James Beard award-winning food writer Kevin Pang did not have a good relationship with his father. They would speak occasionally, but exchange only the most superficial of pleasantries.
Then, one day in 2012, Kevin got an email. The subject: "Jeffrey Pang wants you to check out this YouTube video."
What followed was a journey of reconnection and rediscovery between father and son on a scale that neither could have ever imagined.
Kevin tells the story of how the email sparked a previously unfathomable reconciliation.
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Episode Transcript
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Max Chopovsky (00:02):
This is Moral of the Story interesting people
telling their favorite shortstories and then breaking them
down to understand what makesthem so good.
I'm your host, max Chepofsky.
Today's guest is Kevin Pang.
Author, journalist, magician,little league baseball umpire
producer, theater, musicdirector, award-winning
filmmaker, cooking show host and, of course, foodie of the
(00:24):
highest caliber, with a JamesBeard Award to prove it.
An eclectic mix of adventures,yes, but it's not all that
surprising when you unroll thescroll.
That is Kevin's life.
In fact, the trajectory startsto make a whole lot more sense
when you dig deeper.
Born in Hong Kong, kevinimmigrated with his parents to
the US at age six.
To call his relationship withhis dad strained would be an
(00:47):
understatement.
Kevin embraced Western culture,while his parents were firmly
rooted in the Eastern way oflife, with no interest in
assimilating.
This dual cultural experience,to put it mildly, gave rise to
dual identities.
Kevin was, in his own words,american during the day and
Chinese after school.
The arguing and fights with hisdad were constant, ranging from
(01:09):
smoldering embers tofull-fledged conflagrations.
The Eastern cultures put a highemphasis on respect for elders,
but Kevin was recalcitrant,insistent on doing things his
own way, from refusing to speakCantonese to bleaching his hair
blonde, an act that elicitedfury from his dad, who accused
him of being ashamed of hisChinese heritage.
(01:30):
Kevin was raised in Toronto andSeattle, working at the Pikes
Place Fish Market.
In high school, after moving tothe Windy City, he worked as a
metro reporter at the ChicagoTribune.
Meanwhile, the relationshipwith his dad, now 2,000 miles
away, was barely a glow, keptalive through a weekly phone
call filled with the mostsuperficial of pleasantries and
small talk.
Something changed when Kevinwas offered a position on the
(01:52):
paper's food writing staff.
He had zero experience, exceptfor one highly qualifying line
item.
He was Cantonese, steeped inthe region's food-centric
philosophy, in a deep, thoughperhaps dormant, love of cooking
, and this would be the key tounlock not just his future
career but transform hisrelationship with his dad.
Jeffrey Peng had an obsessionwith food that was at once
(02:15):
borderline, manic and completelyculturally acceptable, and
after Kevin became a food writer, he and his father, for the
first time ever, shared a mutualinterest.
The weekly phone calls evolvedfrom weather forecasts to deep
and analogy drenched tutorialson the way a Shumai's rapper
should caress its filling or theproper way to brace pork belly.
Five-minute calls regularlystretched to 30 minutes or more
(02:40):
After his father started makingcooking videos on YouTube, kevin
was shocked to learn that notonly did his parents have a
loyal audience their viewermetrics were impressive but the
koo-the-grass to their fraughtrelationship came when Kevin
learned why his father startedto make the videos.
It was for Kevin For, when hisparents were no longer around,
to prepare the dishes for him,and so, as the family recipes
(03:01):
migrated from the carefullymaintained spiral notebook to
the world of online content, sodid Kevin's relationship with
his dad level up.
Meanwhile, kevin continuedchanneling his energy into his
culinary pursuits co-directingthe critically acclaimed film
For Grace, which followsbrilliant but tormented chef
Curtis Duffy, in the monthsleading up to the opening of his
first restaurant, grace, whichwould go on to earn three
(03:22):
Michelin stars.
Creating and running theonion's food spin-off, the
Takeout.
And joining America's TestKitchen as editorial director
and co-host of the Hunger PangsCooking Show, a duty he gladly
shares with his dad.
And almost as a bow on theirconverging character arcs, kevin
and his dad are releasing acookbook of Cantonese cuisine
entitled A Very Chinese Cookbook, out on October 24th of this
(03:46):
year.
Writing a book is hard, andalthough it's bound to do well,
considering the following of itsauthors, my sense is that if
you ask Kevin what he reallythinks, he'd tell you that just
being back in the kitchen withhis dad made the whole thing
worth it.
Kevin, welcome to the show.
Kevin Pang (04:00):
Wow, max, that felt like being on an episode of this
Is your Life or my Funeral oneof the two, but it's so great to
be here.
Max Chopovsky (04:09):
Max, thanks for having me, of course.
Of course, thanks for beinghere.
So you are here to tell us astory.
Is there anything we shouldknow before we get started?
Kevin Pang (04:19):
if you want to set the stage, yeah, you know, I
think you set it up quite wellwith a lot of context, but I
want to tell the story of afterI had become a food writer.
There was one moment thatreally precipitated everything
that happened over the following12 years.
Max Chopovsky (04:36):
I love it All right.
Well, let's get into it.
Tell me a story.
Kevin Pang (04:40):
So, max, you know that I become a food writer, and
that was one way that gave areason for my dad and I to speak
together.
We would, rather than havingthese really nothing phone calls
at all I mean, it was the mostcordial of calls we would call
each other.
We would say, hey, how are youdoing?
What did you eat?
Did you go to Costco?
(05:01):
You know like, are you hangingout with mom?
That sort of thing, right.
And the thing is that we didfight, but most of the time it
wasn't fighting, it was having acordial conversation about
nothing at all.
So I'm sure you can relate.
It's just when you feelobligated to talk to someone
(05:22):
that you care about, but thenyou really have nothing to say,
and so you resort to the samethree or four things that you
talk about every single week,and so our relationship was just
in a holding pattern.
That's what it was.
So, even after I became a foodwriter, we still had these sorts
of things.
We were talking about how toroast pork belly, but then,
(05:43):
beyond food, it was just likeyou know, hey, how's it going?
That sort of thing.
So one day in 2012, you hadmentioned, I received this email
from my dad this forwardedemail that says Jeffrey Pang
wants you to check out thisYouTube video.
Now, when you are back in your20s and you receive an email
(06:06):
from your parents that sayscheck out this YouTube video,
what do you do?
You delete it.
Because you don't look at theseforwarded emails.
You think, well, it's probablysome crazy conspiracy theory or
something political.
I'm not going to read this, Imight have time for this, right.
And then a few weeks later, mymother contacted me and said hey
(06:27):
, kevin, have you seen thisvideo that your dad sent?
I'm like no.
And she said you should look atit.
So I clicked on it and thefirst thing I saw was it was
called creative production andthe EAT in the middle of
creative was highlighted.
It says eats right?
I'm like all right, that's kindof cheese ball.
(06:48):
And it had royalty free music.
You know something you didn'tpay for, right?
Just something you just gotfrom the internet for free.
And then I saw a photo of my momand her mom, my grandmother,
and I thought what the hell isthis?
And then I saw my mom's hands.
(07:09):
I noticed her wedding band,which is recognizable, and she
was massaging dough and she wasrolling out the dough and there
were scallions on it and Ithought wait a minute, this is
my mom making scallion pancakes,which is something I grew up
eating, something my grandmotherwould make and something that I
(07:30):
loved to eat when I was a kid.
Take care, they were makingtheir own YouTube cooking show
and my parents are tech phobicpeople.
These videos were lo-fi andwhen I saw this I thought what
the hell is this?
I was completely shocked and thebiggest shock was that they
(07:51):
kept doing these videos.
They were like 20 videos, youknow, in the ensuing months, in
the weeks and months, right, andsome of them had more than half
a million views and in total,it was more than like two
million views combined.
Now, this was back in 2012,2013,.
Back when getting two millionviews was pretty hard.
I mean, like now today you canbump in church and you can get
(08:17):
like 10 million views on TikTok,right, it's pretty easy to like
sort, but back then it was kindof hard to like get that and my
parents were doing that and Iwas in digital media and I'm
like, okay, I'm helping producevideo content on my work and
they're getting more views thanI was.
Like what was going on so manymonths later, as you alluded to,
when I asked them like, why didyou make?
(08:39):
Like?
Why are you making these videos?
Like, are you trying to getlikes?
Or, you know, are you trying tomake money?
And you know they're makinglike 60 bucks a month and you
know, my dad's able to take mymom out to a nice restaurant,
which was cool.
They said that, well, you andyour sister are not exactly the
most communicative of people,right, and you know, we
understand we don't really speakthe same language, right, and
(09:02):
so, like, there's a lot ofthings that get lost in
translation.
And they said that we wanted tospeak to you in a medium that
you would understand, and youguys live in the digital medium,
you live in YouTube land, sothe only way that we can talk to
you guys, you and your sister,is through YouTube.
And one day when and this is myparents speaking when we're no
(09:27):
longer around, and you growolder and you realize, well,
maybe they, you know, hey, yourparents weren't all too bad,
they did do something right.
And one day when you thinkabout some of the food that you
grew up eating and you arethinking about that dish and how
you just want to recreate itand we're no longer around,
we'll have these instructionsfor you.
(09:48):
So it's almost like they'remaking a time capsule for you to
discover later in life.
Except, more than two millionother views have been.
People have seen these videosas well too.
So I think from that point on,the relationship got gaping.
Which is not to say that we'restill not arguing from time to
(10:09):
time, but we now have deeperconversations than just hey, how
you doing?
Did you go to Costco?
What did you eat last night?
Right, we actually havesubstantive conversations now,
and who knew that food was gonnabe our lingua franca, that this
was gonna be the way that wewould talk to each other?
In Cantonese there's a saying.
(10:31):
We don't really say hey, howyou doing?
Hi, we say, have you eaten yet?
That's the phrase you greetother people with.
I'm sure other communities havesomething similar, but food is
so integral to us that we willavoid conversations about
relationships, aboutgeopolitical strife, but we will
use food as a way to broachthose subjects.
(10:52):
So who knew that a simple email12 years ago would lead to all
these things?
Lead to a cooking series thatI'm doing with my dad and a
cookbook, but, most of allimproving parental relationships
.
Max Chopovsky (11:09):
Well, it went through your mind when you
realized that they went throughsuch incredible effort just to
communicate with you and yoursister.
Kevin Pang (11:18):
I think it wasn't until years later when I became
a parent myself.
I've got a seven-year-old now,right, and I'm sure many parents
go through this.
They will soon realize that, oh, this is why your parents did
that thing.
They tried their best.
They're by no means perfectparents I don't know any parents
(11:42):
who are and it wasn't until mydad was telling me a story about
how, when he was five, hismother, my grandma, and they
were growing up in Hong Kong.
They were poor.
She would take him to themarket.
There were no TVs, radios youknow their household back then.
They had nothing to do, right.
There was no internet, notablet, so we had no babysitters
(12:07):
.
They had no babysitters, right.
So my grandma would take my dadout to the market to go shopping
, and they didn't have arefrigerator back then too.
