The East Coast Asian American Student Union (ECAASU) is seeking interested and dedicated individuals to serve on its National Board. The National Board will provide leadership to ECAASU. This is a great opportunity for you to be a part of a national organization encompassing more than 1,000 college students and alumni. Being on the National Board will require some travel, and attendance during conference call meetings is expected. We welcome you to join us in making significant impacts on the Asian American community in the United States. The following positions are open for application (note: each of these positions can be filled with either a chair or two co-chairs or a chair/vice chair, the composition depends on the applicants--if you prefer a vice-chair, especially the vice-national chair, please indicate your preference): To apply, go online at http://applynational.ecaasunational.org and fill out the application by March 15th, 2009.

Readers, did any of you attend? What were Calvin Sun's workshops like? How was Phil Yu's "angry" speech? How green was the conference, exactly? Please let us know!

Remember when ECAASU first came out with a blurb about this year's theme, and we at The Blaaag were a little "eh" about it, because it sounded too corporate, too similar to the Beijing Olympics in being overly wholesome and pleasant? Well, "Distinct Worlds, One Vision" is now the official theme, and they have really tweaked their mission statement:

Asian culture is strong. It is deeply rooted. It has not waivered for hundreds of thousands of years. There are a multitude of them, each with their own distinguishing characteristics that we should be proud of and embrace. Yes, even though it is our strength, it is also our weakness. We are so focused upon our distinct worlds that we fail to recognize that even within all of these distinguishing characteristics, there is one thing that we have in common.

Major props to whoever thought of making ECAASU "green", which is entirely new for an APA conference, but this mission statement still doesn't scream "forefront of the Asian-American movement" to me. Now that I'm working in a museum and understand corporate jargon over marketing and branding, I'd really love to know how much the sponsors--Coast Guard, McGraw Hill, State Farm, Verizon, KACF, and RUSA--had in crafting these words.

ECAASU, I still remember last year when you talked about the need to change ideas by working from the inside out, which was your reasoning for legitimating a Coast Guard sponsorship, but how much are you (and all APA conferences, which endlessly need money) compromising in the process?

In the end, readers, I still want you to go to ECAASU, because it's pretty fking important to immerse yourself and grab some awareness. Late registration ends on the 13th (a whopping $65). Go to the website and do something.

ECAASU 2009 will promote the unique nature of the vast Asian cultures while emphasizing the need for the unification of ALL Asian American students.

This conference will be, by far, the highlight of your scholastic year. With exceptional workshops, captivating speakers, and fierce entertainment, ECAASU 2009 will be an unforgettable experience - one you definitely do NOT want to miss out on!

The 2009 conference will be held at the luxurious Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Fitted with spacious ballrooms and swanky rooms, the hotel is walking distance from the Rutgers University College Avenue Campus, making it the prime location for this conference.

This can be better written.

Love,
A humble ECAASU fan and attendee

(P.S. Is this an appropriate albeit cynical Blaaag post?)

EDIT:

Marilla writes, "i'm sorry, i honestly didn't read any of that, except the part where they said "vast Asian cultures" and i completely flashed back to the cornell president's speech [last year at ECAASU]. oops."

Our beloved Dean Nair, who left us this summer for U. Penn, is currently slated to be a keynote speaker at ECAASU 2009. He also just published a book. What a baller.

Those of you who are still at Barnard/Columbia... if you're interested in meeting some cool ECAASU people, or just people from other schools, try to make it to the national board's annual mixer. RSVP is required. See details below:

Saturday, 10/18

Dinner Reservations @ Boat Basin Cafe
from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM

Dinner & Pregaming

Well, it looks like Angry Asian Man beat us to it. If you haven't heard already, last weekend's ECAASU introductory speech by Cornell University President David J. Skorton was less than impressive:

During his speech, he referred to the Asian American students attending the conference as immigrants, and claimed to have "a love affair with Asia." Yeah, definitely not the best choice of words. Apparently, the President's comments did not sit well with the conference-goers, because I [Phil Yu] have been getting emails like this all day.

