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May 2017 - Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

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Peyangki is looking at the lights of the city. (Independent Lens "Happiness") Credit: Thomas Balmès
Peyangki is looking at the lights of the city. (Independent Lens "Happiness") (Credit: Thomas Balmès)

In May, KQED proudly celebrates the diversity of our community with a special Asian Pacific American Heritage Month programming lineup on KQED Public Television.

Premiere dates are listed below. Please click on each program for additional airdates and information.

KQED 9

Wednesday, 5/3
7pm The People’s Hospital (NEW)
Become immersed in a space in San Francisco's Chinatown that is vital to the well-being of the community and serves its most vulnerable — the poor, immigrant, monolingual and elderly.

Tuesday, 5/9
11pm Relocation, Arkansas — Aftermath of Incarceration (NEW)  
In 1942, nearly 120,000 Americans of Japanese ancestry were forced into prisons because they looked like the enemy. Two of those prison camps were in Arkansas, a land of deep racial divide. This film chronicles the trauma of this incarceration experience and how it’s been passed down through multiple generations.

Saturday, 5/13

Pacific Heartbeat "Mele Murals"
Pacific Heartbeat "Mele Murals" (Credit: Oiwi TV & Tadashi Nakamura) (Courtesy of CAAMFest)

6pm Pacific Heartbeat “Mele Murals” (NEW)
This documentary shows the transformative power of art through the unlikely union of graffiti and ancient Hawaiian culture.

Sponsored

 Sunday, 5/14
6pm Pacific Heartbeat “Next Goal Wins” (NEW)
In 2001, the tiny Pacific island of American Samoa garnered headlines across the world as the worst football team on the planet. Next Goal Wins is an inspirational story about the power of hope and what it really means to be a winner.

7:30pm Arnold Knows Me: The Tommy Kono Story (NEW)
This program chronicles the life of Tommy Kono, one of America’s greatest Olympic champions.

Tuesday, 5/16
11pm Pacific Heartbeat “Visions in the Dark: The Life of Pinky Thompson” (NEW)
This film is a Hawaiian story of pain and promise, of challenge and triumph, and of leadership.

Friday, 5/19
8pm Soul of a Banquet
Wayne Wang, director of The Joy Luck Club, takes us into the world of Cecilia Chiang, who introduced America to authentic Chinese food.

Saturday, 5/20
6pm Plastic Paradise: A Swingin' Trip Through America's Polynesian Obsession
This program explores the fascinating, little-known Tiki culture, culminating with a visit to the annual Hukilau celebration.

Tuesday, 5/23
11pm Pacific Heartbeat “Ever the Land” (NEW)
Ever The Land explores the sublime bond between people and their land through the story of the relationship between the Ngai Tuhoe tribe and the New Zealand government.

KQED Plus

Monday, 5/1
mid Journeys in India “Jodhpur: India's Queen of the Desert” (NEW)
Explore the impressive city in the great Thar Desert of West India.

10am Of Race and Reconciliation (NEW)
This film chronicles the Chinese experience in America around 1885, the year when the Chinese residents of Tacoma were forcefully expelled from the city.

3pm Off the Menu: Asian America
Go into the kitchens, factories, temples and farms of Asian Pacific America to explore how the bond with food reflects an evolving community.

Wednesday, 5/3

Alexandra and Mia sitting on the dock by the sea. (Credit: Moment Film)
Alexandra and Mia sitting on the dock by the sea. (Independent Lens "Twin Sisters") (Credit: Moment Film)

10am Independent Lens “Twin Sisters”
Twin sisters separated at birth finally find each other on opposite sides of the world and discover that not only do they look and act alike, but they are unmistakably and inextricably connected to each other.

11am Counting From Infinity: Yitang Zhang and the Twin Prime Conjecture (NEW)
This documentary centers on an exciting string of mathematical discoveries.

Thursday, 5/4
11am Telos: The Fantastic World of Eugene Tssui
Telos chronicles the unorthodox life and revolutionary work of Eugene Tssui, an eccentric visionary and a maverick architect.

Sunday, 5/7
11am Pacific Heartbeat “Pure Caz: Music of the Brothers Cazimero”
Legendary musicians Robert and Roland Cazimero perform an enchanting array of original compositions and island standards.

