Sarah interviews Cheryl's two sons, Zaccai and Santiago, about their first trip ever to Philippines - the homeland of their ancestors.

Aimee Eng, former Board Member of the Oakland Unified School Board, joins us to speak about her family's roots of living and serving in Oakland over multiple generations. Aimee's rich familial and personal history includes anecdotes about public service, allies who supported her family, and treasured Oakland favorites. She also shares about the joy…

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Meet Lauren, a fellow friend from Sama Sama Cooperative and an early childhood arts educator by day and illustrator/mark-maker in life. Lauren, who has deep roots in the Bay Area (and a geographic affinity for San Pablo Ave in particular) shares her wisdom on how to nurture creativity in both little ones and the "little me's" inside of us grown ups…

Sarah and I catch up as we are in summer mode, swapping observations and random thoughts that go from stunningly comfortable overalls to Korean - Filipino couplings (or the lack thereof) to childhood "benevolent lies" to Expose (yup, the 80-90s Top 40 girl band). We're all over the place which is exactly what summer sometimes feels like. Thanks for…

On this mini episode, Sarah finds a way to talk about BTS (yet again), then we segue into the kindness of strangers, the ethics of keeping a library book after the due date, old bikes and candy, beans as dessert, different ways to prepare rice + coconut, and the basics of kimchi. Thanks for listening! Learn more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dinug…

Florence is a multiracial new mom and journalist-in-training whose work has been published in The Oaklandside. Originally from the bordertown of El Centro, Calif., Florence settled in Oakland just a few years ago but has longtime family roots here. Florence made two big life changes during the pandemic - becoming a mom and switching careers - and s…

We share our thoughts on everyday parenting topics such as bedtime, sleepovers, and chores...and reflect about our own childhood experiences vs how we parent our own kids. We have some in the moment revelations too:) We apologize for the abrupt ending as we need to update our Zoom account! LOL.

In this next mini episode we share our thoughts on how we get stuff on the cheap or for free and the tactics we use to avoid annoying fees. And of course, there's all the randomness that goes along with our conversation, including my discovery of a surprising life skill that Sarah has yet to learn.

On this episode, Cheryl and Sarah attempt to discuss a few of our favorite things…except it turns out Cheryl doesn’t play favorites! Or does she? Though we started out with this prompt, our wide-ranging conversation led us to chat about dimsum (including some controversial takes!), our mutual love of Trader Joe’s, Paxton Hall-Yoshida, tiny ears, Sa…

Happy 2023. For the start of this new year, OAM will be hosting a series of mini-episodes on random, but relevant topics. TBH, these conversations between Sarah and I are really just recordings of our usual banter with a sprinkling of what's been on our mind and in our texts this week. For our first conversation, Sarah starts us off with the age ol…

Our friend Nancy was profoundly moved by the way food served as a source of recovery, healing, and community-building during her mother’s experience with cancer. After almost a decade of planning and dreaming, she launched Purpose and Hope, an Oakland-based small business that serves nutritionally dense, handcrafted soup. Nancy shares about how her…

Welcome to our Oakland Asian Dad friend, Miguel! We spoke with Miguel about growing up in the Philippines, coming to the States, and raising Asian American daughters here in Oakland. Miguel and his partner are raising their kids in a multicultural and multilingual household with intentionality about paying equal attention to the multiple identities…

Hi everyone! This is our 2nd episode on the topic of Adoption - a bonus episode since Sarah and I remembered that Tracy, our mutual friend, was adopted! Tracy, adopted as a newborn, tells us about her journey from her birth at a Thai refugee camp then immigrating to the state of Alabama and finally settling in Oakland, CA where she has made her hom…

We get the chance to debrief with Sarah and former guest, Jeannie, about their recent travels back to Korea and the Philippines. For both, It was a multi-generational family trip and one that sparked a desire for deeper connection to their homelands. Sarah and Jeannie share about meaningful family time as well as the joys and complexities of naviga…

We invited Glynis, an honorary Oakland Asian Mom by way of Austin, Texas, to speak about her beautiful adoption story. Glynis was born in the Philippines and was adopted at the age of 1 by white parents at a Manila-based adoption agency. She shares sweet memories of how she learned about her adoption story, of feeling fully embraced by her family, …

"This was a story that really wanted to be told, that wouldn't let me go." On this episode, we talk to first-time author Jane Kuo about her first book, In the Beautiful Country, about a young girl from Taiwan immigrating to Southern California in the 1980s and building a new and very different life. The book is loosely based on Jane's own immigrati…

