Angela Lin 0:21
We have a special guest with us today. Ryan wait actually, do you go by Ryan Alex Holmes or Ryan?
Ryan 0:29
Ryan Alexander Holmes. It’s almost like a British name or something like that.
Full Transcript (Note: Transcribed via AI, may contain errors)
Angela Lin 0:33
I love it. Okay, um, Ryan, how would you describe yourself? You’re part actor, TikTok celebrity or like, what’s your go-to?
Ryan 0:43
Celebrity? I just like to express myself. Like, I like to fully investigate my identity and who I am and share it with the world in whatever medium that I can get my hands on to do so.
Angela Lin 1:03
And our signature question to start things off – but where are you really from? And or what are you?
Ryan 1:13
I’m, I’m, I’m a citizen of Blasia. Ever heard of it?
Angela Lin 1:19
Tell us more.
Ryan 1:21
It’s a country that I founded just now. For all the Blasians out there because we don’t have a home country. We’ve never had one. When people ask where are you from? A blasian has to make up an answer that’s not adequate I feel like for them, and I’ve just and so I’m from Blasia, that’s where I’m from.
Angela Lin 1:41
Okay, I love that. We’re having Ryan on to talk about a lot of cool things. But one of the main things is that we’ve never been able to explore this, like, multicultural biracial identity. So I think we have a lot of fun stuff to talk about. But for those who don’t know you, so you’re blasian but that is so wide, as well as like, what kind of Asian?
Ryan 2:04
This is even interesting too I mean, I’m African American. So, you know, from, you know, slavery. That’s my dad side. And my mom’s side is Chinese, but from Taiwan. Yeah, I know you guys are both from Taiwan, right? I do get flack sometimes because people are like, they see that the Taiwan flag that I proudly wave and put on on my social media handles? Like, when you say Chinese when you mean Taiwanese, and I’m like, No, I don’t mean Chinese. Because because my, my mother is ethnically Chinese, but grew up in Taiwan. And you guys know the history and I don’t know, your family background. But my family, my Chinese family came to Taiwan after the war. You know what I mean? And so they’re that, you know, if I do identify, it’s Chinese-Taiwanese. You know, but that’s always been contentious. I don’t consider myself under the laws of whatever that identity is to, to the people who are telling me how to identify I’m gonna identify however I want. And what’s funny is that like, people will tell me as if I don’t know my own family history what I need to identify myself as, you know, instead of asking, like, I see the Taiwan flag, but you say Chinese, let’s – can you explain why that is? Instead of being like, how dare you say that? You don’t even know your history? It’s like, come on, man.
Jesse Lin 3:42
That’s interesting. You’re saying other Asian people are like, sorting you into one of the two are like forcing you to pick.
Ryan 3:49
Yeah exactly yeah. I mean, that’s that those are the ones that accept me as Asian.
Jesse Lin 3:55
That’s so you know what, cuz we also we talk a lot about how like, non Asian people also like to put us in boxes. But on the flip side, we also talked about how there’s generally like this imposter syndrome. Like you don’t really fit in anywhere, like, when I go back to Asia, like people can tell that I’m not from there
Ryan 4:13
Yeah, I heard that there that in a previous episode, you’re just like, yeah, they can clock it right away. Like,
Jesse Lin 4:19
Yeah, we’re like, we look similar. But then people can tell they’re like, you’re not from here.
Ryan 4:24
You smell different? I don’t know. You ain’t from here.
Jesse Lin 4:29
Yeah.
Ryan 4:30
Yeah, I feel you, man. I felt that when you said that, because I’m just like, I guess mine is another layer, right? Because I don’t. I love to tell people like, I do look Asian. Like, just because I don’t look Asian to you does not mean that I don’t look Asian because I literally am Asian. You know, in my blood. It’s what I actually am. So to say that I don’t look it. You could say I don’t look like the stereotypical idea of Asian. Yeah, sure. But you better say that. Because I am Asian, so therefore I do look Asian.