 Monday, 5/8
mid Journeys in India “Kazaringa: Land of Giants” (NEW)
Join Bill Ball as he attempts to find India’s mega-animals: the elephant, buffalo and rhino.

Thursday, 5/11
11am Slow Way Home (NEW)
This documentary presents an uplifting examination of differences in culture as it contrasts the way children travel to school in America versus Japan.

Friday, 5/12
10am Kamikaze
Discover the secrets of how kamikaze weapons were built and launched.

Sunday, 5/14
11am Pacific Heartbeat “Hula: The Merrie Monarch's Golden Celebration”
Take a behind-the-scenes look at preparations for the 50th annual Merrie Monarch Festival in Hilo, Hawaii.

Monday, 5/15
mid Journeys in India “Jaisalmer: India's Hidden Gem” (NEW)
Every major country has a destination that is incredible but not well known to outsiders — Jaisalmer is such a place.

3:30pm Canefield Songs: Holehole Bushi (NEW)
Hosted and narrated by ukulele virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro, the film tells the story of music teacher Harry Urata and his efforts to record, preserve and perpetuate the histories of holehole bushi.

Wednesday, 5/17
11am Changing Season: On the Masumoto Family Farm
Review a transitional year in the life of farmer, slow-food advocate and sansei David "Mas" Masumoto and his relationship with his daughter Nikiko.

Friday, 5/19

The Great Transmission
The Great Transmission (Credit: Guna Foundation)

10am The Great Transmission (NEW)
This documentary is the story of one Tibetan refugee lama and his efforts to preserve the sacred texts of his tradition.

Monday, 5/22
mid Journeys in India “Gujarat: Land of Extremes” (NEW)
Learn how the people and wildlife of the western state of Gujarat have found ways to survive in an inhospitable environment.

Monday, 5/29
10:30am Four-Four-Two, F Company at War
Filmmaker Peter Wakamatsu’s unique war documentary is told through the eyes of the men who fought in combat.

KQED Life

Monday, 5/15
8pm Family Ingredients “Hawaii — Poi”
Get an introduction to Hawaii’s most famous and most misunderstood dish.

Tuesday, 5/16
8pm NOVA “Himalayan Megaquake”
Dramatic eyewitness footage reveals the shocking quake that rocked Nepal in April 2015.

Thursday, 5/18
7pm Independent Lens “Happiness”
Meet Pyanki, a nine-year-old monk living in a Bhutanese village who is about to get access to his first television. How will these images shape a child so isolated from commerce, materialism and celebrity?

Monday, 5/22

Okinawan soba, a blend of noodles, soup, and pork spare ribs. (Family Ingredients "Okinawa - Soki Soba")
Okinawan soba, a blend of noodles, soup, and pork spare ribs. (Family Ingredients "Okinawa - Soki Soba") (Credit: Courtesy of Renea Veneri Stewart)

8pm Family Ingredients “Okinawa — Soki Soba”
Don't confuse Okinawan soba with Japanese soba. The blend of noodles, soup and pork spare ribs embodies the spirit of the Okinawan people and the complex history of their islands.

Monday, 5/29
8pm Family Ingredients “Tahiti — Poisson Cru”
Modern seafarers proved that Polynesians navigated their world in canoes, following the stars. Meet a crew member on a worldwide voyage with a stop at his ancestral home.

KQED World

Tuesday, 5/2
5am Pidgin: The Voice of Hawaii
This program profiles the Pidgin language from its rise as plantation jargon to a source of island identity and pride. 

Wednesday, 5/3
5am America ReFramed “Cambodian Son”
The documentary follows a year in the life of Kosal Khiev, who was born in a refugee camp in Cambodia, as he navigates his new fame as Phnom Penh's premiere poet.

6:30am Lost Child: Sayon's Journey
This program explores the Cambodian genocide (1975–1979) and its lasting impact through the eyes of a former Khmer Rouge child soldier.

7:30am Stories in Thread
This film focuses on Hmong Pa Dau (Story Cloths), hand-made textiles that are integral to what it means to be Hmong in America.

