The Spark Podcast 火花

Meg and Amy sit down for a mid-summer check-in. They talk about what they’ve been up to since the last episode, visiting past versions of themselves, work, Amy’s trip home, and more as they look forward to what fall holds for The Spark. Meg 和 Amy在这仲夏之日，坐下聊了聊过去几个月发生的点点滴滴。她们分享了从刚开始做播客到现在的心态变化，工作上的起起伏伏，以及Amy的回家之旅。在这集的结尾，Meg和Amy分...

Meg and Amy revisited their past episode "Two Cities, Multiple Lives” after three years of turbulence, travel bans, and growth. The world may seem and feel different after the pandemic. However, upon re-listening to the episode and reexamining their lives over the past three years, they realized that instead of splitting lives in between different places, it is in fact, the other way around. Meg...

Meg and Amy reflect on episode 3: Scared But Brave, and episode 4: Hello 2020 - the two episodes recorded before the world as we knew it fell apart. Hello 2020 right? And when they look back they talk about how coincidental it was that the motto they went into to 2020 with, “Scared But Brave,” would be so necessary. They discuss the moments they had to be “scared but brave” over the past three yea...

Every great story starts at the beginning. Now that The Spark is almost four years old, Meg and Amy wanted to take a look back on how it all started. They reflect on their first two episodes and from it emerges a the topic of growth. Amy shares how she’s learned to less-critical of herself and Meg shares how she’s learned to become more herself and less self-conscious. Taylor Swift and Jay-Z (not...

Meg and Amy are back behind the mic again for their first episode of 2023! They share where they’ve been, where they’re going, and what they’ve been up to since the last episode. Plus, what’s new for The Spark and the exciting new way to connect with Meg and Amy and others in The Spark community! Be the first to join in here: https://thesparkpodcast.substack.com/ And be sure to follow along with u...

If you look at the outdoor industry, you usually see one type of person - white men. Alex Kim has set out to change that. Alex Kim is a first generation Korean American. Originally from Maryland, he’s the founder and director of Here Montana. Here Montana, is an outdoor program in Missoula, Montana that serves people of color to increase outdoor recreation around 4 pillars: joy, community, educati...

然这并不是火花电台第一次采访楼佳凯，但这是我们第一次用中文与佳凯对话。佳凯是怎样从一个中国留学生，成长为一位拎着相机设备，义无反顾地深入丛林，牧场，和高山的纪录者？除了腾讯纪录片里收纳的情节，《一次远行》镜头后到底还发生了什么故事？在异国他乡学习生活多年后，如今，佳凯终于回到了老家义乌。他最近在忙什么？生活如何？ 摘下相机的佳凯，是一个什么样的人？希望通过这集，我们都可以更加了解我们的老朋友，故事...

You may have seen the recent Tencent Documentary Series, Bon Voyage, that follows five Chinese students living abroad during the pandemic. In the last episode , they follow past Spark guest, Jiakai Lou. When we first talked with Jiakai, he was in Missoula, Montana at the height of the pandemic sitting at a crossroad: To stay in the U.S. or to go. If you’ve seen the documentary, you know that Jiaka...

In this solo episode, Meg caught up with the first foreign exchange student she knew who subsequently became one of her oldest and closest friends. Meg met Diane Schäfer-Surén in highschool on the Oregon Coast. The two take a walk down the memory lane, talking about all the instrumental moments that turned Diane’s foreign exchange experience into one of the best experiences in her life. Today, she...

Amy终于在去年年底，采访到了一位她非常佩服的好朋友——李泽尧。目前，他的全职工作是一名在PINT任职的网络工程师。业余时间，他是纽约市立大学亨特学院的客座教授。从屏幕前到讲台后，作为一名年轻的外国教授，泽尧在美国公立大学教课的过程中经历了非常多有意思的身份转换和奇异故事。在这集中，我们均娓娓道来。 李泽尧是一名生长在北京，如今长居在纽约的网络工程师，设计师，以及教育者。他本科毕业于上海纽约大学，研究生毕业...

In this episode, Amy had a casual conversation about careers, lifestyles, and the meaning of being a global citizen in today’s context with one of her friends, Zeyao Li. Zeyao is a web engineer at PINT, an adjunct professor at the Hunter College Film and Media Department, and a fellow Bejinger / New Yorker/ NYU Shanghai Alumni. He unleashes his creativity through web design, and he is on his way t...

Amy and Meg are back with a brand new episode of The Spark in the New Year, kicking things off how it all began - in conversation, just the two of them. As they embrace the Year of the Tiger wholeheartedly, Chinese New Year brings the concept of home to mind. They realized that the concept of home and it’s definition has changed for the both of them, especially over the course of the pandemic. The...

