Documented: For Asian Immigrants in NYC, Legal Help Remains Out of Reach With Life-Altering Consequences
By April Xu Mohan, a 55-year-old Nepali immigrant, woke up one morning this past December expecting a resolution to two decades of uncertainty about his life in the U.S. following an old asylum denial. He had submitted a marriage-based application for adjustment of...
Documented: As Hunger Surges, Immigrants and Advocates Demand Passage of Food Security Package
By April Xu In mid December, Melody Yang, an entitlement benefits specialist at the Chinese-American Planning Council (CPC), received an unexpected request from one of her Chinese clients. “Can you withdraw my SNAP application?” the woman asked. Yang had helped her...
Documented: Beaten by a Chicken: How a Chinatown Arcade Legend Became a Children’s Book
By April Xu Told from a child’s perspective, Kimberly Tso’s new children’s book offers a playful way to connect kids with Chinatown’s history and heritage. Once upon a time, inside the Chinatown Fair arcade on Mott Street, lived a legendary tic-tac-toe game player....
Documented: Ghosts of Chinatown
By Rong Xiaoqing “I am very nervous,” Peter Chin, squirming on a chair in front of a standing microphone, told a rapt audience at the Chatham Square Library in Chinatown. “You give me a mic, I don’t know what to do. You give me a gun, I know what to do.” He was only...
Documented: Ava Chin’s “Mott Street” Tells Us Why History Shouldn’t Repeat Itself
By Fisayo Okare Chin’s award-winning book provides a detailed experience of America’s Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, from her family’s perspective. It shows how iterations of exclusion through immigration laws keep coming up over and over again. As...