
But it's much more than that.
Like first of all, food is culture, right?
Food is identity.
And so, like, you're erasing all of that when
you're letting someone, a white chef, come
and cook the food without recognizing all
these identities and cultures that comes with
the food.
So I also feel like the other aspect of this
video and really the entire situation that
unfolded from the video was just a really
poor instance of media representation.
You know the media representation kind of
started off with Bon Appetit and who they
reached out to first.
It is harder to reach out to a Vietnamese
pho chef.
There are language barriers and things like
that, but that doesn't mean that it's not
necessary.
So if we're talking about media representation,
we're talking about how it's presented in
a way that's catered to a certain... um...
Demographic.
... yeah, demographic, exactly and it's not
really telling the whole story.
Yeah, I feel like for the Vietnamese audience
it's just a slap in the face.
Why is it that we've always grown up being
made fun of for our food, and you know, a
white chef gets to make it cool?
With pho, it's that they didn't think that,
"Oh yeah, Vietnamese people have been cooking
this for a really long time."
They just thought, "Oh well, there's the new
person in town we can talk to and he looks
like he's doing a great job, so we'll just
go speak to him."
And so they didn't ever think about our history.
They didn't think about our culture.
They didn't think about everything we've ever
gone through with this dish.
So without that Vietnam War, without the immigration
here, do you think pho would be here today?
I don't think so and they didn't think about
any of that stuff.
I think another issue is we are never, Asian
American or AAPI or any in that general group,
ever in the conversation.
Yeah, so I guess when Bon Appetit was thinking
of this video and thinking of who to feature
and how do we frame it, there were probably
no Asian Americans in the room.
No Vietnamese Americans in the room, and that
is so important to have diversity in the newsroom.
Diversity at the decision-making level so
then someone in the room is going to be like,
"Hey, I don't think this is okay, kind of."
When you think about social activism, what
is social justice and what is social activism?
What are we trying to do when these problematic
videos and issues come up into the media and
I think, yeah, not to say the chef did not
say some problematic things in the video,
it's just I think a lot of the... we should
be more critical of Bon Appetit and how they
were portraying him and portraying the article
and how they presented the story as a whole.
Right.
And who they picked too.
Because they could have picked anyone from
the Vietnamese community but they didn't.
So...
I think we mention this in the beginning,
but there's nothing wrong with a chef, a white
chef, making Vietnamese food.
Right?
Totally agree with you.
I think the response to the chef and Bon Appetit
and the whole entire situation was also problematic
in a lot of ways.
So there was a lot of response articles to
it and I get it, people are angry and they
have a right to be.
They do, and it's a good thing to care, but
there were a lot of responses that were like
"f**k this chef" and "screw you" and "stop
culturally appropriating our food" and all
this stuff and the anger.
And I just feel like there just wasn't as
much critical thought, so...
Yeah.
And when you're thinking about what is progressive
change and how to be critical, if we are in
a social justice community, and we're trying
to promote social awareness and social change,
we have to think about the "why" behind it.
Yes, right?
And the chef is not the why.
The why is the whole media representation.
The whole why Bon Appetit portrayed this story
in a certain way and we should be critical
of the chef for what he said, but we should
be more critical of the media source of it.
How do we change the media representation
of our culture, our identities in the media?
So I put all my meat down so that it cooks.
And then, I put in my vegetables.
My steamed bean sprouts in there.
And then I put in siracha, because in the
Central we like spicy food and pho is not
that spicy on it's own.
So I squeeze a little bit of lime in there.
And then, because my meat is always on the
side and it's always raw, I put lime all over
my meat.
So this is long cilantro and I don't use it
in mine, but I do use the basil leaves.
So my mom always taught me to take it and
rip it up.
So like ripping it.