In this episode, Amy and Meg sit down for one final conversation of The Spark’s Motherhood Series which organically stemmed from a single episode and turned into a beautiful, sensitive, and powerful series featuring three inspiring mothers. For Amy and Meg, it only felt fitting that the last guests of the series were the mothers they’ve been in conversation with since day one - their own.   在这集...

Raised in Shanghai, China, Jenny Zheng is a fellow millennial, entrepreneur, influencer, and a new mom in Manhattan. She is the founder of Velvet. Co , an international public relations and marketing agency and living her life to the fullest countering challenges with instinct. In this conversation, Jenny opens up about becoming a mother, striking the balance between work and life outside of work,...

Dr. Wednesday Martin is a social scientist, storyteller, and #1 New York Times Bestselling Author. Her book, Primates of Park Avenue (translated into “I Am a Mother, I Need the Hermes Birkin Bag” in Chinese), stirred up a heated debate across oceans and sparked an greater awareness around “exhausted motherhood” and the scarcity mindset that runs rampant through circles of affluent mothers across t...

赞了：在母亲节之际，我们决定发布与一位实实在在的超能女性的对话。她是“酷妈黛安娜”。曾经的她是一位投行人士，一位时尚设计师，以及竞技拉丁舞舞者。现在，她是两个男孩的妈妈（认真的，她简直是全能）正巧录制于国际妇女节，黛安娜和Meg还有Amy分享了作为一位在不同文化和不同国家之间，养育具有世界观的小朋友的经历和故事。当黛安娜成为妈妈的时候，她必须学习如何重塑自己的崩塌的个人身份。内容创作和录制视频帮助她找回了...

We're celebrating Mother's Day by kicking off a Motherhood Series in conversation with a true wonder woman and "cool mum," Dianna Lee . She's a former investment banker turned fashion designer, a Latin ballroom dancer and mother to two boys (Seriously, she does it all). Recorded by happenstance on International Women's Day of all days, Dianna shares with Meg and Amy the ins and outs of her world a...

Pelayo Alvarez is the host, founder, and producer of The Forbidden Apple Podcast, a space to reclaim your spirituality. He’s also been one of Amy’s best friends for the past three years after she moved to New York City. Pelayo grew up in the Catholic Church in Gijon, a northwestern city in Spain. He never felt like he belonged. His personality and identity felt bigger than what Gijon could offer o...

The third installment of the “Artist Series,” Meg and Amy dive deep into conversation with, founder of Latitude Gallery in New York City, Shihui Zhou. In this episode, Shihui Zhou shares her story and invites us all to come along with the adventure that is opening an art gallery in 2020, that today, is not only surviving, but in many ways thriving. Shihui also opens up about her journey here - the...

You may have heard about Ting Zhao, the documentary filmmaker who recently became the first Asian Woman to win a Golden Globe for her film 'Nomad Land' - a film observing U.S. culture. Our guest on this episode of The Spark Podcast is an aspiring documentary filmmaker and visual journalist currently based in Missoula, Montana who is well on his way to following Ting Zhao's footsteps. Jiakai Lou, k...

生长在北京的 Ariel Ziyi Cui从小就知道自己长大后想成为一个艺术家。从五岁拿起画笔的那一刻起，她就再也没有将笔放下。三年前，她来到纽约学习设计。今天，她在纽约的一家精品住宅建筑事务所做与室内整修相关的工作。她终于实现梦想，并且成为了一位展览和室内设计师。作为火花电台“艺术家系列”的第一位嘉宾，在访谈和交流中我们深入探索了在他想寻找灵感，追随创作热情的过程。对于Ariel而言，在不同文化间穿梭的生活方式让她终...

Born and raised in Beijing, Ariel Ziyi Cui always knew she wanted to be an artist. She began painting at five years old and never stopped. Three years ago, she came to New York to study design. Today, she’s an exhibition and interior designer, and working for a boutique residential architecture firm specializing in gut renovations. The first in our Artist Series, our conversation with Ariel Ziyi C...

The second guest on The Spark podcast is someone who Amy’s heard about most of her life, but Meg met him first. The Spark literally wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for this guest. Because of him, Amy and Meg met in the first place. Haocheng Wang is a prosecutor for the State of Montana and Meg’s husband. 13 years ago he came to the United States as an exchange student where he began building a dual l...

Following part one comes part two of The Spark’s interview with former fashion industry journalist and current editor at VICE Asia Pacific, Rachel Ruonan Zheng. In the second half of the interview Meg and Amy dive in deeper with Rachel as she shares the benefits and challenges of working and living in a bilingual environment. Together, Meg, Amy, and Rachel examine the cultural power gap existing w...

Amy Tianyi and Meg are back with the second season of The Spark, where they open up the conversation by introducing their first guest, Rachel Ruonan Zheng. Rachel is a former fashion industry journalist and, currently, an editor at VICE Asia Pacific. Amy first met Rachel in New York City by happenstance when Rachel was one of the speakers at an event she attended. They immediately hit it off, shar...