It’s a special treat to spend time on Angel Island with Nellie, Genny & Flo.
Individually, these women have such deep history with this place, as descendants of Angel Island immigrants and as artists who have helped to explore and preserve the history and the emotional complexities of the experiences of immigrants held on Angel Island to the general public through their work.
Genny’s important efforts include her translations of the Angel Island immigrant poems, with the groundbreaking book, Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island, written with her co-authors Him Mark Lai and Judy Yung, published in 1980, and her play Paper Angels, which continues to bring the Angel Island experience to life on the stage and on television for audiences.
Nellie was one of the first, along with Genny, to write poetry delving into a history that was so often held in secret. An excepted reading of her poem, “It’s in the Blood,” a personal narrative about her family’s journey from Chinatown to Oakland’s Chinatown through Angel Island, first appears in 1981 film, Mitsuye and Nellie: Asian American Poets, with scenes filmed on Angel Island and at the Minidoka internment camp with sister poet Mitsuye Yamada.
Flo’s visual art installation on the island in 2000, made in usa: angel island shhh, was “a three-year oral history project to embellish rice sacks with text, bead, sequins and the American flag” to “narrate the stories and secrets of Chinese immigrants who entered the country as paper sons and daughters.” Through her artwork, Flo was building upon the work begun by Genny and Judy Yung to document the stories of Chinese immigrants.
These three distinct voices have performed together, in steady collaboration with Del Sol Quartet since Angel Island Insight, a virtual Zoom program during COVID 19 pandemic in May 2021 for the United States of Asian America Festival. In October of 2021, the poets read the Angel Island poems for the world premiere of Huang Ruo’s Angel Island Oratorio with the Del Sol Quartet.
This special program with Del Sol, featuring music by composers Erika Oba, Meilina Tsui, Huang Ruo and Chenery Ung, was held in celebration of the 40th Anniversary of AIISF, with two performances on Saturday, December 2, 2023 at 11:30am & 2:00pm in the Detention Barracks Museum at the Immigration Station on Angel Island.
(above left) Ed Tepporn, Executive Director of the Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation; (above right) Del Sol Quartet – Kathryn Bates, cello & Charlton Lee, viola; (below) Hyeyung Sol Yoon & Benjamin Krieth, violins.
When The Last Hoisan Poets closed the program with their signature poem, Haw Meong Suey (Good Life’s Water) — read for the very first time on Island, there were tears in the eyes of one longtime docent. Sam Louie was so touched by the sounds of the Hoisan-wa dialect spoken by his mother. He searched through every scrap of paper in the wooden bowl full of poems and photos offered as a memento to all attendees, in hopes of finding a copy of the poem.
We were so glad to share the poem’s text with him on this special day. Sam has been working with AIISF on a special app that will allow visitors to use their cell phones to listen to readings of the Angel Island poems in the original Chinese dialects.
Haw Meong Suey. Haw Meong Suey. Haw Meong Suey.