So they had to buy these thingsfresh every day.
Right, it's not like today.
You go to Costco, I keepplugging Costco.
Costco should give me someresidual here, you know.
But they're not going to asupermarket once a week, they're
(12:28):
going every single day,sometimes twice a day, to buy
fresh produce, meats, fish andthings like that.
And so when my grandmotherwould take my dad there, she
would teach him about what tolook for in an eggplant.
It should be the specific color, it should be firm.
You should be able to hold it.
You have some bounce to it.
You should be able to you know,use tactile also your senses,
(12:53):
you know your visual senses tobe able to, like, tell whether
something's fresh or not, right.
And then afterward, if he wasbeing a good boy, my grandma
would buy my dad a bowl of, likenoodle soup as, like, a reward,
and the same way that I wouldbuy a big Mac for my kid, right
to be hungry.
And then I never envisioned mydad as the same age as my child.
(13:19):
And it's like you always lookat your parent as parents, that
is like you always see them asolder than you, right, you
always see them at a certain ageor older, right, but you would
never imagine them as afive-year-old.
And I had a kid who, back then,was five, right, and so it was
for the first time I thought youknow this person, you know my
father, who I have all thisarguments and strife with, right
(13:43):
, he was at one point, thisinnocent kid who was perhaps
curious and scared of the worldand had hopes and fears and
dreams, just like my child does.
Now, right, and that was themoment that I thought, oh, this
guy's a human too.
He's not like some automatonwho's trying to annoy you or
(14:06):
like, ruin your life or justmake your life hard.
So it wasn't years later, untilI became parent, that I
realized oh well, now I see whatthey're trying to do, and it is
both quite humbling and youthink well, you know, I wasn't
the easiest kid to be raised.
As well, too, I was, as you said, recalcitrant.
(14:27):
I was being annoying, I wasbeing ironic.
They have no idea what ironywas right, they don't know what
sarcasm is, and so when youdon't understand sarcasm and you
say things that are theopposite of what you mean, they
just become confused, and sothat just shows more confusion.
So I think, really becoming aparent, that was probably the
moment that I saw my parents asnot just parents, but as human
(14:50):
beings.
Max Chopovsky (14:51):
Totally, and a lot of the time that doesn't
actually happen until we becomeparents.
And by that point our ownparents are so much older and so
we kind of have less timeduring which we understand them
more as people who are imperfect.
And what I find so interestingis, you know, to your point,
(15:13):
when we're younger we see ourparents as people who are static
, that have everything figuredout, who are, who they are, and
we just kind of live in theirworld.
And when we become parents werealize through our interactions
with our own kids that actuallyour parents didn't have it all
figured out, and maybe withouttelling us they were questioning
(15:34):
their decisions that they madearound us or different you know
sort of, or their paths rightThrough life.
But they never let us know anyof that and so we never knew
that backstory until we sort ofreverse engineered it when we
had kids.
And then, through thoseconversations with our own
parents, we're like, oh my God,why didn't you tell me any of
this stuff?
Kevin Pang (15:54):
Yeah, because we never asked.
Nor will we have a reason toask.
Max Chopovsky (15:57):
Exactly exactly.
Kevin Pang (15:58):
Are your parents still around, max?
Yeah, they're.
So one thing you just said isthat, like how lucky some of us
are to like still have thoseparents around, to like
understand fully.
It's like, ah, now I get it,and to be able to tell them that
I have a lot of friends whohave become parents and their
(16:20):
parents are not around anymore.
It's like they don't get theopportunity to tell them now I
understand and now I empathizewith you.
So I guess that makes us verylucky people.
Max Chopovsky (16:32):
It really does.
It really does Whatever limitedtime we have left with them.
It really does help us create aricher relationship out of it.
What I find so interesting iswhen you talk about how your
dad's mom would take him to themarket.
In this day and age, we can justleave our kids at home in front
(16:53):
of the TV or with a babysitterwhile we run all the errands and
they live the super charmedlife where they get to go to
birthday parties and activitiesand stuff, and then we have to
do all of that stuff, you know,drive them around, but we also
then have to do all the behindthe scenes boring stuff that
makes their lives easy.
But the flip side of that isthey don't get those moments
(17:15):
that your dad, for example,still remembers, the moments
when they're at the store andthey figure out how to tell if
an eggplant is good, right.
And so I always struggle withthat.
Like, how much should we takeour kids with us just to run the
boring errands, even thoughthey absolutely hate it?
Because during those boringerrands A they learn life isn't
(17:35):
all peachy and you have to doboring stuff to do stuff that
you like, right.
But also they get these randommoments with us that maybe in
the moment they don't want to behaving those moments.
They want to be in front of theTV watching you know their show
, but down the road they'regoing to be like oh my gosh.
I cherish those moments so muchand I think that's almost a
missed opportunity.
(17:56):
Like Kevin Hart has a bio, anautobiography that he wrote, and
in the autobiography he talksabout how his mom would drag him
with her to run her errands andthey had to take public
transportation four or fivebuses.
It would take, you know, twohours to get somewhere, right,
and then they would have toschlep all the groceries back to
their house.
And in the moment, while he was, while that was happening to
(18:19):
him, he probably was cursing hislife like, lamenting every
moment that maybe his friendswere out playing, but his mom
couldn't leave him home alonebecause they didn't have a
babysitter, so she dragged themto do all these errands.
Now he looks back on thosemoments and says, wow, that gave
me discipline, that gave mepatience, that gave me
creativity and the ability tonot drive myself crazy while I
(18:41):
was sitting on the bus lookingat the person across from me for
a half an hour.
You know, it almost seems to melike I mean I hate to be like
the nostalgic guy, that kind ofyearns for the days long gone,
but I do feel like we wereforced to have certain
experiences that our kids aren'thaving as much because they
(19:02):
don't have to, because we havethe resources for them to not
have them.
Kevin Pang (19:04):
Well, I think we have to be really conscious
about building in those moments.
Those boring moments that are,you know, in retrospect are
quite, quite instructive.
And you know, I'm sure a lot ofparents, you've heard your
parents say you know, you'llthank me later, you'll thank me
later, and so that's certainly amantra that keeps running
through my head.
Now, you know, one thing that Ithink we can do and I really
(19:27):
try to do, I suppose, and I amfortunate enough to be able to
do is especially post COVID, youknow, post lockdown, there's a
term I think the travel industrycalled revenge travel, because
everyone just like ends up andthey just want to go out again
Totally.
And I realized that I can spend$100 on a Lego set for my kid,
who loves it, for exactly 48hours and then he dismantles it
(19:50):
and then it just becomesintegrate into this part of this
growing pile of, you know, legopieces that will never be built
again.
And there goes my $100, right,totally, versus taking my kid
out to travel.
And we did that last year.
We went to four places, fourdifferent places in 2022 and
we're traveling again this year,and I just realized that the
(20:13):
thing that I want to do morewith my family than anything
else is to travel.
I don't need clothes, I don'tneed a Tesla, I don't need a new
house.
I'm fine with sort of like whatI have.
We live with very simple means.
But the one thing I don't wantto compromise on is travel,
because I want my kid to havethose experiences to go to a
(20:35):
different country and try tospeak someone else's language,
try to order a pan au chocolat.
You know my kid, seven.
He doesn't really speak Frenchbut he knows how to say je
voudrais un pan au chocolat, sivous plaît.
Right, and I haven't been verytouched when he says that.
So I think just building inmoments for our children I think
(20:58):
that is sort of my top parentalresponsibility is make sure
that's.
You know, that they, years fromnow, they can think about it.
Years from now, they can thinkback and say my parents took me
here.
We had these moments.
Not all of it was easy.
It took 14 hours to get here,we missed our connecting flights
, but you know what?
It's all part of it and I thinkthat those moments are really
(21:20):
instructive 100%.
Max Chopovsky (21:22):
I mean, the downside of living where we live
is that we're surrounded bypeople who aren't struggling at
least for the most part,financially right, and the
byproduct of that is having kidswho are entitled if you don't
course correct them right.
And so I was talking tosomebody who were kind of joking
about this, but they were likeyou know, the weather wasn't
(21:44):
good and we were about to gohome and he was like you know
what?
I actually don't mind if itrains, it'll be good for them.
Life isn't all about likesunshine and rainbows.
You have to make them a littlebit uncomfortable.
He was like you know, sometimesI'll make the tub a little bit
colder, right?
He's like, I'm not suggestingyou do this, but I made the joke
that, like you dip them in alittle cold plunge and then you
(22:06):
put them in the tub, right,right, right, right.
My wife did not approve of thatstatement, but it's all about a
showing them that the worlddoesn't revolve around them,
right, absolutely, because theyhave to order a chocolate
croissant in French, right?
And it's allowing them tounderstand adversity while they
(22:28):
are still at home and while youcan pick them up and explain to
them both what happened, how toaddress it and say things like
this happen more often thanyou're used to.
Kevin Pang (22:39):
Yeah, I think making sure that our children have
empathy for other people, that'sreally important, but also they
need to struggle a little bit,correct?
You know, I think one of myfavorite things to say to my
7-year-old is like you figure itout.
You got to figure this outyourself, man, so I think it's
that's not being negligent,that's in fact being really
(23:00):
helpful.
You know, I read a book thatreally changed my life.
Do you ever read the bookAnti-Fragile?
I've heard of that book, yeah,by Nassim Taleb, and I love,
love, love, love, love that book, because the central thesis is
that you should be embracinguncertainty, you should be the
(23:21):
opposite of fragile, which isanti-fragile.
Right?
It's like, think about the waythat you exercise.
Right, you do not row until youintroduce some trauma to your
muscles.
Correct, you got to work outand that's that can be painful
and not comfortable, andcomfortable at many, many times,
but that is also going to goodfor you.
Now you take that and you applythat to whatever emotional
(23:43):
trauma, whatever discomfort andlike we need to be resilient.
And the way to become resilientpeople to not sort of, whether
at the first sight or the firstfeeling of discomfort is you
need to experience someheartache.
You need to experience some,you know, some shit in your life
(24:03):
, right, totally.
So I really like the idea.
Now, how do you do that withoutyou know throwing them straight
into the fire, like in that?
That's the balancing act.
But yeah, that book really,really I think is a good
operating philosophy for us.
Max Chopovsky (24:17):
I'm going to definitely check that out.
I think that for our kids, ifthey don't experience discomfort
, we're doing them a disserviceTotally, totally.
When my kids get mad at mebecause I'm making them do
something that they don't wannado, and they yell at me and I
(24:37):
hold my ground, which is reallyhard for me because I'm
constantly questioning am Ibeing too hard on them?
But I also say to them youmight not like what's happening
right now and you might notunderstand what I'm about to
tell you, but you'll get itlater.
It is my responsibility as yourparent to send into the world
(24:58):
an empathetic, kind, resilienthuman being.
Kevin Pang (25:03):
Yeah totally.
Max Chopovsky (25:04):
The only way to do that is for you to be
uncomfortable sometimes.
Kevin Pang (25:07):
Yes one of my favorite quotes, someone told me
, is like the best things inlife are on the other side of
comfort.