I distinctly remember the reaction after the speech: a lot of students were looking around incredulously, asking, "Wait. Did he just call us immigrants?" Later, a girl also stood up during Q&A with Jeff Chang, the second keynote speaker, and claimed that she was personally offended by the President's speech (as he sat in the front row in the auditorium, ouch). David was sending out private e-mails in an attempt to recover exact lines from the speech, but props to Phil Yu and all the proactive attendees for getting the word out first.

David:

Some details I've been able to scavenge...

The first speaker (a dean) also gave us a list of Asian countries that have produced the greatest number of international students for Cornell - China, South Korea, Taiwan, India, Singapore. One of the speakers also enchanted us with the story of the first Asian student at Cornell. (Obviously an international student.) He then went on to talk about the contributions of Asians to Cornell University, at which point most of us had either conked out or were viscerally pissed off at the guy.

A part of me wonders if they could have done their speeches better if they had just cracked open the program...

Marilla:

After reading an anonymous comment, I realized that our general sentiment towards ECAASU may be misunderstood (which is reasonable due to our lack of live-blogging during the conference and our harmful but habitual internet snarkyness). If this isn't clear - we had a cold-reckless-amusing-and-inspiring blast. Yes, the President's speech was unnerving (when the words finally sank in), and we questioned some of the conference's co-sponsorships; but ECAASU is one of the oldest APA conferences on the East Coast and is known to uphold an excellent tradition of spreading awareness. Our thoughts are merely for future boards (Rutgers in 2009) to keep up the good work, and (in line with David's comment) to confirm that university presidents read the conference program carefully before letting themselves get comfortable at the podium.

Even though we were terrible with the whole live-blogging deal, here are some pretty pictures... Sorry, no pictures of Gary Okihiro (affectionately called G-yo) or from our workshops, but we were too lazy during workshops and you can probably see Professor Okihiro shopping at the frozen meat section of Fairway.
(Click on the captions for website links)

Christina, Ryan, Patrick, and I arrive. We wait for the rest of the posse to leave Columbia. Some brief dialogue ensues as we sit in Room 392 of the Downtown Ithaca Holiday Inn, sick after three hours of Spongebob Squarepants:

Me: What should I say about our first day of ECAASU?
Patrick: (miscellaneous mumbling)
Me: What?
Patrick: It was fucking ra.
Patrick: Except we haven't gone to Cornell yet.
Me: Um.

Me (to Ryan): What do you want me to say about ECAASU?
Patrick: It's the fucking shit!
Me: NOT YOU.
Patrick: It's absolutely ridiculous! It's off the hook! Fucking wasted!

Ryan: Say that my stomach hurts.

Patrick: Ugh, I really need to study.

The rest of the group arrives at midnight. We split into three rooms, meet various organizations, drink sour mix with liquor, spit rhymes (no match for D'Lo, iLL-Literacy, or Blue Scholars), and discuss the superiority of Tim Burton's Batman series over Joel Schumacher's.

This weekend the Blaaagers are going to be at Cornell, hopefully not freezing off our asses but weather forecasts indicate differently.

The ECAASU (East Coast Asian American Student Union) conference is a yearly ritual for AAA and affiliates, where we consistently go to attend workshops, be ridiculous, and learn more about how to host our own conference in April. This year's conference will feature the likes of Yul Kwon and Becky Lee, Survivor stars-turned-Asian American activists, as well as Blue Scholars, etc. Fun fun.

Registration is closed (and has been for a while), but if you tune in to The Blaaag, you'll probably see a three-day live blog of sorts, detailing our every intoxicated movement in Ithaca. And if you're up there, come find us and say hi to us! (Yes, actually. If you're creepy about it, we'll give you the benefit of the doubt.) See you around.

Now I just need to figure out how to watch Lost before leaving.