May Chan, Christine Chan, and Kevin Longa

00:07 My name is Kevin Kevin longer and my age is 25. The date is June 6th. 2015. Our location is San Francisco. And I am the grandson of May Chan the Storyteller and the son of Christine Chan one of the interviewers.

00:31 Hi, I'm Christine Chan. I'm 65 years old. It's June 6th, 2015 or in San Francisco. I'm the mother of Kevin and the daughter of Machin.

00:48 I am a champion. My age is 96 1/2 and today is June 6th, 2015 in San Francisco my relationship 200h to my grandson Kevin and my daughter Christine.

01:14 So I wanted to open this up Papa. By the way, we we call you pop off ever since my young. I don't think I ever really called you Grandma much. It's always been the Cantonese Papa. I wanted to start with

01:36 Are whole discussion of food and family with you and how you started off in America and with your family and with food so when you were first born where it where was it at California, my father worked in a rice field then later at 18 years old. He went to China and got a wife came back to America work in the rice field again. And also I hate my grandfather was a San Francisco old he was as she goes I roller

02:26 And so after the rice feel my dad didn't care for agriculture because it was too hot and he decided to open a restaurant in Arbuckle and also in Willows and then he decided that with eight children that we needed to come to San Francisco and learn the Chinese language. So we moved to San Francisco and when I was 13 years old old during the Depression my dad lost his job. So we open a rest. He came down to Burlingame and open a restaurant there, which was May 8th 1972. And what was the restaurant called Cafe but

03:26 Being that he wanted his own name. He called at least Cafe. It was depression time show business with slow it we serve American food and our outstanding dish with pop over and why is why did you serve American food? You are you're holed Chinese family, right? There was no American Heritage with your family deep American Heritage at that time. Nobody under a Chinese food. It was always American food. And also he had worked in the tea house and and in Willows and Arbuckle. It was always American food. So but then we decided on Friday we would serve Chinese food, which was Chop Suey chow mein and egg foo young and boil noodle just on Friday.

04:26 Otherwise, it was all American food and was that kind of a way to introduce the the Caucasian public of Burlingame that Asian Heritage supposed it was apparently he people had asked my father or for Chinese food. So those were the main Chinese food and what's the difference between chow mein and Chop Suey chow mein with with fried noodle and Chop Suey with rice a difference.

05:02 And I I know that our family or your family was the first Asian family in Burlingame to come to Burlingame. How did the how did the city react to having a a different ethnicity in their town at first understood us and also the police chief and the lawyers at because it was depression time and my father was the only one who paid the rent and soul Edition owner James Lawrence told the businessman at all how I miss my father was so therefore we had the reputation of being in a good family living in Burlingame because they never did.

06:02 Have they just wanted it to be a white City?

06:13 Well, when they heard that my father had a bought a home near Bayshore, which is now 101 and the neighbors put a petition in to evict us. And since this judge judge the rapper Stone lived a block away from us. He signed a petition which he later regretted. However, we did get to live on 11 Burlingame Avenue and I remember stories that even The Barbers refused to cut our hair. Yeah. So my mother decided to learn how to cut all our hair today. It sounds like to me you're generation, you know in the Depression era was a very self made

07:09 Generation you had to cook your own food. Not only for yourself, but for the town of Burlingame at least Cafe cut your own hair. What did what did the people think of that what did people think of help what do people think of your food or some of the favorite dishes currently, they liked our food and and also I remember Pauline Sparrow in Burlingame had a hat shop. She cater to wealthy Atherton no Hillsborough woman and and she liked our family and so she helped us get some customers.

07:56 So I think that's how we we we survive through word-of-mouth. And I know that all of your siblings you everybody all the family were in the restaurant. Yes, so

08:11 I know you didn't really necessarily get paid a lot, but you did get some treats and snacks. What were some of the things that you guys got to eat nibble on while while working at the restaurant lease Cafe. I remember every once every week. My dad would have a big piece of roast beef and he would cut it real thin and then a branded and then my mother fried it and the two that it was really a treat besides eating leftovers from the steam table.

08:57 And then I know that the leaves have quite a sweet tooth and Lee family has class, right? What kind of what kind of desserts did you did you have at the at least Cafe? In fact that we were very popular with the apple cobbler at however, my dad did make strawberry pie lemon pie pumpkin pie, but I am so we always like to have dessert we were so used to having dessert that even know how old my of my sisters and I love to bake because we love to eat dessert but it's gone farther than this or sisters. To my generation. I have several cousins to started bakeries.

09:52 2 and then every event we go to a celebration there are desserts Galore so that everybody has a dessert to take home.