On this episode, we talk to fellow Oakland Asian mom Celia about the journey and hopes of raising Asian American sons. The three of us have known each other for a long time, and this was a particularly meaningful conversation. We talk about how our upbringing in Asian immigrant families has shaped how we parent, how living in the Bay Area helps to …

Welcome to the OAM's next series which focuses on "Raising Asian American Sons" and who better to interview that our own partners. For the first time, Sarah and I invite our hubbies (Stephen, Sarah's husband and James, Cheryl's) and our mutual friend, Greg, to talk about...what else (no surprise) parenting, identity, and community. We asked these f…

This our third and final episode in our series talking to Asian American faith leaders. To close out the series, we interview Emily, a Taiwanese mom who talks about her journey of following her God-led curiosities in life that brought her to the Bay Area and to serve as a Methodist pastor. Emily shares how she has come to see her leadership style a…

When Augustine Tang’s father passed away, Augustine decided to inherit his taxi medallion – the license that had allowed his father to drive a yellow taxi cab in New York City for decades. But the medallion came with a $530,000 debt trap and years of struggling to escape it. Augustine’s friend Kenny, a fellow taxi cab driver, committed suicide. So …

This is our second episode in a three-part series talking to Asian American moms who are faith and spiritual leaders in Oakland and the East Bay. In this episode, we talk to Erina (@erinakimeubanks), a second generation Korean American mom of Black and Korean kids. Erina is a co-pastor, with her husband, of Bethel Community Church (@bethelcommunity…

For our first episode of Season 2, we invited a friend of ours, Gala, who works at the Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity. Gala shares about her experiences working at Interfaith, offers wisdom on pursuing a decolonized faith and humbly speaks about the challenges of integrating anti-racist practices into her personal and community life. We ap…

In this Season One closer, Cheryl and Sarah take questions from you, our loyal listeners.

We're branching out a bit geographically for this episode and talking to Diana, a multiracial Asian and white mom hailing from Hayward. Diana talks to us about her work as an academic librarian at Cal State East Bay (RIP CSU Hayward), how she got involved with SURJ, which organizes white people for racial justice, and what it's like being a multira…

When Sarah and I first brainstormed who we wanted to interview on our podcast, Jodi was on top of our wish list! We couldn't quite narrow down one topic to talk about with Jodi...so we decided to ask her to speak about things we know she is passionate about: intentional living among the poor, working abroad, integrating values of simplicity and gen…

"We're not people you would think would start a nonprofit." In this episode, we talk to our friend Amy, a San Francisco Asian Mom and the founder and executive director of Jubilee Immigration Advocates, a nonprofit providing free and low cost immigration legal services in the Bay Area. Amy talks about being a somewhat atypical nonprofit founder and…

We invite Natalie, a work colleague of Cheryl's, to share about her Samoan culture and background and how she ended up in the prevention and mental health field. Natalie, who leads the Pacific Islander Wellness Initiative (PIWI), speaks proudly about her Samoan heritage: how her identity is so interwoven with her sense of home and how growing up in…

On this episode, we talk to our very pregnant friend Michelle about all of the hopes and expectations that accompany first time motherhood, including navigating a multiethnic and multilingual partnership with her Oakland born-and-raised husband. This was a sweet and nostalgic episode for Cheryl and Sarah, as we recalled our own journeys to motherho…

We welcome Andrea, a mom we met when all our kids went to preschool together, to speak about growing up in a mixed family that spans generations and places: Hawaii, Japan, Peru and the Bay Area. Andrea, an long time educator of Oakland Unified School District, shares about how her early experiences related to language and immigration shaped her pas…

In this episode, we talk with Tram, who came to the US as a refugee from Vietnam at 3 years old about her professional transitions -- Tram was an editor at Colorlines, one of the first print magazines that focused on communities of color, authored a book called We are All Suspects Now post-9/11, and is currently working in public heath policy. Tram…

On episode 14, we talk to a modern hero - a frontline medical worker during the pandemic, our friend and neighbor Esther. Esther talks to us about working as a doctor in a community medical clinic in Oakland Chinatown both before and during the pandemic, and the ways in which she practices self care and how her patients watch out for her wellbeing …

We invite our friend, Yu-Shuan, a 1.5 gen Taiwanese American, to share about her ever-evolving faith journey. Yu-Shuan is the founder of Sacred Roots Oakland, a collective that "seeks to center people of color - Black, Indigenous, API, immigrants, queer, and womxn - in pursuit of shared healing and liberation." We learn about how Yu-Shuan's own sac…