Yeah, which I really love that,and I think that is something
that I really try to abide by atall times.
Max Chopovsky (25:20):
Totally, totally.
Do you recall a moment duringthese last few years when you've
gotten closer with your dadwhere he said something to you
that just kind of was so deepbut he almost said it kind of in
?
He almost it was almost like athrowaway comment but he said it
and you were like, oh my God, Icannot believe.
(25:42):
He just said that to me Likethis is such a big moment.
Kevin Pang (25:45):
I don't remember the specifics, but I remember very
vividly the feeling that I feltwhen he said whatever it was
that he said, and I had saidsomething, and sort of my
standard operating state is torespond with perhaps some humor
or with some sarcasm.
We're always like in a joking,playful manner, right.
(26:08):
And when I said it to him, heresponded back with me with
sarcasm as well too, and Ithought, like number one, this
is a hilarious line coming froma 72 year old Chinese man, right
, like you're able to like thatis like if you're in a writer's
(26:28):
room of a late night talk showand you like responded this line
like I would high five you.
Because it was like really,really hilarious.
And I forgot what that line is,but I just remember him oh, now
you're like responding to me.
It's like this is like we'reengaging in like verbal, like
playful fisticuffs now.
And I thought, how do you knowhumor or sarcasm or irony, right
(26:53):
?
And that was the moment that Ithought, okay, it further
chipped away this notion thatyou're not just this like elder
figure, stoic figure, like youactually have a sense of humor
and you're able to like go toeto toe with me, and I thought,
oh, you're a human being.
Yeah, you're not a robot,you're a human being.
(27:15):
And so I don't remember what itwas he specifically said, but I
remember the response was sounexpected and surprising and
hilarious that it just likeknocked me back.
Max Chopovsky (27:29):
I'm sure it actually makes me think.
Do you ever think that maybeyour parents held back on some
of those parts of theirpersonalities while you were
younger, for whatever reasonsthey might have had, and they
didn't wanna sort of fully showtheir the breadth of their
(27:50):
personality to you until you gotmature enough to experience it?
Kevin Pang (27:53):
I don't think it was any conscious thing.
But you know, like I didn'treally go up to them like after
dinner to be like, hey, let'shave this conversation, like I
would just be off into my world,I'd be playing Nintendo or
doing my homework, right?
So I did not create thoseopportunities for them to be
able to express those sorts ofthings.
You know, I mean, as any kidwould.
(28:13):
It's like you don't reallywanna hang out with your parents
, right?
So I think it wasn't that theywere holding back, it's that I
never allowed the space or theopportunity to express those
things.
And now that you know, one ofthe great things about working
on this cookbook is that I'mtalking to them three, four
times a week.
I'm on the phone with them onZoom calls for hours at a time,
(28:34):
you know, talk to them,interviewing them, and when
forced to do this professionally, is when, personally, like this
stuff is actually coming out.
So it's almost like though mywork, you know, professionally I
am being forced to have arelationship with my parents,
right.
So I mean that's a verypowerful thing.
(28:56):
And you won't believe how manypeople have told me that they
wish they had this opportunitywith their parents.
And I, like you know, I didn'treally think much of it, like I
never saw this as like, oh,here's an opportunity for me to
reconcile any sort of like fraudrelationship, right, I just
thought I get to do a cookbook,that's fun, right.
But when I heard that Irealized like, oh, maybe I am
(29:17):
lucky to be able to have this.
And yeah, who would havethought that this you know 30
year old food media companywould help, you know, repair
whatever fractured relationship,which is kind of amazing.
Max Chopovsky (29:30):
Totally.
You know we were talking aboutthe screenplay that I wrote
before we started recording andI never let my parents read it.
So I wrote it in the spring of2020, and then I revised it and
sort of the working draft wasfrom September of 2020.
And it goes really deep intothe complexity of the
(29:51):
relationship that I have with mydad.
Right, and what's sointeresting is the more I got
into that screenplay, the deeperI got into it, ironically, the
more I started to understandwhere my parents were coming
from.
Because I didn't want to makethe character simple so that
there's an obvious villain andan obvious like an obvious
(30:11):
protagonist, obvious antagonist.
I wanted to make each characterrelatable because in reality,
somebody can relate to him,somebody can relate to me, to my
mom, to my brother, and so itwasn't supposed to be a very
sort of black and whitesituation, which in reality it's
obviously not.
My dad turned 70 a few weeksago and we drove down to see
(30:36):
them with my whole family andafter my wife and the kids went
to bed, I sat with my parents ontheir deck and I had two
printed copies of the screenplayfor them and they read it.
Kevin Pang (30:44):
Oh boy.
Max Chopovsky (30:45):
Yeah, and I had come to expect, based on some
conversations I had with people,that it was gonna get pretty
crazy, because this wasbasically me communicating to
them through the screenplay, thesame way that your dad
communicated to you throughthose YouTube videos.
I was just using a differentmedium.
Right, and At one point my dadis reading my mom's reading, and
(31:08):
I have to kind of like lookover their shoulders to see what
pages they're on, just so I canfollow along, and they're
pretty quiet.
And at one point my dad looksup and just nonchalantly, matter
of factly, says you know, younever had to prove anything to
me.
And then he just keeps readingand I was like, oh, my God, like
(31:28):
that shook me, because that wasthe statement that I had been
looking for for so many years.
Right, there's one part in thescreenplay where he says why
can't you just be proud of me?
Right, to his dad, and Iactually told him keep reading,
keep reading.
Responding with sarcasm, almostthe same way that your dad
responded to you, you know.
(31:49):
But it was such an interestingexperience because to me it was
like, wow, this is what it tookfor me to hear from him,
literally nonchalantly, and whatI had been wanting to hear all
those years, and it also showedme that, actually, maybe it's
true, maybe I never had to proveanything to him, but the way
(32:12):
that he was pushing me wasbecause he thought that I wasn't
living up to my full potential.
Kevin Pang (32:17):
And so, in the same way that this cookbook is
bringing you and your dad closertogether, but through you being
able to see some of hisperspective, maybe him being
able to see some of yourperspective, it was the same
thing with the screenplay Onething I think I realize
throughout working on this andI'm sure you can probably relate
to this, Max is that throughoutthis process I realize my dad
(32:44):
was way smarter and wiser than Igive him credit for, and vice
versa, my dad realized, oh, myson is way smarter and wiser
than I give him credit for.
So, it's like, and it took acookbook.
It took your screenplay.
For others it would take apiece of poetry, a song, a work
(33:04):
of art, a painting, whatever itis right.
But it's amazing how you have astack of 70 pages on printed
paper.
That is the conduit forunderstanding 70 sheets of paper
, or however long yourscreenplay is you know 370 pages
for my cookbook.
That's like this inanimatephysical object that weighs
(33:26):
three pounds has, like, so muchmeaning and like symbolism in
this thing which is like, whenyou look at it, you think this
is amazing that I'm holding thisin my hands.
Max Chopovsky (33:39):
Yeah, you know You're holding a conduit in your
hands.
Kevin Pang (33:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like this is 40 some odd yearsof complexity and strife and
misunderstanding, butencapsulated in this three pound
book which is like oh my God,it's kind of crazy to think
about it Totally.
Max Chopovsky (33:58):
I mean, maybe there's something to the fact
that we see our kids as kids andto us, like you know, I say to
my girls like you're alwaysgoing to be my babies, right,
but at some point they grow upand they mature and at some
point you have to sort of shiftyour understanding of who they
are as people and their maturitylevel, because then you can
start to have some of thosedeeper conversations with them.
(34:20):
But most parents probably wantto be perceived the way that we
perceived our parents when youwere younger, which is
invincible, omnipotent, kind ofunfallible right.
But at some point, if you keepthat up, your relationship will
suffer with your kids.
Like, at some point you have toshow vulnerability because
otherwise they're going to seeyou the way that you and I saw
(34:41):
our dads Right.
At some point there has to bean inflection point.
But they grow up so graduallythat it's hard for us to be like
, hmm, maybe now I can bringthis up, or maybe now I can
bring this up.
Like I always err on the sideof no, I don't want to bring any
of that up, but I feel like onsome level that's, you know,
putting me in the same positionthat I was in with my dad.
Kevin Pang (35:02):
I was going to respond to that with like at
least we have like the foresightto like recognize us and think
about this.
But then, as soon as I saidthat, I realized who's to say?
That my parents also did notsee this and realize this and
just like never got a chance ofdoing that, like, maybe they
were just as conscious aboutthat idea.
And so, like what if I'm justwhat, if this is just history
(35:23):
repeating itself?
Like what, if?
So, again, understanding thatwe need to give them more credit
than what we think that theydeserve?
So, but I think the fact thatwe're like conscious and like
recognize that this is happening, I think it's really important.
But again, who's to say that?
Our parents, we think, well,what do they know?
Maybe they didn't know, we justdon't know it.
Max Chopovsky (35:45):
Maybe they did, and my wife and I talk about
this all the time.
It's like are we doing theright thing, Are we being good
parents?
And are you know, are we givingour kids enough resources and
teaching them enough?
And remember I was talking tosomebody a couple of years ago
and their response to that sortof stuck out in my mind and now
I give it as advice to peoplethat ask me the same question.
The advice is if you're askingthe question, then you're
(36:09):
probably within the margins ofwhat's acceptable, because there
are a lot of parents that don'teven ask the question.
Now, now that you are closerwith your dad and you have so
much more insight into sort ofboth sides of the story, how has
that influenced your parentingwith your little one?
Kevin Pang (36:28):
I think that it makes me like rewind back to my
memories when I was like sevenor eight and how I perceived my
parents, you know, and it mademe realize that feeling that I'm
feeling, whatever it is,however irrational my seven year
old brain was back then isprobably the way that's my son
(36:53):
is probably perceiving me now,and so this is very much like
walking a mile in their shoes,but like sort of in reverse,
like I like it's like I walked amile.
Now I understand how you'rewalking a mile and I think
that's made me much moreconscious about how I should
react in certain situations.
I can sense probably like a fewyears ago I could be like way
(37:16):
more impatient and way moreimpulsive and reactive to these
things, but now it's like thereis a little birdie that just
tells me it's like oh, wait aminute, is this how you wanna
react?
So basically it's just likesomething that just holds you
back before you sort of revertto that monkey brain reaction.
You know that primordialreaction.
(37:37):
So I think it's just more aboutnow in my brain.
Now it gives me like a splitsecond, more to like reflect and
go.
Do you wanna like yell andscream?
And you know in reaction toyour kid spilling a glass of
(37:58):
milk onto the ground right.
So it has added a split secondbuffer in my parental brain.
Max Chopovsky (38:06):
That's a massive win.
Kevin Pang (38:07):
Yeah.
Max Chopovsky (38:08):
It's a massive win.
Kevin Pang (38:10):
It's just a 0.37 seconds is all it takes.
Literally and hopefully and Iunderstand now when you think of
like these old folks with theirsage wisdom.
That's what it is.