10:06 What is my favorite part mom would have been some of your fond memories of your mom and dad's cooking when your generation I remember being a kid, but my mother has.

10:22 Four brothers and three sisters and then that meant a lot of cousins. So there were about thirty cousins and we all go to that home off of 11th Burlingame every holiday and my grandma and grandpa will cook a huge meal that were two turkeys to Rusty the wages food Galore enough and then we all had more to take home all the deserts in the eat and so is just one big get-together that we had that we always look forward to coming to and then there was a that don't we couldn't all eat around 1 people not forty of us. So there was a dolt table and the kids table so you are forever in the little kids table, but there was always plenty plenty to eat less more celebrity had something to take home with them to take home with them. What kind of foods do you remember when we was just the basic regular armor?

11:22 Holiday Foods, I don't remember much cooking of Chinese food Chinese food cooking. I know comes from my father. My father is father was a tailor at during the Depression very poor. He knew he wanted to college and against all

11:42 His father's guidance. His father wanted him to go work in the restaurant once he graduated from high school go making out and making money against that he went out and said I got to go to college. I want to go to college I think at 11 or so. He went to China with the family and saw how poor the roads were in China and decided that he wanted to become an engineer help pave the rose in China, so when he finished high school he decide to go to college against his father's will but then still had to pay for it in some way. So we ended up working in his good friends fathers restaurant like midnight Jose Jose and Jones Buffet in San Francisco, like midnight and whatnot. Then went to Berkeley to school to become a mechanical engineer and then once you finish that I think he also worked at a senior citizens home.

12:42 At different days and what he did there initially was just to help out but then the cook needed to have a day off one time a week. So the cook said you could be the cook this one day a week that were lamb chops. So we did that and then once my parents got married my father work. My mother was a maid was a homework, but he said, you know, I got to help out. He was really a man ahead of his time. He says I want to give Mom a day off every week so that she doesn't have to cook all the time. So he would cook always on Sunday. So we get his cooking but what the real neat thing was that whenever we had a big Chinese meal amongst yourself or with other people coming. My father was the Chinese cook so doing that.

13:42 Just cooking lamb chops a senior citizen home. He became learn how to cook Chinese food himself and it was banquet style food. So you my son came the heritage of lot of food and people interested in food types of dishes. Does your dad make oh my grandfather chicken salad was a everything. I don't know either. I taken wrapped in chicken wrapped in paper. I mean what time you made this beautiful whole fish with a tomato sauce over it?

14:23 And one of my sisters is not this again and my father looked it up because coming from the depression you don't turn any food away and said you're going to eat it all and it's now that joke of the family. So but this cooking is food to Kevin for your heritage goes very far throughout. I've got a couple of cousins two cousins like that that will Bakery 1/2 had a bakery one at a bakery and went into now is teaching baking you're my cousin and son you contemporary is a shift as an apple, but he was a chef at the Domain to a winery and then my cousin Marcus brought Mexican food to Switzerland started.

15:23 TV or something and swiss on a gringo tortilla Ria and then now Marcus has a catering business An Affair to Remember. My list Summit. Doreen is teaching home economics. Yeah home economics is that carry is baking sheet. She had a bakery many many many years has a lot of food a lot of food with the tendency to the Sweet Tooth in Mom's baby sister is just a phenomenal Baker and she'll make like pies and and and then given to all the neighbours she doesn't need to stitch a bit but she's out making everything. She she's got quite a you know, it's it's fall and and Thanksgiving and Christmas time when you smell pumpkin pie made by Papa and apple pie made.

16:23 My papa from our Orchard like we back in back in Willowbrook. We have that family Orchard of pear trees apple trees pomegranate and we just Harvest figs. It runs the gamut and we Harvest all of it and we make a make a lot of sweet things with it. That's for sure in the farming started early when I grew up in Menlo Park, we had a garden in the backyard victory garden. So that's where I learned that when you plant corn you need to plant string beans next to it. So you can give nitrogen back to the ground cuz that's what she told me but we had that and strawberries plus the the fruit. It was always that why did Google why did Google decide to make an orchard in the first place?

17:18 Nothing, is it that the other sin II holy blastoma stole the valley because she didn't want to mow lawn anymore so old when we built our new home in Portola Valley it one acre of it. He decided the front of the house should be an orchard because he felt he like to reap the Harvest instead of mowing lawn and and watering and work to it. And if I remember that's quite being quite a trendsetter like in the neighborhood everyone had Immaculate Lawns with pretty flowers, but use one of the first to do an orchard right in front of the house. I'm not in the back but in the front and you know, people started doing other people started doing that now it's not now it's the thing to do but why waste your water on Greenlawn in the front when you can grow vegetables and fruits that you can eat in Harvest what you are used.