Angela Lin 5:46
Did your family like take you back to the motherland frequently or what was like the first time that you went?
Ryan 5:52
I went first time to the motherland Taiwan like two years ago, two and a half years ago. My mom hadn’t been back since she left which after she went to NTU National Taiwan University. She was a nerd. And then she went to another nerd school. She went to UPenn. And she was never she never went back. And so she went with us. We went there. I guess what I expected was like when my dad takes me back or took me back to you know where he’s from in the south Jacksonville, Florida. Like, this is where I grew up. These are this. These are the halls that I walked. This is my paper route – my mom’s just like, okay, here’s my school. Yeah. And yeah, and that’s Taipei 101, you should look at that. It’s like, it wasn’t like a huge homecoming. And I’m like, Mom, you haven’t been here in like, 30 years, like, isn’t this exciting for you? She’s like, yeah it’s exciting.
Angela Lin 6:50
You know how Asian parents like to quell their own emotions.
Ryan 6:57
You know, but we did go to like her old she went to boarding school out there. So we saw her boarding school, we walk the campus of NTU. You know, and but a lot of it was just she said, like a lot of the things that she used to do and walk around in the building. Like it was all different. You know, yeah, but she barely recognizable. You know?
Angela Lin 7:18
It’s funny.
Jesse Lin 7:18
So you said your grandparents left China after the war? Do you have families still in China as well, or everyone’s in Taiwan?
Ryan 7:27
And this is where it’s complicated, right? Because I lived in Shanghai, which, which is where I do have family. But I didn’t see them. And I don’t know why I didn’t see them. And I say I don’t know why. Because I don’t know why. I don’t know if it’s because my grandma doesn’t get along with them. Or like the family doesn’t get along with them. Or if it’s because I’m black. Just gonna be straight up here. You know, I mean, and, and, and I don’t know, you know, maybe my grandma’s protecting me from the racism that I might experience. You know, the non acceptance that I might experience. Because I heard the podcast we were talking about your grandparents. Was that your grandparents? Jesse? I don’t care who you bring home. It’s fine…
Jesse Lin 8:13
Oh, yeah that was my aunt.
Ryan 8:15
…as long as they’re not black. Okay. Yeah.If they’re not black, it’s fine. Anything else? It’s like, Damn, why do you hate us so much? Like, we’re humans, dude. I get it. I can laugh about it. Because like, I’ve lived my whole life, understanding like, why they feel that way. And a lot of it is just not even their fault, because it’s just conditioning, that they’ve had it. They’ve been brainwashed by, honestly.
Angela Lin 8:41
Let’s dig into that. Because I think that was a big piece I am like, very curious about is, it sounds like your grandparents were super embracing and like loving and like, DGAF that you’re half black.
Ryan 8:55
They got there. They didn’t start there. My mom was going against the family what the family wanted by marrying my dad, you know, which race was also a part of it. I don’t want to make it. I don’t want to paint a picture that like my grandparents were just absolutely racist. And it was all about the skin color. Because it wasn’t it is more complicated than that. But it definitely was a factor. Right? And then when my when my brother my oldest brother was born, then it had to it just had to change, right? Because now my grandparents, and my Chinese side of the family is like, Oh, shit, okay, well, now there’s a baby he’s Chinese, and he’s black. We love him. We love it. We’ve decided we want to do it. I mean, that’s what and that’s and that’s what’s so funny about it. When I look at people who like don’t like somebody because of they can say it’s non racial factors as to why they don’t like a group of people. But it is and it’s racist, just period. And people will do anything they can to justify those, those thoughts and that ideology, but I can see it for what it is because I’ve lived it. And my family has lived it, and we realize that it doesn’t fucking matter at all, you know. And if you actually get to know the human being for who they are, outside of these preconceived ideas about someone you’ve never met yet, then you’ll get to see like, Oh, I got it. And that’s how I was raised. I was raised by obviously, both my sides and taught to embrace both my sides. And obviously, on the Chinese side, because I don’t look traditionally stereotypically Asian. It was, you know, there’s pushback from that side. And what I had to learn was that, as long as I have my family who accepts me for who I am, and I don’t have to prove that to