It's just having more time toreflect and think and not
needing to say the first thingthat comes out of your mouth.
I tend to start speakingwithout my brain consciously
(38:33):
knowing when I'm actually howI'm gonna finish the sentence,
but I just feel the need, I justneed to start talking, right,
and now I think it's okay topause and like take a second to
ponder and it's like you knowwhat.
It's fine to do that, and likesame thing, parental.
It just gives you like a splitsecond more to pause and reflect
(38:55):
.
Max Chopovsky (38:56):
Totally yeah.
Silence is only uncomfortablefor people that maybe don't
trust their gut as much.
Kevin Pang (39:05):
right Like silence is actually not a bad thing,
it's kind of powerful thing tohave.
It's like, you know, when you'rethe person in a meeting, in a
work meeting, you just likebabble on and on and on.
I don't know if some folks viewthat as like insecurity, I don't
know, but I remember a bosswhere you would ask a question
and she would just sit and waitand think about it for a second
(39:30):
and then respond and I'm like,in those five seconds of silence
I thought, man, that's powerful, like you are the boss for a
reason.
Like that's a really powerfultrait to have.
So I've learned to embracesilence and you know, and I know
that we're here to also to talkabout story, and I think one
way of sort of bringing it backto the idea of story is that
(39:50):
like we don't necessarily needto fill every part of the sort
that we're telling with forwardaction with you know, because I
think the brain also does needsome time to process and reflect
.
And I think building in thosemoments of silence and just let
things sit in the air and ponderfor a second, I think that's a
really, really powerful trait.
Max Chopovsky (40:12):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's what they call in a
theatrical pause, yeah, yeah,so let's talk about storytelling
.
So you've obviously heard andtold some amazing and powerful
stories in your life and you'veused multiple media to tell
those stories.
So what, in your opinion, dogood stories have in common?
Kevin Pang (40:33):
Good stories almost always have something at stake.
This is every single fairy talesince time in memorial.
Like is someone has thisperfectly happy life, something
happens and it just likedisrupts that world.
Something goes missing, someoneloses something, and then they
(40:55):
have to try to restore orderfrom chaos.
Right, so to me, I mean, youknow, gosh, untold volumes have
been written about how to tellstories, but I think at the
heart of it, it's just about youhave stasis, you have
(41:15):
uniformity, and then chaos isintroduced and you try to damnd
us.
You try your damnd us, andheart is to restore that chaos
into harmony again.
And the consequences of notrestoring that chaos it could be
(41:36):
small, it could be big, itcould be existentially important
, but you certainly don't wannalose whatever.
That is so, and then you haveyour reasons for wanting to make
sure that you don't lose it,you know so it's just chaos and
order.
Max Chopovsky (41:53):
I think that's what all storytelling is Totally
and even better if restoringorder comes at some cost to the
protagonist.
Kevin Pang (42:02):
Yeah, yeah.
And I think as youngstorytellers, I think, certainly
when I was in my 20s it's veryeasy to look at like
storytelling as like this verysimple framework as conflict
resolution.
All right, you lose something,you find it, and it's happily
ever after.
Well, I think as you grow older, you realize that happily ever
(42:24):
after doesn't really happen,right.
It's like sometimes you onlyget some of that order back,
yeah, and then you've become achanged person at the end of it.
And I think that's probably thebigger thing is that, like, you
were this person before andthen you become this person
afterward.
And what is that shift?
(42:44):
What's that emotional shift,right?
What's the spiritual shift?
And it's not as binary as likeconflict and resolution, that's.
You know, it's way morecomplicated than that.
But basically, I think allstories go from one place, go
somewhere else, and then it'sunderstanding the effects of
(43:07):
what that change does thatperson.
That to me, I think, is veryinstructive in understanding how
humans work.
And I think, at the end of theday, we just want to better
understand what this complexmass of flesh called humanity
like, what it works and how dowe become better at it.
Totally.
Max Chopovsky (43:25):
Totally Now.
Does every story have to have amoral?
Kevin Pang (43:30):
I don't think so.
I think people try to jammorality down people's throats
in a very explicit way thatfeels oftentimes quite forced.
And I think that when you saymoral, it's an either or thing.
(43:51):
There are different shades ofit, there are different
spectrums of it and there aredifferent degrees of it.
And I think, rather thanlooking at it as like should
every story have a moral, I amlooking at it as should you
force morality into every story.
I look at it that way and Ithink the answer is no, when I'm
(44:14):
also thinking about moral andI'm glad the title of your show
has that word in it right, it'sabout understanding, like I said
, how we live, how do we becomebetter humans, what we can learn
from other people's mistakes.
And I think, while notnecessary to have it, I think it
(44:39):
does make the story worthwhile.
It actually makes it worthlistening to.
Otherwise, why did you justspend 30 minutes listening to it
, watching this, reading this,if it was all sort of
meaningless?
So I think it's good to have it.
Is it necessarily to alwayshave it?
Probably not.
(45:01):
Should you be forcing it downpeople's throats?
Definitely not.
You know, I think there's anarts in letting that unfurl and
letting the reader, the viewer,the listener come to that
conclusion themselves.
And I think that's probablyeven the more powerful thing is
when they had that aha moment.
(45:21):
You know, I love it whencomedians I just stand up, act
right, they will tell a joke,but they don't give the
punchline, because the punchlineis filled in the heads of the
listener.
And then you can slowly hearmurmurs of laughter from the
audience, like building.
You're like ah, I get it, I seewhat they're saying, right,
yeah, they're like why don't youdo this with morality in a
(45:43):
story and a tale?
It's that you don't force uponthem, but they discover it
themselves.
All we're doing as storytelleris we're unearthing this thing
for you to then discover that,if you can do that, that is
magic, that is arts, right there.
Max Chopovsky (45:59):
Totally, you're giving more credit to your
audience, exactly, yeah, yeah,yeah.
So last couple of questionshere.
You mentioned anti-fragile as abook that you love.
Tell me about maybe one or twoother books that you love that
really nail the art ofstorytelling.
Kevin Pang (46:17):
I never read a lot of John Steinbeck when I was
young and I started reading himvoraciously as an adult.
And I think my favoriteSteinbeck is not the one that
everyone's going to say which isnot Grapes of Wrath, which is
not to say that's not abrilliant book.
But I love East of Eden.
But I think that's a book thatI read later in my adult life
(46:41):
and it's a story about twofamilies and how they live, and
it's not necessarily conflictresolution in the traditional
sense, but just seeing how theylive and how they react and the
dynamics with each other.
That, to me, is a book thatstays with me, has stayed with
me long afterward.
(47:01):
And one thing I'm reading nowthat I'm really enjoying is you
know, steinbeck would keep ajournal that he would start the
day before he would got to workin, like writing the actual
novel.
He would start the day bywriting a letter to his editor
and he would write abouteverything from these are the
(47:22):
troubles I'm having.
He would write about like hislove life too, which is kind of
like wow, I can't believe you'retelling people that Just about
anything at all.
Just, you know about likeliving in New York and like the
troubles that he's having.
And he did this as a way oflike, it's a warm up exercise
for the actual act of like,writing the novel.
And I'm quite enjoying readingthe East of Eden's letters that
(47:44):
he wrote because it's really funto read it in parallel with
reading that novel as well.
He also did this with theGrapes of Wrath as well too.
That's, I find, in addition tothat book, reading the letters
of EB White's, of John Steinbeck, of Ernest Hemingway, right,
like it's almost like theequivalent of reading the
(48:05):
people's emails today, right,but back then, like there was so
much gold to be mine from thosecorrespondences and you sort of
learn a lot about the problemsthat they endure, the roadblocks
that they face, and I think youcan learn a lot about writing
from reading those.
So, anyway, I would say numberone, east of Eden, john
(48:29):
Steinbeck, but then also theEast of Eden letters that he
wrote to his editor.
Those two things I'm just likethey're really, really profound
to me.
Max Chopovsky (48:39):
Oh, I love that and it makes you appreciate the
book more, the reading theletters.
Kevin Pang (48:43):
Yes, oh, and I can't wait to read East of Eden again
.
It's almost like watching theSimpsons, like when you're 13
and you watch it.
It's one thing, and then youwatch it again in your 30s.
You think this is brilliant,because this is a show that is
different for when you're 13 andwhen you're 33.
And it's like, wow, this isreally, really so like I really
(49:06):
can't wait to like dive intolike old episodes of, like like
all these jokes and adultreferences that you don't get,
that they wrote just for theadult version of the viewer.
And I feel like the same way ifI'm reading Steinbeck again.
So I can't wait to dive in, butI'll do that after this book
tour, maybe when I have sometime to read again.
Max Chopovsky (49:24):
Yes, you are quite the busy man, which we'll
talk about in a sec.
But the last question I havefor you is if you had a few
minutes with 20 year old KevinPeng, that young, brash,
recalcitrant, stubborn,intelligent, ambitious young man
, if you had a couple of minuteswith him, what would you say to
(49:47):
him?
Kevin Pang (49:49):
I heard this in a show I forgot where a few weeks
ago, and it wasn't aboutpersonal advice, it was about,
like, how to have a long-termrelationship.
And this person said the threemost important words with a
spouse is not I love you, butlet it go.
(50:11):
And I thought, wow, that istrue, let it go.
Of course, it also makes methink of the Frozen song, which
I, you know that sort of likereally annoys me because I can't
help but to hear that now.
But I think if you just let goa lot of the anger and all the
anxiety and just like, what doesit really mean at the end?
(50:33):
Probably not, not a lot.
So just like, let it go, let itgo, you know, let it go.
Adena Menzel said it best.
So let it go.
I think it's a really good lifephilosophy.
Max Chopovsky (50:45):
Let it go.
If you just zoom out enough,you'll realize that so many
things that we think matter nowactually don't.
Kevin Pang (50:51):
Totally.
Yeah, I'll tell you one morething too.
I think I heard it might havebeen Tim Ferriss or someone else
said it, but he said like let'ssay you're driving down the
road and you get this like flattire right and you can be really
, really upset and angry at thatmoment.
And he said at that moment youneed to think about in six
(51:13):
months six months from whateveris happening right now, will you
still be angry about it, theway that you're feeling now?
And the answer is almostemphatically no.
So don't like, why add anxietynow when, in six months, like
(51:34):
who cares?
Totally, I really like thatframework.
It's like saying like askyourself, will the person in six
months still be angry aboutthis current situation you're
feeling it's okay to feelemotionally upset or annoyed,
right, but it's like you don'treally need to let it fester and
, at the end of the day, youshould just let it go.
Max Chopovsky (51:54):
Totally.
I love that Great advice.
Well, that does it, kevin Pang.
Author, talk show host.
So many other wonderful thingsand I will say again, foodie of
the highest caliber.
Thank you for being on the show.
Thanks, max, what a pleasure.
So Kevin has a book coming outwith his father, jeffrey 370
(52:20):
pages of gold Cantonese cuisinecookbook, entitled a very
Chinese cookbook.
It is out on October 24th.
Make sure you get that, kevin.
Thanks for being on the showman.
Thanks so much For show notesand more.