18:18 That was the 80s when he did the mid-eighties when he did that and I'll look when we are in 2015. That was the way he was also he had four daughters. No sons and Chinese family is very strongly Michelle boys. Your boy was a boy once he had four daughters is not a problem. I'm going to raising my voice. I'm going to educate them so that they'll be able to take care of themselves. And that's exactly what he did. He was a man ahead of his time when it came to that fact, you know, you really brought that ethos and like you mom went to also went to his alma mater UC Berkeley you got an education and you really valued education and nurturing that the Next Generation. I mean, how come your son so I I feel that to my car.

19:14 And I think The Changing Times definitely brought about new different bike food culture is like in our generation now, we we eat out more.

19:27 And so a lot of my memories with food are you know intern restaurants, but I do say that a lot of it comes from like Papa's home cooking your cooking. Mom nudes. You are wonderful cook for you know, everything from American to Chinese food in it. Does it really shows that kind of Heritage that we have?

19:55 You know coming in as a as a Chinese family and into this very very Caucasian area of the United States and kind of like learning the ways of the land and integrating our cells and sharing our culture. So Kevin you've taken an interest in in food and that you're going Beyond more International. What do you feel from what my mom and I gave you that has made you feel what you want. Wanted to broaden it to more International lo-boy.

20:39 Well, just hearing this conversation kind of like pieces a lot of the the puzzle pieces together, but there's one thing that I think it didn't happen so much and your Generations that I feel very fortunate. It was able to happen in my generation with our family is that our family traveled a lot and of course, we traveled our stomachs with us. And so I remember our first our first international trip. It was to China and it was actually we made a point of it to go and see goons. Old Village old Family Village outside of Guangzhou and

21:29 Over over there

21:32 It just opened up my entire idea of what food was like I was I was not the most healthiest kid, I when I went.

21:42 When I had Mike my normal meals, I would get McDonald's I get a cheeseburger or two McChickens a large fry large Coke and a McFlurry and that would be my culinary boundaries. But once we got to China I saw Peking duck. I saw a whole bunch of watermelon. I saw you know foods made with snakes and then we went to those Villages of our family and for example are our ancestors. They were honey. Bee farmers and grandmas relatives and Grandma. Yes, and we saw

22:22 How much they cared about cultivating their land and their food and how simple it was there is no high fructose corn syrup or anything no ingredients that you couldn't pronounce. It was pretty

22:40 Basic and so it started opening up my world like so to answer your original question. It was our

22:49 AR

22:51 Intrepidness to explore different world and cultures as a as an entire family like going and papa. They took us you took us on some pretty amazing trip. So, you know after you not right after that we went to walk right after that. We went to France London and then in London and France went up to the Eiffel Tower had some snails escargot Valves and all that fresh fruit the more you go by in those markets and then just rows and rows of fresh fruit fruit that not we now see the first Fruit markets here are similar to the European ones lavender the hills of lavender that they have there and Europe and off.

23:48 All that French bread melting over everything the ding of a bicycle as you go past like a bakery in it it it was just a whole sensory experience and it was year 2000. So it's like right in the turn of the Millennium. I was about 11 years old and you know, it was just a whole new world literally for me. So like

24:21 Just the way that our family was able to help encourage my exploration of all these different cultures and Foods got me. I got bitten by the travel bug of course was already bitten by the food bug your grandpa. It started the travel bug. That's what he he loved his love to travel and he he got my mom out to travel when she really did want to and then brought us along the whole family my sisters and my your cousin's along to travel with us and then your father and I your father is a lover of travel and he got our family. We've been on a lot of trip, you know, just the Chris and Tom longa family's been out to What Peru and

25:10 Italy Italy Portugal playing Ronnie Copenhagen, and it's just so it's been fabulous to be able to do it all together as a family went to treat me in is that you've taken this on and you like to what you eat you love of food Your Love of travel but there's a love of telling the stories of people's stories about food that you're now getting into and I'm curious. What's that about? Yeah. Well, it kind of stems from a much younger. It's been slowly growing and now it's been kind of exponentially growing so younger slowly growing now exponentially growing in its melting of my I guess my great passions in life.

26:08 Obviously food travel I've been making films ever since I was eight so film and Entrepreneurship. And so that all lets me doing what I'm doing today, which is creating a documentary series about the stories of food entrepreneurs and like I was mentioning back when I was a kid, I wasn't exactly the healthiest type and you know our family considering how much we love food. There is a little bit of a history of diabetes. And at one point when I was 11 years old.