them, I can just be Chinese. Because that’s what I am, you know what I mean? It doesn’t matter to them, then I can carry that same the same vibes into the real world, right? Oh, you don’t accept me as Chinese? Well, guess what? I don’t give a fuck because I am, you know what I mean. And that’s a completely different way of interacting with the world. I’m not asking for your acceptance. I already accept who I am. You know, and you see it in my content, too. I don’t, I’m not asking for acceptance. I’m showing how I was raised and how I embrace my own culture, outside of whatever opinions may come to the forefront, right? And I think, because I only started making my own content about this, like, five months ago, it was during the pandemic, I started. And I realized also, that the idea that Asian the Asian community did not accept me was was pinned in the 1990s, right, from the anti blackness that I experienced from the Asian community back then. And because I did, because I had this idea, the Asian community doesn’t accept me from that age, it sort of didn’t grow, I didn’t grow with the age of communities understanding in the same way that the Asian community did, about their anti blackness. So the acceptance that I’m feeling now, I’m just like, Whoa, I didn’t know that Asians would, would be like, excited by the content I’m making or think it was funny or see me as one of them. Because that’s not what I was doing it for. I was doing it for me. It was doing it for my self expression. And showing people in general, not the Asian community, that however you identify is how you identify it, especially if it’s in your blood.
Angela Lin 12:39
You know, everything you just said, I feel like a bit of envy, almost, because you went through a lot of clearly growing up to like, get to the point where your family is like totally embracing you and like empowering you, you’re empowering you and your sense of self. But it feels like all that did, you know culminate in you feeling like super secure in your identity and like how you want to express that and wanting to like really own and be, you know, prideful of your Chinese heritage. And I think something that Jesse and I have talked about a lot is like how we denied our heritage growing up, like we wanted desperately just to be like white, right? Yeah, no, we can’t escape how we look. So we’re, we couldn’t ever really escape the Chinese, Taiwanese-ness. But we wanted to deny it as long as possible. And it’s like only until recently that we’re trying to like rediscover that for ourselves.
Ryan 13:43
So I feel you on that, because there’s times where I wanted to erase my blackness, and be not necessarily white, but be like everyone else, and everyone else was white, and also the Asian kids that I was around because my community was 50-50 White, or 50-50 white and Asian. Wanted to be white too, you know, or wanted to be part of the popular culture. Like so I’ve I’ve experienced that too. I’ve also experienced, you know, moving – going to a middle school that was in Rowland Heights, which is primarily Asian. And I would hide in the car when my grandparents would pick me up because I didn’t want people to know that I was Chinese and I didn’t want them to ask questions. You know, I didn’t I was already getting made fun of for being black. I didn’t want to get made fun of for being Asian too. You know, and I can’t i’ve i’ve had to forgive myself, right? Because my grandpa, my grandpa is not alive anymore. And I look back at the way that he raised me and I’m just like, that is so it was so not synonymous with how other Chinese grandparents raised their grandkids. He would tell me, he loves me every single time I saw him. Every day, you know what I mean? And so I’m just like, How could you? little, you know, like talking to my little, my former little self hiding in the backseat? Like, how could you do that? This man was he loved you and no other Chinese parents are doing that, how dare you? You know, I had to forgive myself for that, because that’s what and also look back at that perspective and not carry it with me moving forward now, right? Because I was totally subject to what others were telling me to identify as and believe. And I was living my life in accordance to their value structures, right? Whereas now I’m like, oh, you’re making fun of me for being Chinese? Well, you’re the idiot here. I don’t have to listen to you. I don’t have to, I don’t even have to, you’re not gonna live in my head rent free. You’re gonna get evicted. And and also, the mean, right? Like when you’re a kid, you’re you don’t have choice. Like you have to go to the school, you have to be around those kids. I don’t have to be around anybody. I don’t want to be around. That doesn’t feed me. That doesn’t support me.