What were family vacations like when you were a kid? In this mini-episode, we reminisce about memorable childhood trips, talk about the planning and route mapping it took before yelp and GPS were a thing, and how we showed off the beauty of the Golden State to visitors! Somehow, we get a little off-topic and spend a good chunk time talking about fo…

On this episode, we meet our friend Shuli, the brains, heart, and soul behind Asian Lit for Kids, an Instagram account featuring quality Asian American children's literature. Shuli talks to us about what motivated her to start the account, and the need for more stories about our community, written in our own voices. We also talk about what Shuli lo…

Most of the world knows Russell Jeung as the co-founder of Stop AAPI Hate, producer of the Oak Park Story, and college professor of Asian American studies. While, we, in the neighborhood, know him as the church Uncle and Asian Dad who likes to give out free food (especially his yummy hamburgers), hang out with unhoused neighbors, and organize young…

We speak to our mutual and dear friend Wendy on this episode of OAM. All three of us have sweet spots for each other's kiddos and often bond over how to incorporate our culture in our family life. Inviting Wendy to be on the show really came out of our own personal desires to hear more about her profession as a Special Education teacher in public s…

In this mini-episode, we ask ourselves a question we posed to a past guest (Jane of Episode 9): "What would we be doing if we weren't a social worker or attorney?" We came up with a few alternate professions, circled back to the Asian immigrant sacrifice narrative, chatted about semi-famous creatives we know while adding to our list of Filipino cel…

On this episode, we talk to our new friend Jane, a Korean American public interest attorney and mother of young kids. Jane works for a local nonprofit in our neighborhood, representing Latinx clients with their immigration needs. Jane talks about entering this space with cultural humility, as well as how her own story as an immigrant and a child of…

In honor of Father's Day, we interview Oakland Asian Dad and Uncle, Albert, who shares about the pressures (and academic secrets) of growing up in Cupertino, CA and how that experience has influenced his own parenting style. Albert, who has Taiwanese/Chinese/Filipino roots, also talks about the challenges and joys of raising his three kids in the F…

We’re talking to our friend and neighbor Ja Young about raising multiracial and multiethnic (Korean! Black! White! Filipino! Chinese!) kids, what we love about our people, the joy and complexity of passing down culture and language, including the grief and inadequacy that we sometimes feel as mothers trying to raise children deeply rooted in and pr…

After gaining much attention and popularity during his presidential bid, Andrew Yang is running for mayor of New York City. We delve into the concerns brought up by Asians Against Yang, a coalition of community members, organizers, and activists who are opposing Yang’s bid to be New York’s next mayor. Then, our producer Cynthia, co-host Janrey, and…

Join us as we talk to a Korean American mother, Suzy, and her teenage Korean/Chinese (with Vietnam roots) daughter, Sierra, from the Fruitvale about their relationship over the years and how their "fiery" dynamic has led to much mutual love, appreciation, and admiration. For all us mothers who have young kids and wonder..."what will our relationshi…

Super librarian/local celebrity Annabelle from the Cesar Chavez branch of the Oakland Public Library joins us to talk about how she became a librarian, what she misses about her work because of Covid, a bit of Cesar Chavez library history, being asked by patrons "where are you from?," how she incorporates reading in her child's life, and her mom's …

Pacific Islanders and Native Hawaiians have historically been the most overrepresented demographic in the U.S. Military. This week, we speak with Gabby Langkilde, an American Samoan, about her experiences growing up near an army base and dealing with military recruitment in high school. Then, we discuss the military’s role in colonialism and citize…

The Indian farmers’ protests began late last summer and are still ongoing, even as coronavirus has worsened over the past month. Sylvia, Janrey and our reporter Sahil begin by explaining the legislation that has put about 50% of India’s population, small farmers, at risk while benefiting corporate interests. We explore some of India’s agricultural …

Our reflections about friendships nowadays, over time, and over seasons of life... pre and post covid.

Meet Cheryl's mom, Auntie Cora, who shares her story about coming to the U.S. as a newly married person, being a working mom for over 30 years, and reflections on taking care of her grandchildren in her home (which is lovingly known as "Nona's school.")

Our guest, East Bay mom Jeannie Celestial, PhD, co-author of The Filipino Instantpot Cookbook, talks about the origins of her love for food & veggies, how community & family has shaped her cooking journey, and sharing Filipino recipes with the world. She mentions that you can reach out to her by IG (jeanniecelestial) or join the Filipino Instant Po…

Cheryl and Sarah share what has brought them joy during the pandemic.