26:48 Go into the hospital room. And the nurse she looks at my body mass index chart and she looks at me and then she gives me a deep deep Claire and she says like right over her her glasses. She looks at me. She says Kevin.

27:12 If you keep this up and you're white, you're going to get type 2 diabetes.

27:18 And at that moment, I just froze because I really like my aunt's on my dad's side had diabetes for very long time from my cousins have diabetes. And I remember back when going on with a live picking his finger for blood samples almost every day for diabetes and pictures to the hold me go do that myself if it is an eleven-year-old, I you know, every young kid hates needles. So after that day, I pretty much like put myself through this personal boot camp until like butter and sweat and oil it like seed out of my pores doing push-ups and through that process. I was still filming like doing just, you know, fun short little films with like my friend Brandon who lived up the street from us.

28:13 And I also learned about where my food came from who made it. What's the story behind that food? Oh, yeah, you did that documented for high school and food corporations. So that was a triggering. Yeah. That was a traitor. Yeah, you got it hit the nail on the head. Like actually there was just one moment when I was in high school by this time since 11:00 since the time I was in that hospital room.

28:43 I had lost a dramatic amount of weight. I got into swimming and been eating right and everything and there was this one moment after swim practice is after I like late is one of those nights after like varsity swim practice where where we had morning practice in the morning like at 5:30 and then night practice, of course at night and like I was literally in the pool when it was dark out in the morning and at night and so it was a long day and I was just kind of like flushed out like

29:24 And I was back at home sitting behind my computer. I had tail stuck in between my teeth and I was sitting behind the computer editing that documentary and I realized oh my God.

29:39 That this is been that Journey. This is like the melting of those for passions. Well, three or two of the time food and film and it wasn't until UCLA where the the ladder to which is travel and Entrepreneurship came into play. And so when I went to UCLA, I really wanted to get involved in a lot of things. I didn't want to just focus on film. So I you know did the marching band and is started the film photography society and did a whole bunch of other stuff. But of course entrepreneurship comes in is like started the journey with some really great friends, by the way. I should mention II

30:26 Started the film and photography Society with a bunch of friends as well and

30:33 Basically during that time. I made a real point of it to live abroad in Copenhagen in Denmark, and it was because of my love for travel and because what my family gave me that opportunity to to get that little travel bug bitten in my butt real deep.

30:57 And so over there over in Denmark. I can korstad the whole backpacking around Europe thing and live very frugally and fried home wonderful foods that that's like that's basically what our family has done. Like, we don't buy a lot of stuff. We're really quite Frugal. We don't gamble. We don't drink eat it eat it. Yeah, like the first time like this was my first-ever fancy restaurant experience was in in Copenhagen. I was basically living off of cheese and crackers in Denmark to save up to go to what was then and I think still is now the best restaurant in the world.

31:44 And it was just a life-changing experience not just normal, but the whole entire travel experience. So then after that I I graduated UCLA and I had this whole wealth experience with those for passions food film travel entrepreneurship and so sadly but also to my benefit I guess in hindsight. I didn't get a job after graduating like most people my age after graduating in the economic crisis. It was not many jobs available for new grads. And so

32:27 I was applying to job after job after job and getting rejected rejected and Isaac. There was one moment when I got rejected from Google and I broke down crying. I don't know if you remember that very well. Like I prepare for like weeks for that in that is at the second to the last level. Yeah top top. Yeah, Jenna guy and I was just like losing all hope and then all of a sudden out of the blue my my friend Brian called me up who was the founder of the film and photography Society back at UCLA and also UC Riverside.

33:05 He said hey, we just got invited to the Asiana International Film Festival in Kuching Malaysia. Do you want to come?

33:15 And my knee-jerk reaction as a Chan is a lie is yes. I want to go travel. I want to experience everything but I was like right in this mindset of I can't find a job. I said man, I need to get my career site and he said what is your job? What is your career when you want to actually do and then I thought back to that time when I was behind my computer after that swim practice with kale stuck in between my teeth.