Head over to maspodorg.
Find us on Apple Podcasts,spotify, wherever you get your
podcast on.
(52:40):
This was more love the story.
I'm Max Drepowski.
Thank you for listening.
Talk to you next time.
This is Moral of the Story interesting people
telling their favorite shortstories and then breaking them
down to understand what makesthem so good.
I'm your host, max Chepofsky.
Today's guest is Kevin Pang.
Author, journalist, magician,little league baseball umpire
producer, theater, musicdirector, award-winning
filmmaker, cooking show host and, of course, foodie of the
(00:24):
highest caliber, with a JamesBeard Award to prove it.
An eclectic mix of adventures,yes, but it's not all that
surprising when you unroll thescroll.
That is Kevin's life.
In fact, the trajectory startsto make a whole lot more sense
when you dig deeper.
Born in Hong Kong, kevinimmigrated with his parents to
the US at age six.
To call his relationship withhis dad strained would be an
(00:47):
understatement.
Kevin embraced Western culture,while his parents were firmly
rooted in the Eastern way oflife, with no interest in
assimilating.
This dual cultural experience,to put it mildly, gave rise to
dual identities.
Kevin was, in his own words,american during the day and
Chinese after school.
The arguing and fights with hisdad were constant, ranging from
(01:09):
smoldering embers tofull-fledged conflagrations.
The Eastern cultures put a highemphasis on respect for elders,
but Kevin was recalcitrant,insistent on doing things his
own way, from refusing to speakCantonese to bleaching his hair
blonde, an act that elicitedfury from his dad, who accused
him of being ashamed of hisChinese heritage.
(01:30):
Kevin was raised in Toronto andSeattle, working at the Pikes
Place Fish Market.
In high school, after moving tothe Windy City, he worked as a
metro reporter at the ChicagoTribune.
Meanwhile, the relationshipwith his dad, now 2,000 miles
away, was barely a glow, keptalive through a weekly phone
call filled with the mostsuperficial of pleasantries and
small talk.
Something changed when Kevinwas offered a position on the
(01:52):
paper's food writing staff.
He had zero experience, exceptfor one highly qualifying line
item.
He was Cantonese, steeped inthe region's food-centric
philosophy, in a deep, thoughperhaps dormant, love of cooking
, and this would be the key tounlock not just his future
career but transform hisrelationship with his dad.
Jeffrey Peng had an obsessionwith food that was at once
(02:15):
borderline, manic and completelyculturally acceptable, and
after Kevin became a food writer, he and his father, for the
first time ever, shared a mutualinterest.
The weekly phone calls evolvedfrom weather forecasts to deep
and analogy drenched tutorialson the way a Shumai's rapper
should caress its filling or theproper way to brace pork belly.
Five-minute calls regularlystretched to 30 minutes or more
(02:40):
After his father started makingcooking videos on YouTube, kevin
was shocked to learn that notonly did his parents have a
loyal audience their viewermetrics were impressive but the
koo-the-grass to their fraughtrelationship came when Kevin
learned why his father startedto make the videos.
It was for Kevin For, when hisparents were no longer around,
to prepare the dishes for him,and so, as the family recipes
(03:01):
migrated from the carefullymaintained spiral notebook to
the world of online content, sodid Kevin's relationship with
his dad level up.
Meanwhile, kevin continuedchanneling his energy into his
culinary pursuits co-directingthe critically acclaimed film
For Grace, which followsbrilliant but tormented chef
Curtis Duffy, in the monthsleading up to the opening of his
first restaurant, grace, whichwould go on to earn three
(03:22):
Michelin stars.
Creating and running theonion's food spin-off, the
Takeout.
And joining America's TestKitchen as editorial director
and co-host of the Hunger PangsCooking Show, a duty he gladly
shares with his dad.
And almost as a bow on theirconverging character arcs, kevin
and his dad are releasing acookbook of Cantonese cuisine
entitled A Very Chinese Cookbook, out on October 24th of this
(03:46):
year.
Writing a book is hard, andalthough it's bound to do well,
considering the following of itsauthors, my sense is that if
you ask Kevin what he reallythinks, he'd tell you that just
being back in the kitchen withhis dad made the whole thing
worth it.
Kevin, welcome to the show.
Kevin Pang (04:00):
Wow, max, that felt like being on an episode of this
Is your Life or my Funeral oneof the two, but it's so great to
be here.
Max Chopovsky (04:09):
Max, thanks for having me, of course.
Of course, thanks for beinghere.
So you are here to tell us astory.
Is there anything we shouldknow before we get started?
Kevin Pang (04:19):
if you want to set the stage, yeah, you know, I
think you set it up quite wellwith a lot of context, but I
want to tell the story of afterI had become a food writer.
There was one moment thatreally precipitated everything
that happened over the following12 years.
Max Chopovsky (04:36):
I love it All right.
Well, let's get into it.
Tell me a story.
Kevin Pang (04:40):
So, max, you know that I become a food writer, and
that was one way that gave areason for my dad and I to speak
together.
We would, rather than havingthese really nothing phone calls
at all I mean, it was the mostcordial of calls we would call
each other.
We would say, hey, how are youdoing?
What did you eat?
Did you go to Costco?
(05:01):
You know like, are you hangingout with mom?
That sort of thing, right.
And the thing is that we didfight, but most of the time it
wasn't fighting, it was having acordial conversation about
nothing at all.
So I'm sure you can relate.
It's just when you feelobligated to talk to someone
(05:22):
that you care about, but thenyou really have nothing to say,
and so you resort to the samethree or four things that you
talk about every single week,and so our relationship was just
in a holding pattern.
That's what it was.
So, even after I became a foodwriter, we still had these sorts
of things.
We were talking about how toroast pork belly, but then,
(05:43):
beyond food, it was just likeyou know, hey, how's it going?
That sort of thing.
So one day in 2012, you hadmentioned, I received this email
from my dad this forwardedemail that says Jeffrey Pang
wants you to check out thisYouTube video.
Now, when you are back in your20s and you receive an email
(06:06):
from your parents that sayscheck out this YouTube video,
what do you do?
You delete it.
Because you don't look at theseforwarded emails.
You think, well, it's probablysome crazy conspiracy theory or
something political.
I'm not going to read this, Imight have time for this, right.
And then a few weeks later, mymother contacted me and said hey
(06:27):
, kevin, have you seen thisvideo that your dad sent?
I'm like no.
And she said you should look atit.
So I clicked on it and thefirst thing I saw was it was
called creative production andthe EAT in the middle of
creative was highlighted.
It says eats right?
I'm like all right, that's kindof cheese ball.
(06:48):
And it had royalty free music.
You know something you didn'tpay for, right?
Just something you just gotfrom the internet for free.
And then I saw a photo of my momand her mom, my grandmother,
and I thought what the hell isthis?
And then I saw my mom's hands.
(07:09):
I noticed her wedding band,which is recognizable, and she
was massaging dough and she wasrolling out the dough and there
were scallions on it and Ithought wait a minute, this is
my mom making scallion pancakes,which is something I grew up
eating, something my grandmotherwould make and something that I
(07:30):
loved to eat when I was a kid.
Take care, they were makingtheir own YouTube cooking show
and my parents are tech phobicpeople.
These videos were lo-fi andwhen I saw this I thought what
the hell is this?
I was completely shocked and thebiggest shock was that they
(07:51):
kept doing these videos.
They were like 20 videos, youknow, in the ensuing months, in
the weeks and months, right, andsome of them had more than half
a million views and in total,it was more than like two
million views combined.
Now, this was back in 2012,2013,.
Back when getting two millionviews was pretty hard.
I mean, like now today you canbump in church and you can get
(08:17):
like 10 million views on TikTok,right, it's pretty easy to like
sort, but back then it was kindof hard to like get that and my
parents were doing that and Iwas in digital media and I'm
like, okay, I'm helping producevideo content on my work and
they're getting more views thanI was.
Like what was going on so manymonths later, as you alluded to,
when I asked them like, why didyou make?
(08:39):
Like?
Why are you making these videos?
Like, are you trying to getlikes?
Or, you know, are you trying tomake money?
And you know they're makinglike 60 bucks a month and you
know, my dad's able to take mymom out to a nice restaurant,
which was cool.
They said that, well, you andyour sister are not exactly the
most communicative of people,right, and you know, we
understand we don't really speakthe same language, right, and
(09:02):
so, like, there's a lot ofthings that get lost in
translation.
And they said that we wanted tospeak to you in a medium that
you would understand, and youguys live in the digital medium,
you live in YouTube land, sothe only way that we can talk to
you guys, you and your sister,is through YouTube.
And one day when and this is myparents speaking when we're no
(09:27):
longer around, and you growolder and you realize, well,
maybe they, you know, hey, yourparents weren't all too bad,
they did do something right.
And one day when you thinkabout some of the food that you
grew up eating and you arethinking about that dish and how
you just want to recreate itand we're no longer around,
we'll have these instructionsfor you.
(09:48):
So it's almost like they'remaking a time capsule for you to
discover later in life.
Except, more than two millionother views have been.
People have seen these videosas well too.
So I think from that point on,the relationship got gaping.
Which is not to say that we'restill not arguing from time to
(10:09):
time, but we now have deeperconversations than just hey, how
you doing?
Did you go to Costco?
What did you eat last night?
Right, we actually havesubstantive conversations now,
and who knew that food was gonnabe our lingua franca, that this
was gonna be the way that wewould talk to each other?
In Cantonese there's a saying.
(10:31):
We don't really say hey, howyou doing?
Hi, we say, have you eaten yet?
That's the phrase you greetother people with.
I'm sure other communities havesomething similar, but food is
so integral to us that we willavoid conversations about
relationships, aboutgeopolitical strife, but we will
use food as a way to broachthose subjects.
(10:52):
So who knew that a simple email12 years ago would lead to all
these things?
Lead to a cooking series thatI'm doing with my dad and a
cookbook, but, most of allimproving parental relationships
.
Max Chopovsky (11:09):
Well, it went through your mind when you
realized that they went throughsuch incredible effort just to
communicate with you and yoursister.
Kevin Pang (11:18):
I think it wasn't until years later when I became
a parent myself.
I've got a seven-year-old now,right, and I'm sure many parents
go through this.
They will soon realize that, oh, this is why your parents did
that thing.
They tried their best.
They're by no means perfectparents I don't know any parents
(11:42):
who are and it wasn't until mydad was telling me a story about
how, when he was five, hismother, my grandma, and they
were growing up in Hong Kong.
They were poor.
She would take him to themarket.
There were no TVs, radios youknow their household back then.
They had nothing to do, right.
There was no internet, notablet, so we had no babysitters
(12:07):
.
They had no babysitters, right.
So my grandma would take my dadout to the market to go shopping
, and they didn't have arefrigerator back then too.
So they had to buy these thingsfresh every day.
Right, it's not like today.
You go to Costco, I keepplugging Costco.
Costco should give me someresidual here, you know.
But they're not going to asupermarket once a week, they're
(12:28):
going every single day,sometimes twice a day, to buy
fresh produce, meats, fish andthings like that.
