OFF THE WOK

Gogo dancing, we've all heard the term before, but chances are many of us either don't know what it actually is or tend to incorrectly associate it or group it with a bunch of other dance forms. This is why we have Carole and Pola from @thecommietearoom to help us clarify and educate. Along the way, we discuss the cultural stigma associated with the profession and how Carole and Pola have navigate...

What does it mean to be vegan? As our guest Rose Lee (@cheaplazyvegan) describes, it is a way of living where you seek to exclude as much animal exploitation in your life as possible. This can include diet or fashion (think Canada Goose) or even entertainment (like going to the zoo). Rose details her beginnings with being vegan and what got her started (make sure to check out the book Skinny Bitch...

What do you get when you cross two beer-loving buddies (Boaz Leung and Jacob May), amazing food, and a great creative mind? Two Pillars Brewery (@twopillarsbrewery). With a small commercial brewhouse allowing two kegs per brew, it gives Two Pillars a chance to constantly innovate and create different unique and exclusive beers. Boaz and Jacob give us their background story on how they started, the...

When you think of boudoir photography, what do you think of? Many of us who haven't experienced it before or are not part of the industry tend to make certain generalizations or misconceptions about boudoir photography, misconceptions that our guest Rex Szeto (@rexszetophotography) is happily able to clear up. Rex is a boudoir photographer based in Calgary and among other things, he talks about wh...

Sorry in advance for my horrible intro singing but although my singing might be horrible, this episode is not as it talks about a popular topic among our listeners, and that is love! Joining us today is Sahib Gill (@sahib_gill), who immigrated to Canada when he was 13. Sahib gives a breakdown of his experience with dating (hint: you need a strong beard game), relationships, wedding traditions (inc...

How does one go from a 9 to 5 to tattooing full time? Al Chu (@alchutattoos) of Flipside Tattoos knows, and he gets into details of how he (with a little bit of luck) got into the business. Drawing has always been in him since he was young, it just never registered as a potential profession until much later in his life. Al chats about how his training started, the type of art he specializes in, wh...

CGI is everywhere in film nowadays, and it's something a lot of us take for granted when we watch movies. But there's a huge team responsible for making these amazing scenes/effects/creatures come to life and it's something we're having a chat about today with Cobol Yu, a VFX designer who works in Vancouver. He shares his knowledge and experience in the industry as he has worked on films like The...

A random topic that came about while we were waiting for Ken to show up to a meeting (he was late again) got us thinking, is Asian lateness a thing? It's something that we've heard of and been guilty of before but is it actually a thing? To help us with that conversation is Cristabel Tan (@xtabelll on Insta), she's from Malaysia and over there, they have what's known as "running on Malaysian time"...

Happy Pride Month! We have an especially great episode for you as we are joined by Ricky from his podcast The Gay Narratives (IG @gaynarratives). Ricky shares his story of growing up gay in an Asian family along with his internal feelings, emotions, and uncertainties associated with it. Ricky provides his narrative on when he found out he was gay, how and when he came out to his family, his reacti...

Picture yourself running with a tiny one-person sled just so you can jump on it and start sliding down a frozen track at speeds of up to 120km/h...head first, that's Skeleton. A sport that's particularly rare in terms of membership, Jon Chu (@chu_jonny on Instagram) is one of a handful of people who have participated and trained for it. He goes into how he got started and dives into the particular...

Because it's a subject that's often taboo to talk about. Whether it be society's norms, the media, or just an old way of thinking, men are somehow led to believe that it's not okay to talk about their feelings or emotions, that it shows weakness and shouldn't be discussed, even among close friends. The problem is that it's not healthy and if left unchecked, it can lead to potentially serious conse...

Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) is a non-profit organization that dedicates itself to providing one-to-one mentoring relationships between adult volunteers and youths. One of the oldest and largest youth mentoring organizations in the US, it operates in all states and 13 countries around the world. Today, we focus on one member within the Calgary chapter, Henry Luong, who has been with the organiz...