33:43 Took me a week to come to realize that I wanted to go out and start filming food around the world specifically just food around the world. That was my main intention. But when I eventually made the decision to go and when I actually went I started to very very quickly realize after like while I was there in Vietnam or the Philippines. I realized that a lot of the people who made my food had stories is it like the little people the fisherman and then the butcher like stories, is it similar to like what you know, your grandpa and

34:37 My mom's Uncle with the bee farmer. There is a lot of overlap ins and stories. I'd say ours is kind of unique considering our like where we are in the US and how are Asian family in a Caucasian land and I think every story is very unique to its plants like for example while over in the in Cambodia. I learned about a story of this one kid who basically his name is brissi and he was a drug addict and he lifted the Khmer Rouge. Lots of people were displaced after that lot of people just went homeless and he was one of those people he was living on the streets and he found baking as a way to kind of like release himself out of the get out of this vicious cycle of drugs and how poverty yeah,

35:37 Yeah. Yeah, and he's working with friends international which is a non-for-profit over there in Cambodia.

35:45 And so

35:47 I just as I was traveling around I just learned that.

35:51 You know, I originally set out to go over there to to Southeast Asia and to other parts of the world after graduating to just film like a regular food and travel show like so I'd say hey, my name is Kevin. I talked to the Cameron I said, hey, I'm Kevin and we're eating balut, which is duck embryo out here in the streets of Philippines. Isn't this cool? But you know,

36:18 I don't want to claim that. I'm any real Authority with food and I my story is just beginning really the stories out. There are the people who make our food and I just learned that off camera while traveling around in so that led me to then return back to other places around the world named Lee like you're up and some parts of America and Mexico to start looking and start filming stories. And so now yeah, I've been craving taste which is a documentary series that features of stories of food entrepreneurs around the world that you may even into people similar to ourselves that start back Generations in generation. Alpha farming the farming the land and then of all begin to tell if an aspects of the food even coming around back again to doing farming but touching their fingers touching every aspect of the

37:18 Business it certainly come full circle.

37:22 That's right.

37:30 So after hearing this kind of story Papa of Our Generations

37:38 Of you know you started in Burlingame. Will you start in Colusa on the rice fields? And now

37:47 Here I am going out to different nations in different worlds and exploring other people who make our food beyond our borders.

37:59 What do you think of that? I mean initial reactions are emotions that you have taken the initiative to look into food because we all need to eat.

38:16 I'm I'm so fascinated the stories of various people of how they've been a difficult times and have been able to turn something in themselves to develop a part of their passion with has been a passion of mine and make it go and turn themselves around. I find that aspect very fascinating and I have this sense that there more different types of stories that have not been that we don't know about that people have experienced that I am curious about loading in finding out why and how did someone get to be where they are?

39:06 And then it's not about success all in success in terms of monetary, but there's a huge happiness Factor like Mom your relatives in in China, honey Farmers their face. They were happy. They live in a dirt house dirt walls dirt floors, no flashing twins, but they were happy and so just uncovering all of that about R Us as human beings culture food as I find them looking forward to learning.

39:47 And to kind of explore those those stories of success and food and everything it it it's been

39:57 It's been quite a fun journey into kind of see it in juxtaposition to our family. Like for example, I I filmed a a baker in Budapest. She's Jewish. She considers herself a modern you this your mama and ayuda sure. Mom is one who really cares for her her her family and you know spoils them getting brakes for them makes a lot of food. I mean, she's a fake make sure she's a baker she's a cake maker, but she's very much like she she is like you papa and very spoiled me rotten and you're like you're like

40:40 A traditional loving grandmother and then she's like you Mom where you know, she has aspirations and she's very well-educated. She's sharp as a whip and she uses.

40:53 You know.

40:56 She basically takes

40:59 Initiative in her life, she's not wanting to be like a stay-at-home mom or anything and she was in that regard the others lots of similarities and then courses also lots of differences. Like for example, I found a a a restaurant tour in Prague who like in his circumstances he grew up with Communism and so communism they didn't really have much of a food culture is much more about utility rather than flavor or taste and he kind of went. Well, actually I take that back his story, overlaps with ours like right when the the wall fell he took the first job on a cruise ship to travel around the world and and explore different foods and cultures. And so to see all these different overlaps of stories with food has been quite humbling and

41:56 I guess it's just safe to say that.

42:00 Food and stories. They they bring people together with family together.

42:08 2

42:12 So

42:14 Papa I just want to say thanks a lot for you know.

42:21 Being

42:23 Being that person who who plays the the path for our love of food and and travel is certainly shaped who I am.

42:37 Shapes who my mom is and I think I'm a better person because of it. It's my pleasure cabin.

42:46 That I can help you. Yes. Thank you, Mom. Thank you, Kevin. I've just learned a lot from you and

42:55 It's been a wonderful experience to see.

43:01 Our family and how we grown and we changed and how all our passions have made his clothes and this the beauty of family over time and what it's brought us together before I definitely have to say. Thanks, Mama.

43:17 You're welcome. She she's

43:23 You're amazing.