And so when my grandmotherwould take my dad there, she
would teach him about what tolook for in an eggplant.
It should be the specific color, it should be firm.
You should be able to hold it.
You have some bounce to it.
You should be able to you know,use tactile also your senses,
(12:53):
you know your visual senses tobe able to, like, tell whether
something's fresh or not, right.
And then afterward, if he wasbeing a good boy, my grandma
would buy my dad a bowl of, likenoodle soup as, like, a reward,
and the same way that I wouldbuy a big Mac for my kid, right
to be hungry.
And then I never envisioned mydad as the same age as my child.
(13:19):
And it's like you always lookat your parent as parents, that
is like you always see them asolder than you, right, you
always see them at a certain ageor older, right, but you would
never imagine them as afive-year-old.
And I had a kid who, back then,was five, right, and so it was
for the first time I thought youknow this person, you know my
father, who I have all thisarguments and strife with, right
(13:43):
, he was at one point, thisinnocent kid who was perhaps
curious and scared of the worldand had hopes and fears and
dreams, just like my child does.
Now, right, and that was themoment that I thought, oh, this
guy's a human too.
He's not like some automatonwho's trying to annoy you or
(14:06):
like, ruin your life or justmake your life hard.
So it wasn't years later, untilI became parent, that I
realized oh well, now I see whatthey're trying to do, and it is
both quite humbling and youthink well, you know, I wasn't
the easiest kid to be raised.
As well, too, I was, as you said, recalcitrant.
(14:27):
I was being annoying, I wasbeing ironic.
They have no idea what ironywas right, they don't know what
sarcasm is, and so when youdon't understand sarcasm and you
say things that are theopposite of what you mean, they
just become confused, and sothat just shows more confusion.
So I think, really becoming aparent, that was probably the
moment that I saw my parents asnot just parents, but as human
(14:50):
beings.
Max Chopovsky (14:51):
Totally, and a lot of the time that doesn't
actually happen until we becomeparents.
And by that point our ownparents are so much older and so
we kind of have less timeduring which we understand them
more as people who are imperfect.
And what I find so interestingis, you know, to your point,
(15:13):
when we're younger we see ourparents as people who are static
, that have everything figuredout, who are, who they are, and
we just kind of live in theirworld.
And when we become parents werealize through our interactions
with our own kids that actuallyour parents didn't have it all
figured out, and maybe withouttelling us they were questioning
(15:34):
their decisions that they madearound us or different you know
sort of, or their paths rightThrough life.
But they never let us know anyof that and so we never knew
that backstory until we sort ofreverse engineered it when we
had kids.
And then, through thoseconversations with our own
parents, we're like, oh my God,why didn't you tell me any of
this stuff?
Kevin Pang (15:54):
Yeah, because we never asked.
Nor will we have a reason toask.
Max Chopovsky (15:57):
Exactly exactly.
Kevin Pang (15:58):
Are your parents still around, max?
Yeah, they're.
So one thing you just said isthat, like how lucky some of us
are to like still have thoseparents around, to like
understand fully.
It's like, ah, now I get it,and to be able to tell them that
I have a lot of friends whohave become parents and their
(16:20):
parents are not around anymore.
It's like they don't get theopportunity to tell them now I
understand and now I empathizewith you.
So I guess that makes us verylucky people.
Max Chopovsky (16:32):
It really does.
It really does Whatever limitedtime we have left with them.
It really does help us create aricher relationship out of it.
What I find so interesting iswhen you talk about how your
dad's mom would take him to themarket.
In this day and age, we can justleave our kids at home in front
(16:53):
of the TV or with a babysitterwhile we run all the errands and
they live the super charmedlife where they get to go to
birthday parties and activitiesand stuff, and then we have to
do all of that stuff, you know,drive them around, but we also
then have to do all the behindthe scenes boring stuff that
makes their lives easy.
But the flip side of that isthey don't get those moments
(17:15):
that your dad, for example,still remembers, the moments
when they're at the store andthey figure out how to tell if
an eggplant is good, right.
And so I always struggle withthat.
Like, how much should we takeour kids with us just to run the
boring errands, even thoughthey absolutely hate it?
Because during those boringerrands A they learn life isn't
(17:35):
all peachy and you have to doboring stuff to do stuff that
you like, right.
But also they get these randommoments with us that maybe in
the moment they don't want to behaving those moments.
They want to be in front of theTV watching you know their show
, but down the road they'regoing to be like oh my gosh.
I cherish those moments so muchand I think that's almost a
missed opportunity.
(17:56):
Like Kevin Hart has a bio, anautobiography that he wrote, and
in the autobiography he talksabout how his mom would drag him
with her to run her errands andthey had to take public
transportation four or fivebuses.
It would take, you know, twohours to get somewhere, right,
and then they would have toschlep all the groceries back to
their house.
And in the moment, while he was, while that was happening to
(18:19):
him, he probably was cursing hislife like, lamenting every
moment that maybe his friendswere out playing, but his mom
couldn't leave him home alonebecause they didn't have a
babysitter, so she dragged themto do all these errands.
Now he looks back on thosemoments and says, wow, that gave
me discipline, that gave mepatience, that gave me
creativity and the ability tonot drive myself crazy while I
(18:41):
was sitting on the bus lookingat the person across from me for
a half an hour.
You know, it almost seems to melike I mean I hate to be like
the nostalgic guy, that kind ofyearns for the days long gone,
but I do feel like we wereforced to have certain
experiences that our kids aren'thaving as much because they
(19:02):
don't have to, because we havethe resources for them to not
have them.
Kevin Pang (19:04):
Well, I think we have to be really conscious
about building in those moments.
Those boring moments that are,you know, in retrospect are
quite, quite instructive.
And you know, I'm sure a lot ofparents, you've heard your
parents say you know, you'llthank me later, you'll thank me
later, and so that's certainly amantra that keeps running
through my head.
Now, you know, one thing that Ithink we can do and I really
(19:27):
try to do, I suppose, and I amfortunate enough to be able to
do is especially post COVID, youknow, post lockdown, there's a
term I think the travel industrycalled revenge travel, because
everyone just like ends up andthey just want to go out again
Totally.
And I realized that I can spend$100 on a Lego set for my kid,
who loves it, for exactly 48hours and then he dismantles it
(19:50):
and then it just becomesintegrate into this part of this
growing pile of, you know, legopieces that will never be built
again.
And there goes my $100, right,totally, versus taking my kid
out to travel.
And we did that last year.
We went to four places, fourdifferent places in 2022 and
we're traveling again this year,and I just realized that the
(20:13):
thing that I want to do morewith my family than anything
else is to travel.
I don't need clothes, I don'tneed a Tesla, I don't need a new
house.
I'm fine with sort of like whatI have.
We live with very simple means.
But the one thing I don't wantto compromise on is travel,
because I want my kid to havethose experiences to go to a
(20:35):
different country and try tospeak someone else's language,
try to order a pan au chocolat.
You know my kid, seven.
He doesn't really speak Frenchbut he knows how to say je
voudrais un pan au chocolat, sivous plaît.
Right, and I haven't been verytouched when he says that.
So I think just building inmoments for our children I think
(20:58):
that is sort of my top parentalresponsibility is make sure
that's.
You know, that they, years fromnow, they can think about it.
Years from now, they can thinkback and say my parents took me
here.
We had these moments.
Not all of it was easy.
It took 14 hours to get here,we missed our connecting flights
, but you know what?
It's all part of it and I thinkthat those moments are really
(21:20):
instructive 100%.
Max Chopovsky (21:22):
I mean, the downside of living where we live
is that we're surrounded bypeople who aren't struggling at
least for the most part,financially right, and the
byproduct of that is having kidswho are entitled if you don't
course correct them right.
And so I was talking tosomebody who were kind of joking
about this, but they were likeyou know, the weather wasn't
(21:44):
good and we were about to gohome and he was like you know
what?
I actually don't mind if itrains, it'll be good for them.
Life isn't all about likesunshine and rainbows.
You have to make them a littlebit uncomfortable.
He was like you know, sometimesI'll make the tub a little bit
colder, right?
He's like, I'm not suggestingyou do this, but I made the joke
that, like you dip them in alittle cold plunge and then you
(22:06):
put them in the tub, right,right, right, right.
My wife did not approve of thatstatement, but it's all about a
showing them that the worlddoesn't revolve around them,
right, absolutely, because theyhave to order a chocolate
croissant in French, right?
And it's allowing them tounderstand adversity while they
(22:28):
are still at home and while youcan pick them up and explain to
them both what happened, how toaddress it and say things like
this happen more often thanyou're used to.
Kevin Pang (22:39):
Yeah, I think making sure that our children have
empathy for other people, that'sreally important, but also they
need to struggle a little bit,correct?
You know, I think one of myfavorite things to say to my
7-year-old is like you figure itout.
You got to figure this outyourself, man, so I think it's
that's not being negligent,that's in fact being really
(23:00):
helpful.
You know, I read a book thatreally changed my life.
Do you ever read the bookAnti-Fragile?
I've heard of that book, yeah,by Nassim Taleb, and I love,
love, love, love, love that book, because the central thesis is
that you should be embracinguncertainty, you should be the
(23:21):
opposite of fragile, which isanti-fragile.
Right?
It's like, think about the waythat you exercise.
Right, you do not row until youintroduce some trauma to your
muscles.
Correct, you got to work outand that's that can be painful
and not comfortable, andcomfortable at many, many times,
but that is also going to goodfor you.
Now you take that and you applythat to whatever emotional
(23:43):
trauma, whatever discomfort andlike we need to be resilient.
And the way to become resilientpeople to not sort of, whether
at the first sight or the firstfeeling of discomfort is you
need to experience someheartache.
You need to experience some,you know, some shit in your life
(24:03):
, right, totally.
So I really like the idea.
Now, how do you do that withoutyou know throwing them straight
into the fire, like in that?
That's the balancing act.
But yeah, that book really,really I think is a good
operating philosophy for us.
Max Chopovsky (24:17):
I'm going to definitely check that out.
I think that for our kids, ifthey don't experience discomfort
, we're doing them a disserviceTotally, totally.
When my kids get mad at mebecause I'm making them do
something that they don't wannado, and they yell at me and I
(24:37):
hold my ground, which is reallyhard for me because I'm
constantly questioning am Ibeing too hard on them?
But I also say to them youmight not like what's happening
right now and you might notunderstand what I'm about to
tell you, but you'll get itlater.
It is my responsibility as yourparent to send into the world
(24:58):
an empathetic, kind, resilienthuman being.
Kevin Pang (25:03):
Yeah totally.
Max Chopovsky (25:04):
The only way to do that is for you to be
uncomfortable sometimes.
Kevin Pang (25:07):
Yes one of my favorite quotes, someone told me
, is like the best things inlife are on the other side of
comfort.
Yeah, which I really love that,and I think that is something
that I really try to abide by atall times.
Max Chopovsky (25:20):
Totally, totally.