So today we got ourselves our first joint episode with Jason and David, hosts of their podcast Behind the Business. We are going to be talking about the "behind the scenes" for our podcasts because there is a ton of stuff that goes on in the background before a final product gets pushed out. We get into editing, finding guests, platforms used to broadcast, mics, editing software, social media, cos...

Our conversation today takes us into how we were disciplined growing up versus how we discipline our kids today. Joining us in our chat are Giselle and Harlene, co-hosts of their Hard as a Mother podcast. Being mothers themselves, they share stories about the ways they were disciplined and the "tactics" that were used, and how ultimately it affected their relationship with their parents. Learning...

We had such a fun time talking about our life hacks growing up (for those who don't know, it was episode 10) that we decided to do a second episode on it! This one's the web edition version where we chat about internet hacks we do to save ourselves a little money. Joining us again is Johnny, who's got a couple of tricks up his sleeve he's gonna share (if you haven't listened to him before, check o...

Although Asians have been associated in one way or another throughout Hollywood's history, their roles have rarely been significant. Many Asians were typecast to roles like the weak nerd in glasses who helps out the main protagonist, or as an evil mystical person out to get the protagonist and fail. Either way, they were relegated to second-class roles. That, however is finally starting to change...

Mental health has always been a taboo subject among Asians and growing up, you weren't expected to talk about your anxiety, or your stress, or even your feelings to your parents or even anybody because of the stigma attached to it. That you saying anything would somehow bring shame to not only the family but yourself, that it shows weakness or that it's just another excuse where you're complaining...

How does one go from doing accounting at McGill University in Montreal to Dropbox in San Francisco? Our guest Brendan Wong can give you a little insight into that. A native Calgarian, Brendan tells us how he was working in finance in Canada to get his CPA, before checking himself and deciding to move to San Francisco. From there, working at Ernst and Young, his first client was Zynga and that's wh...

Talk to any Asian parent and they'll tell you that education is the key to success. So when our guest Leanne Lam told her parents that she was dropping out...AFTER she already dropped out, it's safe to say her parents weren't pleased. But it turned into the best decision she ever made as from there she started a very successful events company called Le Lumiere Events. Join us as Leanne gives us th...

We are starting a new sub-series! And we are calling it... dat Asian hustle! It will focus on individuals and their accomplishments, their successes, failures, and how they got to where they are today. We're hoping that these stories break the stereotypical traditional career path of Asians and to let our listeners out there know that if you wanna do something, just fucking do it. And what better...

1 year later and finally we are seeing some progress in the fight against COVID. With vaccinations in full swing, our hope is that everyone will be vaccinated by fall. What hasn't seen progress? Racism. According to stopaapi.org's national report, almost 4000 cases of discrimination and racism have been reported between March 2020 to 2021 in the US. And these are the cases that were reported, ther...

Picture this: you're traveling in Hong Kong and start getting hungry so you're searching for places to eat. Easy right? Hong Kong is like the mecca of food in the east, with everything from fine dining to local food stalls on every street. There's a catch though, you need to eat a gluten-free diet. And in a city where gluten is like the second ingredient after salt, finding a restaurant that offer...

In 2014, Eric embarked on a journey to Malaysia with his business partner to launch a startup in the dating sphere. For 2 years, he lived there to build Sparka, a dating app specifically aimed at SE Asia before coming back in 2016. Although the app was ultimately unsuccessful, the experiences he lived and breathed while in Malaysia will always be positive and life learning. Join us as we delve int...

Gaming nowadays is considered cool. People scramble for the latest sold-out systems or newest hottest games because it's not only fun to play, but is also now socially acceptable. Gaming has evolved into a recreation for both the young and old, and this evolution has turned it into the billion-dollar industry it is today. Esports is now a thing and can be considered a full-time job with the possib...

Let's talk about the concept of who am I? But not in the context of that awesome 1998 Jackie Chan movie, but more in a cultural context as an Asian born to immigrant parents in Canada. Growing up, we get influenced by two cultures, one from our family, and one from outside our family, a western influence. Both are equally strong and as such, it can be difficult to know what you identify as. Are yo...