Jesse Lin 16:07
We’ve talked a lot about how like our childhoods and how we grew up kind of like directed where we went as adults or like our behavior. But I think a big part of it that I we tend to overlook is that we reinforce that on ourselves, in a sense, like, it’s baggage that we carry with us. And we allow, as you said, to live rent free in our head, like where, in a sense, it’s like self sabotage. So yeah, I think it’s really interesting that you bring up that point, because I think a lot of a lot of us struggle to identify that self sabotage and figure out like, why is it that I feel second place all the time? Like, why do I let people get in my head. And part of the process of doing this podcast has been so great, it’s because we’re now kind of like, the same place as you are, where we’re like, we don’t care what other people think about our Asian identities, like the purpose of this podcast, is so that we can find what it means for us and like, create that meaning. So that is like a million times more powerful than what other people are thinking in terms of like stereotypes or preconceived notions and stuff like that.
Ryan 17:15
Absolutely. Even having this conversation, right. Is is making us think in different ways and question, you know, the sort of structures that we’ve been taught to live by that may no longer serve us, you know, and that’s the reason why we feel like, sometimes we’re not at it. And that look, I’m not completely secure. Like, I have to still deal with a lot of the things but because I have that awareness, I can be like, now, Ryan, that’s the that’s the conditioning. That’s conditioning. You did do a good job. You did a good job. Tell yourself You did a good job. Okay. Did you did? Don’t -you know what I mean? Cuz, growing up in an Asian household, it’s like, even your accomplishments are just like, even that even the top one accomplishments are like, okay, but what’s next? I’m not gonna give you a trophy for doing what you’re supposed to do. And it’s like, but damn, like, can you just give me like a nod or like a handshake or something damn? I feel like I did something here. You know?
Jesse Lin 18:14
I’m curious. Was that what it was? Like, when you were growing up like the parenting structure was very Asian?
Ryan 18:21
Yeah oh, no, it was very Asian. Okay. Like, first of all, I was raised by my Chinese side, my parents are still together, they raised me together. But like, my entire Asian family lives in Los Angeles. So I’ll go to grandma’s house every weekend with my cousins and stuff like that. We compete. We compete with each other with times tables.
Angela Lin 18:41
You were much more Asian than we were!
Ryan 18:46
Peak Asian. But here’s another thing is like, I didn’t know that that was Asian. Because I didn’t have anything outside of my family to really compare it to, like, we were just being us. And my Asian experience was very insular. I didn’t have sort of, like, a lot of Asian friends that did Asian things that I hung out with. Yeah, I say that to say like, I really did get the experience of just being myself for a while. A lot of ways it was a good experience, because it made me very close with my family and made my identity something that I didn’t, didn’t compare to others about or tried to prove so much about but but there was a lot of me trying to prove my Asianness when I first started really embarking on like, Oh, dude, I am half Asian. Like, I know, I strongly identify with black because society has, has deemed me black. But over the past several years, like really diving into learning the language and the history and trying to make Asian friends and go going to China and living there and going to Taiwan and speaking to my grandparents and my mom about our family’s history and stuff like that. A lot of that started as me trying to prove it to other people. Right? And then being very, very upset, depressed even when I was met sort of with like, what, you know, or like a spectacle, like I’m a spectacle and not really accepted. It’s just like, wow, wow, can I you know, it’s it’s. So now it’s like that that still happens all the time. But I’m not like that doesn’t define me though. Like, I define me. And that’s made all the difference. And another experience I had I modeled out there the whole time I was out there, I signed with this modeling agency, and when I signed with them, they literally straight up told me like, oh, it’s a good thing that you’re not darker because we wouldn’t have signed you. It’s funny, though. It’s funny, though, because Chinese people are my people. I see them as my people. And I know, they don’t mean like, their racism is not like KKK racism. It’s like, no, this, these are just the facts, you know? Like, theseare just the facts. Like if you’re darker, then we wouldn’t want you like, there’s facts, like you wouldn’t make us money.