Do you recall a moment duringthese last few years when you've
gotten closer with your dadwhere he said something to you
that just kind of was so deepbut he almost said it kind of in
?
He almost it was almost like athrowaway comment but he said it
and you were like, oh my God, Icannot believe.
(25:42):
He just said that to me Likethis is such a big moment.
Kevin Pang (25:45):
I don't remember the specifics, but I remember very
vividly the feeling that I feltwhen he said whatever it was
that he said, and I had saidsomething, and sort of my
standard operating state is torespond with perhaps some humor
or with some sarcasm.
We're always like in a joking,playful manner, right.
(26:08):
And when I said it to him, heresponded back with me with
sarcasm as well too, and Ithought, like number one, this
is a hilarious line coming froma 72 year old Chinese man, right
, like you're able to like thatis like if you're in a writer's
(26:28):
room of a late night talk showand you like responded this line
like I would high five you.
Because it was like really,really hilarious.
And I forgot what that line is,but I just remember him oh, now
you're like responding to me.
It's like this is like we'reengaging in like verbal, like
playful fisticuffs now.
And I thought, how do you knowhumor or sarcasm or irony, right
(26:53):
?
And that was the moment that Ithought, okay, it further
chipped away this notion thatyou're not just this like elder
figure, stoic figure, like youactually have a sense of humor
and you're able to like go toeto toe with me, and I thought,
oh, you're a human being.
Yeah, you're not a robot,you're a human being.
(27:15):
And so I don't remember what itwas he specifically said, but I
remember the response was sounexpected and surprising and
hilarious that it just likeknocked me back.
Max Chopovsky (27:29):
I'm sure it actually makes me think.
Do you ever think that maybeyour parents held back on some
of those parts of theirpersonalities while you were
younger, for whatever reasonsthey might have had, and they
didn't wanna sort of fully showtheir the breadth of their
(27:50):
personality to you until you gotmature enough to experience it?
Kevin Pang (27:53):
I don't think it was any conscious thing.
But you know, like I didn'treally go up to them like after
dinner to be like, hey, let'shave this conversation, like I
would just be off into my world,I'd be playing Nintendo or
doing my homework, right?
So I did not create thoseopportunities for them to be
able to express those sorts ofthings.
You know, I mean, as any kidwould.
(28:13):
It's like you don't reallywanna hang out with your parents
, right?
So I think it wasn't that theywere holding back, it's that I
never allowed the space or theopportunity to express those
things.
And now that you know, one ofthe great things about working
on this cookbook is that I'mtalking to them three, four
times a week.
I'm on the phone with them onZoom calls for hours at a time,
(28:34):
you know, talk to them,interviewing them, and when
forced to do this professionally, is when, personally, like this
stuff is actually coming out.
So it's almost like though mywork, you know, professionally I
am being forced to have arelationship with my parents,
right.
So I mean that's a verypowerful thing.
(28:56):
And you won't believe how manypeople have told me that they
wish they had this opportunitywith their parents.
And I, like you know, I didn'treally think much of it, like I
never saw this as like, oh,here's an opportunity for me to
reconcile any sort of like fraudrelationship, right, I just
thought I get to do a cookbook,that's fun, right.
But when I heard that Irealized like, oh, maybe I am
(29:17):
lucky to be able to have this.
And yeah, who would havethought that this you know 30
year old food media companywould help, you know, repair
whatever fractured relationship,which is kind of amazing.
Max Chopovsky (29:30):
Totally.
You know we were talking aboutthe screenplay that I wrote
before we started recording andI never let my parents read it.
So I wrote it in the spring of2020, and then I revised it and
sort of the working draft wasfrom September of 2020.
And it goes really deep intothe complexity of the
(29:51):
relationship that I have with mydad.
Right, and what's sointeresting is the more I got
into that screenplay, the deeperI got into it, ironically, the
more I started to understandwhere my parents were coming
from.
Because I didn't want to makethe character simple so that
there's an obvious villain andan obvious like an obvious
(30:11):
protagonist, obvious antagonist.
I wanted to make each characterrelatable because in reality,
somebody can relate to him,somebody can relate to me, to my
mom, to my brother, and so itwasn't supposed to be a very
sort of black and whitesituation, which in reality it's
obviously not.
My dad turned 70 a few weeksago and we drove down to see
(30:36):
them with my whole family andafter my wife and the kids went
to bed, I sat with my parents ontheir deck and I had two
printed copies of the screenplayfor them and they read it.
Kevin Pang (30:44):
Oh boy.
Max Chopovsky (30:45):
Yeah, and I had come to expect, based on some
conversations I had with people,that it was gonna get pretty
crazy, because this wasbasically me communicating to
them through the screenplay, thesame way that your dad
communicated to you throughthose YouTube videos.
I was just using a differentmedium.
Right, and At one point my dadis reading my mom's reading, and
(31:08):
I have to kind of like lookover their shoulders to see what
pages they're on, just so I canfollow along, and they're
pretty quiet.
And at one point my dad looksup and just nonchalantly, matter
of factly, says you know, younever had to prove anything to
me.
And then he just keeps readingand I was like, oh, my God, like
(31:28):
that shook me, because that wasthe statement that I had been
looking for for so many years.
Right, there's one part in thescreenplay where he says why
can't you just be proud of me?
Right, to his dad, and Iactually told him keep reading,
keep reading.
Responding with sarcasm, almostthe same way that your dad
responded to you, you know.
(31:49):
But it was such an interestingexperience because to me it was
like, wow, this is what it tookfor me to hear from him,
literally nonchalantly, and whatI had been wanting to hear all
those years, and it also showedme that, actually, maybe it's
true, maybe I never had to proveanything to him, but the way
(32:12):
that he was pushing me wasbecause he thought that I wasn't
living up to my full potential.
Kevin Pang (32:17):
And so, in the same way that this cookbook is
bringing you and your dad closertogether, but through you being
able to see some of hisperspective, maybe him being
able to see some of yourperspective, it was the same
thing with the screenplay Onething I think I realize
throughout working on this andI'm sure you can probably relate
to this, Max is that throughoutthis process I realize my dad
(32:44):
was way smarter and wiser than Igive him credit for, and vice
versa, my dad realized, oh, myson is way smarter and wiser
than I give him credit for.
So, it's like, and it took acookbook.
It took your screenplay.
For others it would take apiece of poetry, a song, a work
(33:04):
of art, a painting, whatever itis right.
But it's amazing how you have astack of 70 pages on printed
paper.
That is the conduit forunderstanding 70 sheets of paper
, or however long yourscreenplay is you know 370 pages
for my cookbook.
That's like this inanimatephysical object that weighs
(33:26):
three pounds has, like, so muchmeaning and like symbolism in
this thing which is like, whenyou look at it, you think this
is amazing that I'm holding thisin my hands.
Max Chopovsky (33:39):
Yeah, you know You're holding a conduit in your
hands.
Kevin Pang (33:41):
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Like this is 40 some odd yearsof complexity and strife and
misunderstanding, butencapsulated in this three pound
book which is like oh my God,it's kind of crazy to think
about it Totally.
Max Chopovsky (33:58):
I mean, maybe there's something to the fact
that we see our kids as kids andto us, like you know, I say to
my girls like you're alwaysgoing to be my babies, right,
but at some point they grow upand they mature and at some
point you have to sort of shiftyour understanding of who they
are as people and their maturitylevel, because then you can
start to have some of thosedeeper conversations with them.
(34:20):
But most parents probably wantto be perceived the way that we
perceived our parents when youwere younger, which is
invincible, omnipotent, kind ofunfallible right.
But at some point, if you keepthat up, your relationship will
suffer with your kids.
Like, at some point you have toshow vulnerability because
otherwise they're going to seeyou the way that you and I saw
(34:41):
our dads Right.
At some point there has to bean inflection point.
But they grow up so graduallythat it's hard for us to be like
, hmm, maybe now I can bringthis up, or maybe now I can
bring this up.
Like I always err on the sideof no, I don't want to bring any
of that up, but I feel like onsome level that's, you know,
putting me in the same positionthat I was in with my dad.
Kevin Pang (35:02):
I was going to respond to that with like at
least we have like the foresightto like recognize us and think
about this.
But then, as soon as I saidthat, I realized who's to say?
That my parents also did notsee this and realize this and
just like never got a chance ofdoing that, like, maybe they
were just as conscious aboutthat idea.
And so, like what if I'm justwhat, if this is just history
(35:23):
repeating itself?
Like what, if?
So, again, understanding thatwe need to give them more credit
than what we think that theydeserve?
So, but I think the fact thatwe're like conscious and like
recognize that this is happening, I think it's really important.
But again, who's to say that?
Our parents, we think, well,what do they know?
Maybe they didn't know, we justdon't know it.
Max Chopovsky (35:45):
Maybe they did, and my wife and I talk about
this all the time.
It's like are we doing theright thing, Are we being good
parents?
And are you know, are we givingour kids enough resources and
teaching them enough?
And remember I was talking tosomebody a couple of years ago
and their response to that sortof stuck out in my mind and now
I give it as advice to peoplethat ask me the same question.
The advice is if you're askingthe question, then you're
(36:09):
probably within the margins ofwhat's acceptable, because there
are a lot of parents that don'teven ask the question.
Now, now that you are closerwith your dad and you have so
much more insight into sort ofboth sides of the story, how has
that influenced your parentingwith your little one?
Kevin Pang (36:28):
I think that it makes me like rewind back to my
memories when I was like sevenor eight and how I perceived my
parents, you know, and it mademe realize that feeling that I'm
feeling, whatever it is,however irrational my seven year
old brain was back then isprobably the way that's my son
(36:53):
is probably perceiving me now,and so this is very much like
walking a mile in their shoes,but like sort of in reverse,
like I like it's like I walked amile.
Now I understand how you'rewalking a mile and I think
that's made me much moreconscious about how I should
react in certain situations.
I can sense probably like a fewyears ago I could be like way
(37:16):
more impatient and way moreimpulsive and reactive to these
things, but now it's like thereis a little birdie that just
tells me it's like oh, wait aminute, is this how you wanna
react?
So basically it's just likesomething that just holds you
back before you sort of revertto that monkey brain reaction.
You know that primordialreaction.
(37:37):
So I think it's just more aboutnow in my brain.
Now it gives me like a splitsecond, more to like reflect and
go.
Do you wanna like yell andscream?
And you know in reaction toyour kid spilling a glass of
(37:58):
milk onto the ground right.
So it has added a split secondbuffer in my parental brain.
Max Chopovsky (38:06):
That's a massive win.
Kevin Pang (38:07):
Yeah.
Max Chopovsky (38:08):
It's a massive win.
Kevin Pang (38:10):
It's just a 0.37 seconds is all it takes.
Literally and hopefully and Iunderstand now when you think of
like these old folks with theirsage wisdom.
That's what it is.
It's just having more time toreflect and think and not
needing to say the first thingthat comes out of your mouth.
I tend to start speakingwithout my brain consciously
(38:33):
knowing when I'm actually howI'm gonna finish the sentence,
but I just feel the need, I justneed to start talking, right,
and now I think it's okay topause and like take a second to
ponder and it's like you knowwhat.
