[ti:'Chinese Chorizo' Honors Blend of Two Cultures in Arizona]
[al:Arts and Culture]
[ar:VOA]
[dt:2022-10-29]
[by:www.voase.cn]
[00:00.00]If the coronavirus pandemic had never happened, Feng-Feng Yeh might not have learned the full history of Chinese Americans in her hometown of Tucson, Arizona.
[00:16.42]Yeh was a top chef, or cook, in New York City when pandemic-linked business closings ended her job and career plans.
[00:28.99]She decided to move back to her hometown.
[00:33.41]She also decided to revisit her passion for public art.
[00:40.19]Looking for ideas, Yeh researched the history of Chinese immigrants in the Tucson area. 
[00:49.26]On the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center website, she learned that Chinese family-owned food stores were a successful industry in the city beginning in the 1900s.
[01:05.32]These food or grocery stores were more than just businesses. 
[01:11.55]They were also lifelines for the area's Mexican American communities.
[01:18.04]The food stores - also called grocery stores- even started preparing Mexican chorizo.
[01:27.08]Chorizo is a ground and spiced sausage, or meat from a pig. 
[01:34.01]It earned the nickname "Chinese chorizo."
[01:39.24]Yeh said she was "very moved" by the alliance formed between Mexican and Chinese Americans.
[01:49.43]She described immigration policies set during the same period as "quite racist."
[01:57.60]"I thought that was something that you don't learn in school, especially in Arizona.
[02:05.27]I thought it was something that should be recognized and shared," Yeh said.
[02:11.69]Chinese immigrants settling in Arizona were doing so under the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, the U.S. government's first race-based immigration policy. 
[02:28.58]Both Chinese and Mexican immigrants faced racism even though they were critical members of the workforce.
[02:38.78]Older Chinese Americans in Tucson say they have spent years trying to spread knowledge about this history.
[02:49.16]Yeh proposed building a 3.4-meter-tall statue of two chorizo sausage links. 
[02:58.57]She recently won financial support through the Tucson Museum of Contemporary Art and the Andy Warhol Foundation.
[03:09.63]In support for the project, she organized a celebration called Tucson Chinese Chorizo Festival.
[03:19.30]For the month of October, several local restaurants and food trucks have been serving specials with meat and vegan chorizo.
[03:32.34]Even many locals do not know about Tucson's major Chinese presence.
[03:39.74]The Tucson Chinese Cultural Center is a large space, at almost 1,400 square meters. 
[03:49.29]It serves as a community center and museum. 
[03:53.66]Established in 2005, it has a multipurpose room, large kitchen, classrooms, and a room with tables for playing the Chinese game called mahjong.
[04:09.14]The walls are covered with pictures and histories of long-gone Chinese grocery stores. 
[04:16.05]The center also has a YouTube channel that includes a video on Chinese chorizo.
[04:25.04]"A lot of people don't know we exist after 17 years. So, we've been trying to get the word out," said Susan Chan, the center's chief leader.
[04:37.69]Starting in 1900, Chinese-owned grocery stores succeeded and became an economic force in Tucson.
[04:47.94]By the 1940s, there were 130 families running more than 100 grocery stores in the city. 
[04:57.63]The number of stores dropped in the 1970s and 1980s as larger food stores moved in and young Chinese Americans sought other careers.
[05:12.95]Allen Lew's father, Joe Wee Lew, opened his first of three stores in 1955.
[05:22.28]The stores were called Joe's Super Market. 
[05:26.62]Allan Lew began working at the market around the age of 10. 
[05:31.64]He remained in the business until the last store closed after 30 years in operation.
[05:40.64]He is now 74 years old and a longtime member of the center's board.
[05:48.65]Lew and his four siblings grew up serving Mexican and Native American customers. 
[05:56.70]Everyone felt like they "were all a big neighborhood family."
[06:03.89]In fact, many Chinese grocers would let poor customers pay when they could.
[06:12.30]"A lot of them get paid like once a month, every two weeks, and they ran out of money," Lew said.
[06:20.05]For the festival, Chinese-made chorizo is being celebrated with inventive dishes that combine Chinese and Mexican cultures.
[06:31.48]A local meat store provided the more than 225 kilograms of meat and plant-based chorizo to restaurants for the festival. Yeh created the vegan recipe.
[06:48.18]She invited Jackie Tran, a Tucson food writer and owner of Tran's Fats food truck, to work on the real meat recipe.
[06:59.61]Tran's family is Chinese and Vietnamese. 
[07:03.67]He added spices to the meat including Sichuan pepper, coriander seed and Chinese five-spice powder.
[07:14.09]For the statue, Yeh is partnering with Carlos Valenzuela, a Tucson-born artist of Mexican and Native American ancestry. 
[07:26.41]Valenzuela's grandfather had had a credit account with a local Chinese grocery store.
[07:33.69]If the idea of a chorizo statue brings a laugh, that is the way Yeh wants it.
[07:42.26]"I think it's eye-catching for tourists to come and recognize that this town is a town that was heavily influenced by Chinese culture, which I don't think a lot of people know," said Yeh, who still needs more money to pay for the project.
[08:01.69]What does Lew, the son of a Chinese grocer, think about the chorizo statue?
[08:09.35]"That's great," Lew said. 
[08:11.30]"I was surprised because I think when you grow up and you've done something all your life here, you don't think it's a big thing."
[08:21.17]"But someone outside thinks, 'This is different. This is neat.'"
[08:27.17]I'm Caty Weaver.
[08:28.81]And I'm Andrew Smith.