My local post office agent, Paul, (who looks a bit like Paul Newman, if Paul Newman had been a heavy smoker) is going to the Super Bowl. His son, Paul Jr. arranged it. They are staying in San Antonio and flying down on Friday or something crazy like that. Sports fever. Fascinating.

The only thing that excites/impassions me a similar way is perhaps my fascination with celebrity and the the film/music industry. I had a long talk with my friend Gac Kim last night, who moved back to L.A. a few years ago. This time of year with the Golden Globes and the Academy Awards, it's a media circus out in Hollywood.

Gac, who is KoreAm, is working on a historical novel about a Chinese cowboy town in No Cal. It is a discussion that I have had with other friends from different ethnic backgrounds, but it seems like sometimes it is easier to write about a culture outside of the one that we know so well from first hand experience. My friend Sarah, who studies at the MFA program at Mills, is Pakistani-American and is writing a novel set in Wales. The very complex ethical issue arises of how we represent said culture - if we stick to historical fact and accuracy, or if we take liberties, and is this then irresponsible to the culture in some way, or does the writer than make him/herself an easy target for criticism? It can be easier for me to write about being Taiwanese/Chinese-American because I know what that system is, the rules and boundaries of the community, what the criticisms and outrage would be, and there is some flex room within that, but give me a different culture to write about, and I might find that quite paralyzing.