Angela Lin 21:10
I mean, if it makes you feel any better, I I feel that myself when I go back to Asia, because I you know, Jesse and I grew up in Southern California, just like you and I used to be like, five times darker than this in peak summer, you know, I’d be like bake it all in and I’d go back to Asia and it’d be like, that’s why it stood out is because I’m super dark.
Ryan 21:32
Yeah, colorism is not even attached to just race, right? There is racism in China. But colorism is was a separate issue. But when racism became so popular these days, colorism sort of blended into racism right? Because the colorism was a class thing in Asia. Yeah. And then when when black people existed in these people’s eyes, they were through the lens of how American media wanted to show us or Western culture wanted to show black people. And unfortunately, Asians were subject to that conditioning. So you have this colorism, which is like, you must look like a ghost at all times. And if you don’t find some cream and rub that shit into your skin until you look like a ghost. And then they’re right, right? It’s like weaved into the beauty standards in the class, the classism structure in not just China, but all throughout Asia. And then you have black people who like literally cannot change the color of their skin because they’re just black. And so that negative view from the classist point of view is already there, right? And then you piggyback off of that and add the conditioning, the racist conditioning, right. And that in that comes from little things, too, like Darkie toothpaste, was it called Blackie toothpaste, my mom used to brush her teeth. And she was a kid growing up in Taiwan, right? And she wasn’t thinking about that. Like, you know, but but I don’t think my mom saw a black person until she like in real life until she went to Japan. And that’s 24 years of life, right? And then you imagine that, and, you know, you go to America, and then it’s like a shock when black people look, there’s like a diversity in the black community that you never were taught. Right? I think that’s what happened with my mom. It’s like, Oh, you know, and it sounds crazy. It’s like, oh, black people can be smart?. And like they go to school? Like, that’s sort of like how deep it is. In the conditioning is like they really, conditioning can really make you so racist without you even knowing that racism is even a thing. It’s just like, that’s just how it is like my modeling agency in China. Like that’s just how it is. You’re if you were darker, we wouldn’t want you.
Angela Lin 23:56
Well, let’s go into the media topic. Because you so you did some modeling in China, but you also do some acting here in the US, right? I’m curious about what assumptions people make or boxes they put you in because we’ve we had a another actor on a previous episode, Amy, and she had her own, you know, boxes that she’s put in because she’s stereotypically Asian looking. But I’m curious because you do you do have these two sides of you. And you can even speak Chinese like I’m curious what like role you’re trying to go after versus what people are trying to impose on you.
Ryan 24:37
This is such a great question. And I listened to to Amy’s interview in its entirety. And I was like, wow, I connected this so much more than I thought I would. And I’m like, why aren’t there more conversations like this? Anyway. I’m much more interested in paving my own way and making my own content. That’s what Amy said too because like, it’s like I don’t make content for the predominant cultures gaze, and gaze G-A-Z-E, just so we’re clear. Yeah, I do want to make that clear. Because that’s not expressing myself, if I’m making it for people outside of me that are in control of the industry, so that what they can put me on the map, so it’s all about them. It’s all about pleasing them, and not about expressing myself. I know there’s an in between there, right? But I want the what comes first and foremost, something that’s funny to me interesting to me something that I’m passionate about that needs to lead the project that I want to be a part of. I also think the more time that I spend on understanding who I am and what I want to do, the more I’ll be in connection to the people who are making that kind of those kinds of productions. You know, it used to just be when I first graduated from my MFA program, it used to just be like, well, I don’t care, I’ll just work on a CBS show and, and then I’ll be famous and like, you know what I mean, but like, I’m not really interested. Here’s the thing, like, I’m gonna take a network TV job, if I get it, come on. I’m not above that. What I’m saying is, like, it’s not necessarily what is my, it’s not my dream, my overall goal is to is to do what what my content is doing, is to inspire other people to express themselves outside of other people’s opinions, especially when it’s the predominant culture and in Hollywood, we see that a lot. Right? Why do Asians have to fight tooth and nail to just get one project done? Same thing with with black people in a different way. And people of all people of color, I want us to get to a level where we just make it because we want to make it you know, and we can be just as mediocre as a lot of these white productions are. You know, I don’t like to compare white, black, Asian, I don’t like to do that. But like, when I say white, I mean the predominant culture. And that is that is white, right? And you have all these wack-ass, sorry, all these shows that are like not very good. And they can be not very good. Right? I want to champion like black mediocrity and, and, Asian mediocrity – we should be able to be mediocre and have mediocre shows, too. We should have a diversity, and not have to be like, you know, stand up for a TV show or a movie that we don’t really like, because it’s Asian, because it’s black, because it’s a primarily people of color. But we do kind of have to when we think of it in terms of, you know, establishing ourselves in the industry as we know it today.
