The Grace of Grace
On International Women's Day, a high-five salute to a dear friend
We met online in 1999, in the dark ages of dotcom journalism.
I was the host of What’s Cooking, a new live chat on washingtonpost.com, and Grace Young was promoting her first cookbook, “The Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen.”
As the producer, I fielded questions from WaPo readers like a radio call-in show, and as the guest, she typed her responses as quickly as possible.
Just days ago, we marveled at the technological Wild West that we were living in then. “Live chat was so exotic,” Grace remembered in a text message. Little did we know that text messages would make in-person conversations nearly obsolete.
Over the next decade, Grace, a first-generation American of Chinese descent, would go on to write two more cookbooks, all of which have won either James Beard or IACP awards. Esteemed food writer Betty Fussell dubbed Grace the “poet laureate of the wok.” She became known as the Stir-Fry Guru, the go-to expert on wok cookery.
In the opening voiceover of her award-winning “Wok Therapist” video, Grace makes a confession:
“Mama always wanted me to become a doctor or a concert pianist. I never meant to be a therapist. It just sort of happened.”
If you ask Grace about the most recent chapter of her illustrious career, she’ll say something similar: She had never meant to become an activist. She would tell you she’s kind of shy, not one to speak up.
Soon after news broke of a mysterious virus originating in Wuhan, China, Grace noticed that New York City’s Chinatown got strangely quiet in the early days of 2020. The mom-and-pop businesses where she shopped every week were suffering even before New York went into lockdown in mid-March. Overnight, it seemed, Chinatown went from a bustling city-within-a-city to a ghost town. The “Chinese virus” and “kung flu” slurs coming from the White House all but confirmed her suspicions: This was xenophobia.
Grace grew up in San Francisco. Chinatown was home. It was heritage. It was community. It was identity. And it was safe.
In “Wisdom,” she describes the Chinatown of her youth:
“In the 1960s, it was a charming, intimate community inhabited by legions of old-timers, known as lo wah kue, and locals. On any given day I would see Uncle Kai Bock sitting on a stoop on Washington Street; run into Auntie Margaret at her restaurant, Sun Ya, or stop to see Auntie Anna or Uncle Roy at Wing Sing Chong market.”
Her Baba (Cantonese for “father”) owned a restaurant in Chinatown in the 1940s, serving Chinese and American dishes. In the 1960s, when Grace was a girl, Baba sold liquor to all the Chinatown restaurants and markets. On walks with her father, Grace noticed that he seemed to know everyone they passed, that his ties to the community were deep, that Chinatown was its own kind of small-town America.
Standing up for Chinatown may have felt like an accident, but it was meant to be. Quickly, Grace went to social media in pursuit of a videographer to accompany her as she interviewed shopkeepers and restaurant workers in Chinatown. She was determined to make their voices heard.
Together with Poster House museum and local videographer Dan Ahn, Grace created a video series called Coronavirus: Chinatown Stories.
Of course, the shutdown was happening as they were shooting footage. But Grace kept going. She partnered with the James Beard Foundation on an Instagram campaign called #saveChineserestaurants. She helped raised tens of thousands of dollars to help legacy Chinatown restaurants feed low-income AAPI seniors.
The fearmongering and conspiracies that somehow Asians were responsible for the pandemic fueled widespread violence and hate crimes. If you looked the part, Grace told me, you were a target.
According to the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University at San Bernadino, anti-Asian hate crimes in 2021 increased by 339 percent compared to 2020. From March 2020 through the end of 2021, nearly 11,000 incidents of anti-Asian hate were reported to the national tracking organization Stop AAPI Hate. According to its March 2022 report, nearly half of those incidents took place in public spaces – places like parks, city streets, the subway, or the bus.
As Grace helped raise money for 7,000 personal safety alarms, she became increasingly concerned for Asian seniors. Was it safe for them to walk down the street to get groceries? A March 2022 study published by the Asian American Federation revealed profound fear among Asian seniors living in New York City. Seventy-five percent of the seniors surveyed said that they are reluctant to leave their homes because of fear of anti-Asian violence.
With so many locals still living in fear, Chinatown goes dark early, Grace told me. She never imagined Chinatown — the safe haven of her youth — as a place where they’d roll up the sidewalks at 7 p.m.
As her friend, I worried more about Grace getting assaulted than coming down with Covid.
Meanwhile, Grace’s accidental activism was making headlines. BBC radio called. NPR’s “All Things Considered,” too. Chinatown was getting attention, but would it be enough to make a difference? To help keep mom-and-pop businesses from going under? To keep Chinatown from going extinct?
I know those questions kept her up at night, and still do.
With the fate of Chinatown still hanging in the balance two years later, Grace would receive two incredible honors in 2022: Humanitarian of the Year award from the James Beard Foundation and the Julia Child Award from the Julia Child Foundation for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts. With the Julia Child Award came a $50,000 grant that she would distribute among legacy restaurants in five Chinatowns across the country to help feed those in need.
When I heard the news, I felt light radiating through my body. Truly.
I felt proud to know her. I admired the hell out of her gumption. And I remain grateful for her trying to make the world a better place.
A few weeks ago, I took the train to New York. We met on a corner in Soho, then walked to Hop Lee, an old-school Cantonese diner on Mott Street.
We slide into one of the booths. The dining room is buzzing, full of customers. Grace notes that this is a place where the postal carrier or teachers at the local school may pop in for the lunch special, a steal at $7.50.
Owner Johnny Mui, wearing his trademark red jacket, greets us. Two bowl of complimentary house soup arrive, a steaming beef broth, with flecks of carrots and shredded meat. It is a welcome respite from the outside world.
She was just in DC for a James Beard American Culinary Corps event at the State Department. In between, she went to Capitol Hill to meet Senator Mazie Hirono, briefing her on the continuing financial struggles of her beloved Chinatown community. The residue of the shootings in Monterey Park and Moon Bay was still fresh.
We sit across from each other for three hours, maybe more. We tuck into a crispy cut-up chicken with garlic sauce, stir-fried green beans, a divine pickled vegetable dish with stir-fried beef. Johnny brings Grace’s favorite, razor clams in black bean sauce. We go through a few pots of tea, a plate of cut-up oranges.
We talk astrology, politics, aging, natural remedies, our complicated mothers, the state of our world, the importance of taking care of each other, living each day as if it’s the last.
There will be no museums or Broadway shows on this visit. No shopping sprees or cultural events. This, right here, in this booth in need of reupholstering, is where I need to be. With Johnny and his banter, with the bundled-up old lady waiting for her take-out order talking out loud to no one. With my dear sister, Grace-san, the warrior princess.
Beautiful piece!
Great to see you over here, Kim, and hi, Grace!