Kaia Chau in front of 1995 mural depicting the history of Chinese people in the U.S. | Photo: Julien Suaudeau
“My parents were undocumented and so they were not wanting us to get involved with things,” Debbie Wei tells Julien Suaudeau in the first episode of season two of Song of Philadelphia, released today on Apple and Spotify. “And I grew up in the suburbs so I didn’t have any contact with community or other than you know having trips down to Chinatown to grocery shop.” As an adult, Wei became an education activist, in 1985 suing the School District of Philadelphia on behalf of underserved Chinese students and, in 2011, co-founding the Folks Arts – Cultural Treasures Charter School (FACTS).
Listen here, or on Apple or Spotify.
Now, her daughter, Kaia Chau, 23, has taken up the mantle, founding a youth center, Ginger Arts Center, on N. 12th Street in Chinatown North. In the first episode of season two of Song of Philadelphia, “Bluer than Indigo,” Chau leads her former French professor, podcast host Julien Suaudeau, around the Chinatown of her youth, the stores and pools halls and bakeries, some of these special places lost to time.
In season two, Suaudeau realizes his ambition for Song of Philadelphia: to create a dynamic soundscape of the city comprised of stories and memories. As the episodes opens, Chau takes Suaudeau to the Italian Market, where she grew up and where she still works and where, she observes, “Italian, Mexican, and Vietnamese, mostly, and so many other cultures…come together.” From there, the two venture north to Chinatown, where Suaudeau learns about the colonial origins of Chinese pastries and why the oldest mural in the neighborhood is about to be covered over. All the while Chau reflects on the immigrant’s journey. “My grandfather had a PhD in chemistry and he could not get a job anywhere because he was Chinese,” she tells Suaudeau, linking that struggle with Chinatown’s ongoing effort to gain some control over its future. That story, and Chau’s role in the No Arena campaign, is the subject of part two of this first Song of Philadelphia episode of the season. That episode will be released May 15.