Angela Lin 27:40
You know, when you said that thing about like, why can’t we have mediocre content too. I remembered a conversation I had with a friend when Crazy Rich Asians came out which, but i think is phenomenal, not mediocre. It’s a you know, a certainly above average and the range from there is you know, personal opinion. But I remember you know, talking very highly of that because yeah, number one, great movie number two, you know, all Asian, there’s meaning behind that, whatever. And the person I was talking to was like, I mean, it was just another rom com. I was like, but that’s the point like why do white rom-coms get like, you know, a star rating, whereas like this all Asian cast doing and also just another rom com has to be told it’s just another rom com?
Ryan 28:30
Yes, they don’t get it because they don’t understand how much it means. It’s funny hearing white people’s opinions about Black Panther and Crazy Rich Asians, because they’re really just viewing it as a movie, in their in their own perspective. Right. And so like, they’ll have an opinion, that’s completely not tied to culture at all. But like, if you watch crazy rich Asians, that shit’s about culture. You know, if you watch Black Panther that’s all about culture. And like, if you’re not a part of the culture, of course, you’re not going to be able to really enjoy it that much. But that’s your fault. That’s your fault. You know, because we got to know your culture, whatever it is, I don’t know what that culture what white culture really is. But I think it’s just the predominant culture that we all have at one point in time during our childhood or even people now have not escaped from trying to assimilate into it. Right? But if you are coming from the predominant and you’re watching a movie about you know if you’re watching Black Panther or Crazy Rich Asians, of course your experience is going to be different. But I’ll tell you like I was like weeping, watching Black Panther. Because it was portraying black people in a way that I wish I had as a child. And I and and I wish that I ever had before hand right? Where like we are the most advanced people on the earth. Right? Wakanda is the most advanced Infrastructure technology, you know, sciences in the world. I was like, Oh my god, this is, this is what we need, right? This is what we need. We need to show kids, these positive examples of what you can do for your community. Right? Like, I don’t want to get too into it. But like a lot of rap music and a lot of hip hop culture is so demeaning to women, so demeaning to the community talks about gun violence, right? And I can come at from a perspective of understanding and compassion because I was forced onto us, too, by our circumstances, like we are in part, we are in poverty stricken communities on purpose – legislation brought that about, right, it’s not their fault. It’s not our fault. And I look and then I can talk about Crazy Rich Asians and be like, I also cried there, too. Because I’m like, I’ve never got to, I’ve never got to see my people, Chinese, Asian people, all part of the cast, where there’s no white savior involved. In the wedding scene, I’m just like, wow, like Asian love. Hey, you know, that’s not even a concept. That wasn’t really even a concept really, in an Asian American cinematic history. I’m all about Crazy Rich Asians, all about movies like Black Panther. I’m all about movies that just let Asians be Asians and let black people be black people. Right?
Angela Lin 31:32
Yes. Just people.
