No, our food is not dirty: #ESEAeats
Anna Chan champions the East and South East Asian community through her day job and personal projects, and more recently with Georgie Ma started the popular trend of #ESEAeats. Anna shares how the movement began and her thoughts.
MasterChef’s casual cultural insensitivity towards East and South East Asian (ESEA) food has caused a rollercoaster of emotions in early December 2020.
The ‘branding’ of ‘Dirty food refined’ in association with ESEA cuisine led to many calling out the damaging language and negative connotations seen on Chef Philli’s instagram profile. Instead of engaging with those who had reached out however, Chef Philli deleted comments and blocked accounts, and silenced the community.
Unfortunately, minority groups tend to be the ones reliving their trauma over and over again in the hopes of making a difference in moving the needle towards fairer representation and equity in equality. The journey of allyship and unlearning harmful traits requires bravery and courage. It means looking within yourself, your being and identity, and admitting that you could be perpetuating damaging narratives. In this example, it seemed that our community had its work cut out for it.
The history of racism, hate crime, and resilience
The MasterChef incident is only a recent example of what the ESEA community has been dealing with for generations. These scenes of appropriation and othering are what embolden racist and harmful narratives.
I am second generation British Born Chinese, having grown up in the North of the UK. My family own a Chinese takeaway where we lived above the shop, and at the time, I felt like I was the only one. The town I grew up in was in no way diverse, we were “foreign”, and as a child at school and even through secondary school, I was treated as such: through outright racism, microaggressions, and bullying.
I remember running down the stairs everytime we heard shouting and banging from the shop: another customer kicking off again, damaging our property and hurling abuse at my parents - telling them to go back to China. And yet, my parents and my grandparents before them always looked at the bigger picture: they dedicated their time to wanting better for the next generation and to provide for their families. If that meant keeping their heads down and not causing “a fuss”, so be it.
My family are one of many other ESEA families who have suffered the same, our food touted as cheap, low quality, smelly, disgusting and weird looking. Our culture and heritage attacked in the same way - being scapegoated in fear, for political gain - as the ones who would not fight back.
For example, the most powerful man in the world mocked our community for the “China Virus” and “Kung Flu”, and yet the most recent variant of COVID-19 in the UK has not been tarnished with the same narrative. Why? Because there is no political gain or self serving narrative for blaming the UK for the virus. This was highlighted by Ally Henny on Twitter:
“take a look at who is and isn’t talking about it. Notice the conversations that aren’t being had.
Now compare that to what happened to a Chinese and Other Asian-descended peoples at the beginning of the pandemic”.
Ally Henny’s Facebook post commenting on the contrast in narrative.
Another example is the negative association with MSG and ESEA foods; the backlash of this seasoning being used in our communities' food. Know MSG highlights the history of MSG: how it was created by Dr. Kikunae Ikeda, a Japanese scientist and how one letter to the editor of a prestigious medical journal caused the “Chinese Restaurant Syndrome”.
These examples of damaging language and narratives of the ESEA community still happen in society, highlighting the deepened importance of preserving ESEA culture.
Using our voices, holding others accountable.
My journey is only one of many representations of the ESEA community, every story is different. My privileges have allowed me to carve a space to speak up and hold those around me accountable for their language, their actions, and intentions.
With reported hate crime towards the ESEA community up by 300% and increased anti-Asian sentiment, I join my community to raise our concerns and support our right to fair representation.
The creation of #ESEAeats by myself and Georgie Ma was to use the energy from a negative situation towards more productive means: bringing our community together and taking back our food narrative.
Having faced racism and microaggressions in our everyday lives, we know what it's like to be on the receiving end of backlash.
We wanted to remind our community to celebrate our food and heritage, and to be proud of what generations and generations of our families have been striving for - a better and fair life.
We agreed to rally together to share our food stories: Georgie made a list of possible hashtags and I asked others to share pictures and stories of ESEA food, encouraging our community get involved - then we got to work, spreading the word and posting #ESEAeats!
#ESEAeats a celebration of culture and food - as one community.
With 500+ posts in just over a week since we launched the hashtag, and now almost at 1500+ posts, #ESEAeats is a reminder of the joy and grounding we can build when communities and allies come together. From Hokkien and Teochew Char kway kak, Korean style chicken burgers, Burmese Danbauk, and Vietnamese Bánh mì, the hashtag has a diverse mix of food being shared on Instagram, normalising ESEA cuisine from homecooked comforts to high end restaurant courses by professional chefs.
It was not only food pictures being shared on the hashtag: many told stories of their family, of growing up in the ESEA community, and the deep emotions and memories food invoked.
From these stories, I discovered there are actually quite a number of fellow takeaway kids out there in the UK. I suddenly felt part of a larger group of people just like me, my inner 10 year old self was jumping for joy and felt seen at last.
Since the initial launch of #ESEAeats, the community has been inspired to use their Christmas leftovers to make ESEA comfort foods like congee, noodle salads, Korean Bibimbap, and goose 4 ways by Guan Chau! We have also seen an intense battle between #teamrice Vs #teamnoodles, with @britishchinesebiz and @kelvintanwc having a show down on their stories to see which dish would rain victorious.
#ESEAeats has given me hope: my community has re-energised my passion and desire to give back where I can. It pushes me out of my comfort zone to keep learning but also shows that a few voices, posts, conversations can lead to bigger change. I am committed to this journey, which has inspired me to start Asian Leadership Collective and ESEA in Tech; both projects which will nurture and amplify ESEA’s in the UK.
If you are passionate about a cause and it is within your means to take others with you on your journey, please do it.
Learnings: Future movements, moments, changes for the ESEA community.
We will use #ESEAeats for when we are homesick, in need of food inspiration, to support local ESEA business, when we need cheering up; and for when we have some really nice ESEA food we want to share with the community!
Key reminders from #ESEAeats:
There are so many stories of food, family, love, and culture out there! It is a privilege to be part of a space where everyone is linked.
If you are passionate about something, reach out to others who will support you, but also don’t shy away from feedback.
Allies are so important, let them in - have conversations and learn from each other in a safe space.
You can keep people accountable and still use your energy for joy!
We still have a lot of work to do for fair representation of the ESEA community: choose your battles, ask for help, support each other, and don’t forget to rest - the journey is long but we have got this!
2020 has shown that the ESEA community has the power to take a negative and deeply triggering situation and celebrate the things which make our communities different. #ESEAeats is one example of the hope we can create and fight for collectively as one group. With defiance and resilience in taking hold of the narrative, we can continue to hold those in positions of power and influence to account.
Anna Chan is the UK Lead and Communications Chair of Asiapacforce, a Salesforce Employee Resource Group, and founded ESEA in Tech and Asian Leadership Collective CIC to promote positive ESEA representation, leadership and to promote ESEA allyship in the UK.
This article was modified on 25 May 2021 to correct the name ‘Char kway kak’ from Thai to Hokkien/Teochew.