It's fine to do that, and likesame thing, parental.
It just gives you like a splitsecond more to pause and reflect
(38:55):
.
Max Chopovsky (38:56):
Totally yeah.
Silence is only uncomfortablefor people that maybe don't
trust their gut as much.
Kevin Pang (39:05):
right Like silence is actually not a bad thing,
it's kind of powerful thing tohave.
It's like, you know, when you'rethe person in a meeting, in a
work meeting, you just likebabble on and on and on.
I don't know if some folks viewthat as like insecurity, I don't
know, but I remember a bosswhere you would ask a question
and she would just sit and waitand think about it for a second
(39:30):
and then respond and I'm like,in those five seconds of silence
I thought, man, that's powerful, like you are the boss for a
reason.
Like that's a really powerfultrait to have.
So I've learned to embracesilence and you know, and I know
that we're here to also to talkabout story, and I think one
way of sort of bringing it backto the idea of story is that
(39:50):
like we don't necessarily needto fill every part of the sort
that we're telling with forwardaction with you know, because I
think the brain also does needsome time to process and reflect
.
And I think building in thosemoments of silence and just let
things sit in the air and ponderfor a second, I think that's a
really, really powerful trait.
Max Chopovsky (40:12):
Yeah, I mean, I think that's what they call in a
theatrical pause, yeah, yeah,so let's talk about storytelling
.
So you've obviously heard andtold some amazing and powerful
stories in your life and you'veused multiple media to tell
those stories.
So what, in your opinion, dogood stories have in common?
Kevin Pang (40:33):
Good stories almost always have something at stake.
This is every single fairy talesince time in memorial.
Like is someone has thisperfectly happy life, something
happens and it just likedisrupts that world.
Something goes missing, someoneloses something, and then they
(40:55):
have to try to restore orderfrom chaos.
Right, so to me, I mean, youknow, gosh, untold volumes have
been written about how to tellstories, but I think at the
heart of it, it's just about youhave stasis, you have
(41:15):
uniformity, and then chaos isintroduced and you try to damnd
us.
You try your damnd us, andheart is to restore that chaos
into harmony again.
And the consequences of notrestoring that chaos it could be
(41:36):
small, it could be big, itcould be existentially important
, but you certainly don't wannalose whatever.
That is so, and then you haveyour reasons for wanting to make
sure that you don't lose it,you know so it's just chaos and
order.
Max Chopovsky (41:53):
I think that's what all storytelling is Totally
and even better if restoringorder comes at some cost to the
protagonist.
Kevin Pang (42:02):
Yeah, yeah.
And I think as youngstorytellers, I think, certainly
when I was in my 20s it's veryeasy to look at like
storytelling as like this verysimple framework as conflict
resolution.
All right, you lose something,you find it, and it's happily
ever after.
Well, I think as you grow older, you realize that happily ever
(42:24):
after doesn't really happen,right.
It's like sometimes you onlyget some of that order back,
yeah, and then you've become achanged person at the end of it.
And I think that's probably thebigger thing is that, like, you
were this person before andthen you become this person
afterward.
And what is that shift?
(42:44):
What's that emotional shift,right?
What's the spiritual shift?
And it's not as binary as likeconflict and resolution, that's.
You know, it's way morecomplicated than that.
But basically, I think allstories go from one place, go
somewhere else, and then it'sunderstanding the effects of
(43:07):
what that change does thatperson.
That to me, I think, is veryinstructive in understanding how
humans work.
And I think, at the end of theday, we just want to better
understand what this complexmass of flesh called humanity
like, what it works and how dowe become better at it.
Totally.
Max Chopovsky (43:25):
Totally Now.
Does every story have to have amoral?
Kevin Pang (43:30):
I don't think so.
I think people try to jammorality down people's throats
in a very explicit way thatfeels oftentimes quite forced.
And I think that when you saymoral, it's an either or thing.
(43:51):
There are different shades ofit, there are different
spectrums of it and there aredifferent degrees of it.
And I think, rather thanlooking at it as like should
every story have a moral, I amlooking at it as should you
force morality into every story.
I look at it that way and Ithink the answer is no, when I'm
(44:14):
also thinking about moral andI'm glad the title of your show
has that word in it right, it'sabout understanding, like I said
, how we live, how do we becomebetter humans, what we can learn
from other people's mistakes.
And I think, while notnecessary to have it, I think it
(44:39):
does make the story worthwhile.
It actually makes it worthlistening to.
Otherwise, why did you justspend 30 minutes listening to it
, watching this, reading this,if it was all sort of
meaningless?
So I think it's good to have it.
Is it necessarily to alwayshave it?
Probably not.
(45:01):
Should you be forcing it downpeople's throats?
Definitely not.
You know, I think there's anarts in letting that unfurl and
letting the reader, the viewer,the listener come to that
conclusion themselves.
And I think that's probablyeven the more powerful thing is
when they had that aha moment.
(45:21):
You know, I love it whencomedians I just stand up, act
right, they will tell a joke,but they don't give the
punchline, because the punchlineis filled in the heads of the
listener.
And then you can slowly hearmurmurs of laughter from the
audience, like building.
You're like ah, I get it, I seewhat they're saying, right,
yeah, they're like why don't youdo this with morality in a
(45:43):
story and a tale?
It's that you don't force uponthem, but they discover it
themselves.
All we're doing as storytelleris we're unearthing this thing
for you to then discover that,if you can do that, that is
magic, that is arts, right there.
Max Chopovsky (45:59):
Totally, you're giving more credit to your
audience, exactly, yeah, yeah,yeah.
So last couple of questionshere.
You mentioned anti-fragile as abook that you love.
Tell me about maybe one or twoother books that you love that
really nail the art ofstorytelling.
Kevin Pang (46:17):
I never read a lot of John Steinbeck when I was
young and I started reading himvoraciously as an adult.
And I think my favoriteSteinbeck is not the one that
everyone's going to say which isnot Grapes of Wrath, which is
not to say that's not abrilliant book.
But I love East of Eden.
But I think that's a book thatI read later in my adult life
(46:41):
and it's a story about twofamilies and how they live, and
it's not necessarily conflictresolution in the traditional
sense, but just seeing how theylive and how they react and the
dynamics with each other.
That, to me, is a book thatstays with me, has stayed with
me long afterward.
(47:01):
And one thing I'm reading nowthat I'm really enjoying is you
know, steinbeck would keep ajournal that he would start the
day before he would got to workin, like writing the actual
novel.
He would start the day bywriting a letter to his editor
and he would write abouteverything from these are the
(47:22):
troubles I'm having.
He would write about like hislove life too, which is kind of
like wow, I can't believe you'retelling people that Just about
anything at all.
Just, you know about likeliving in New York and like the
troubles that he's having.
And he did this as a way oflike, it's a warm up exercise
for the actual act of like,writing the novel.
And I'm quite enjoying readingthe East of Eden's letters that
(47:44):
he wrote because it's really funto read it in parallel with
reading that novel as well.
He also did this with theGrapes of Wrath as well too.
That's, I find, in addition tothat book, reading the letters
of EB White's, of John Steinbeck, of Ernest Hemingway, right,
like it's almost like theequivalent of reading the
(48:05):
people's emails today, right,but back then, like there was so
much gold to be mine from thosecorrespondences and you sort of
learn a lot about the problemsthat they endure, the roadblocks
that they face, and I think youcan learn a lot about writing
from reading those.
So, anyway, I would say numberone, east of Eden, john
(48:29):
Steinbeck, but then also theEast of Eden letters that he
wrote to his editor.
Those two things I'm just likethey're really, really profound
to me.
Max Chopovsky (48:39):
Oh, I love that and it makes you appreciate the
book more, the reading theletters.
Kevin Pang (48:43):
Yes, oh, and I can't wait to read East of Eden again
.
It's almost like watching theSimpsons, like when you're 13
and you watch it.
It's one thing, and then youwatch it again in your 30s.
You think this is brilliant,because this is a show that is
different for when you're 13 andwhen you're 33.
And it's like, wow, this isreally, really so like I really
(49:06):
can't wait to like dive intolike old episodes of, like like
all these jokes and adultreferences that you don't get,
that they wrote just for theadult version of the viewer.
And I feel like the same way ifI'm reading Steinbeck again.
So I can't wait to dive in, butI'll do that after this book
tour, maybe when I have sometime to read again.
Max Chopovsky (49:24):
Yes, you are quite the busy man, which we'll
talk about in a sec.
But the last question I havefor you is if you had a few
minutes with 20 year old KevinPeng, that young, brash,
recalcitrant, stubborn,intelligent, ambitious young man
, if you had a couple of minuteswith him, what would you say to
(49:47):
him?
Kevin Pang (49:49):
I heard this in a show I forgot where a few weeks
ago, and it wasn't aboutpersonal advice, it was about,
like, how to have a long-termrelationship.
And this person said the threemost important words with a
spouse is not I love you, butlet it go.
(50:11):
And I thought, wow, that istrue, let it go.
Of course, it also makes methink of the Frozen song, which
I, you know that sort of likereally annoys me because I can't
help but to hear that now.
But I think if you just let goa lot of the anger and all the
anxiety and just like, what doesit really mean at the end?
(50:33):
Probably not, not a lot.
So just like, let it go, let itgo, you know, let it go.
Adena Menzel said it best.
So let it go.
I think it's a really good lifephilosophy.
Max Chopovsky (50:45):
Let it go.
If you just zoom out enough,you'll realize that so many
things that we think matter nowactually don't.
Kevin Pang (50:51):
Totally.
Yeah, I'll tell you one morething too.
I think I heard it might havebeen Tim Ferriss or someone else
said it, but he said like let'ssay you're driving down the
road and you get this like flattire right and you can be really
, really upset and angry at thatmoment.
And he said at that moment youneed to think about in six
(51:13):
months six months from whateveris happening right now, will you
still be angry about it, theway that you're feeling now?
And the answer is almostemphatically no.
So don't like, why add anxietynow when, in six months, like
(51:34):
who cares?
Totally, I really like thatframework.
It's like saying like askyourself, will the person in six
months still be angry aboutthis current situation you're
feeling it's okay to feelemotionally upset or annoyed,
right, but it's like you don'treally need to let it fester and
, at the end of the day, youshould just let it go.
Max Chopovsky (51:54):
Totally.
I love that Great advice.
Well, that does it, kevin Pang.
Author, talk show host.
So many other wonderful thingsand I will say again, foodie of
the highest caliber.
Thank you for being on the show.
Thanks, max, what a pleasure.
So Kevin has a book coming outwith his father, jeffrey 370
(52:20):
pages of gold Cantonese cuisinecookbook, entitled a very
Chinese cookbook.
It is out on October 24th.
Make sure you get that, kevin.
Thanks for being on the showman.
Thanks so much For show notesand more.
Head over to maspodorg.
Find us on Apple Podcasts,spotify, wherever you get your
podcast on.
(52:40):
This was more love the story.
I'm Max Drepowski.
Thank you for listening.
Talk to you next time.
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