Ryan 31:34
I think also, during this time, after George Floyd, I think a lot of the Asian American community, and during COVID racism, the Asian American community has realized like, Oh, we are people of color. And not only that, like, the racism that we didn’t experience was conditional. Like, they will turn on us on any given moment. You know, and if that is the case, and we are people of color, let’s understand other people of colors experience in this country, and unite and find an understanding and a catharsis, too expressing the pain that you felt that you may not even know that you were feeling, because you repressed it, because that’s what we do that let’s come together and find these bridges that we can get that we can fill the gaps between.
Angela Lin 32:26
I do really feel like there has been a coming together across all people colors, and yeah, it’s crazy months that we’ve been living.
Ryan 32:38
Unfortunate that it had to happen this way.
Jesse Lin 32:40
Yeah, you know, we’ve discussed it before. And it is very similar, where, you know, we have this idea that we can kind of just fly under the radar, like, people who present outwardly as Asian, because you have all these like model minority concepts, and you think you can just, you know, exist without people bothering you. But it’s proven not to be the case.
Ryan 32:59
Yeah, I would, I would say that Asians came to this country from cultures of honor and respect, and were met with disrespect and xenophobia, and refuse to stoop to that level. So they put their we put our heads down and, and understood our skill set. And, and kept retained our honor and respect and found success in our own way. And to the people who disrespected us, that it seems like we’re quiet, and that were domesticated and that we don’t have a voice. But in reality, that’s how we coped with the animosity and adversity that we faced when we got here. So I, I think that Asians are amazing. And now we’re just at a turning point where we’re realizing a further way in which we need to adapt and come together.
Jesse Lin 34:01
I agree.
Ryan 34:01
That’s what that’s what it is.
Angela Lin 34:03
All right, well, that was heavy, but also uplifting near the end. So let’s keep it uplifting and move into move into our Fortune Cookie because we always like to end on a sweet treat. Earlier, you talked about hip hop, and rap and how those can oftentimes be more associated with like negative topics. But you know, while we were scrolling through your page and the content that you make, we noticed that you have been promoting more acceptance and awareness of Chinese hip hop and Chinese rap. We wanted to ask what your favorite Chinese language artist is to plug them so that people can start listening.
Ryan 34:55
Oh, man, I mean, there’s so many I like I do listen to Higher Brothers rap group and why I came to respect them so much is because I saw a documentary about them. I think it was on Vice, where they were interviewed about how they came to love rap so much. And they went to this old record store. And they were pulling out rappers that like I had grown up on, like, Rakim and Common and Big L. These sort of like, rappers that that that changed the hip hop game changed the rap game, one of the higher brothers rappers was like, yeah, we used to listen to this in our basement for like, non stop and really understood the cadence of how he was saying and what he was saying and why it was impactful and the rhythms you know what I mean? I was like, Oh, so y’all are really about this. Like, this isn’t like some some cool trend borderline appropriation thing for you like this is life for you. And so I’m a forever fan of theirs. And that’s, that’s hip hop, but also in like the r&b world, Eric Cho is like, I really do like his music a lot. Because it just like, I’m very I’m an emotional sensitive person. And like he really hits your heart every single time.
Jesse Lin 36:15
Yeah, well, if you guys enjoy this episode, if you have any questions for Ryan about himself or his experience, or you just want to chime in with comments about the episode, and reminder that we’re still looking for listener story submissions, so write us in about whatever experience with this topic you have, or whatever you want at telluswhereyourefrom@gmail.com. Ryan, would you like to tell our listeners where they can find you?
Ryan 36:41
You can find me in the streets. No you can find me find me on Instagram and Tiktok my handle is ryanalexh, and maybe you’ll see me on TV too. I’ve got a project I’m working on. It’s gonna be on TV streaming. So that’s not really TV. You know what I mean?
Angela Lin 37:00
It is, as anything can be these days. Awesome. Come back next week. We’ll have another fun episode for you then.