Thursday, 5/4
5am Our American Family: The Furutas
Follow a Japanese American family as they return home from an Arizona relocation camp and band together to pursue the American dream a second time.

Saturday, 5/6
5am Last Days in Vietnam: American Experience
Hear the story of an unlikely group of heroes that took matters into their own hands when the North Vietnamese forces closed in on Saigon in the Vietnam War.

7am Quietest Place on Earth
Explore Maui’s geological and spiritual birthplace — the Haleakala volcano.

5pm Pacific Heartbeat “Dream Big: Nanakuli at the Fringe”
Learn how a group who hailed from what was once considered the “worst school” in Hawai'i came to proudly represent the United States in world’s largest art festival.

6pm Road to Fame
This film chronicles the staging of the American musical Fame — China's first official collaboration with Broadway — by the senior class of the country's top drama academy.

Sunday, 5/7
4pm Ka Hana Kapa
Ka Hana Kapa documents the history of kapa (bark cloth made from the wauke plant) in Hawai'i and follows the complex process of making it from start to finish. 

Monday, May 8

Forever, Chinatown
Artist FrankWong (Forever, Chinatown; Credit: ITVS & Good Medicine Picture Company)

9:30pm Forever Chinatown: A Local USA/Truly CA Special
Forever, Chinatown is a story of self-taught, 81-year-old artist Frank Wong who has spent the past four decades recreating his fading memories by building romantic, extraordinarily detailed miniature models of the San Francisco Chinatown rooms of his youth.

Tuesday, 5/9
5am E Haku Inoa: To Weave a Name
Filmmaker Christen Marquez's drive to learn the meaning of her enigmatic Hawaiian name impels her to unite her scattered family and come to terms with her estranged, mentally ill mother.

Wednesday, 5/10
6am Passing Poston: An American Story
This documentary recounts the moving and haunting stories of four former detainees from the Poston Relocation Center, which housed more than 18,000 Japanese and Japanese Americans. 

Thursday, 5/11
5am Pacific Heartbeat “Splinters”
This film explores the hopes and dreams of the surfers of Vanimo, Papua New Guinea, and how surfing has led to societal changes in a male dominated culture.

Saturday, 5/13
2am Global Voices “In the Matter of Cha Jung Hee”
Her passport said she was Cha Jung Hee. She knew she was not. So began a 40-year deception for a Korean adoptee.

5am POV “Fallen City”
A revealing account of contemporary China’s response to the 2008 quake in Sichuan province.

9am Pacific Heartbeat “Waiting for John”
Explore the history, culture and conflict surrounding the John Frum Movement, the last surviving cargo cult.

Ravi and Geeta Patel with their parents. (Independent Lens "Meet the Patels")
Ravi and Geeta Patel with their parents. (Independent Lens "Meet the Patels") (Courtesy of Four in a Billion Pictures)

9pm Independent Lens “Meet the Patels”
Meet the Patels explores the influences of culture and identity on the most intense, personal and important part of one's life — love.

Sunday, 5/14
7pm Doc World “Finding Samuel Lowe”
Retired NBC Universal executive Paula Williams Madison and her brothers, Elrick and Howard Williams, embark on a journey to uncover their ancestral roots.

8pm Global Voices “Miss Nikki and the Tiger Girls”
This film follows five young women in Myanmar (Burma) breaking free of tradition in their search for an original voice.

Tuesday, 5/16
5am Stateless
Emmy-winning filmmaker Duc H. Nguyen follows the stories of Vietnamese refugees who have been living in a condition of statelessness in the Philippines for 16 years while awaiting a rare opportunity for resettlement in the United States.

Wednesday, 5/17
5am America ReFramed “Unbroken Glass”
Dinesh Sabu sets out on a journey across the United States and India to piece together his parents’ story.

6am I Am
Having lost the opportunity to come out to her own mother, an Indian lesbian filmmaker, now living in the United States, travels across India to meet with parents of other gay and lesbian South Asians.

Thursday, 5/18
6:30am Independent Lens “In Football We Trust”
Explore the story behind the Polynesian pipeline to the NFL through the lives of high school players in Utah. 

Saturday, 5/20
5am Filipino American Lives #101
Upon his father's death, a classically trained guitarist returns to the Philippines after 12 years of absence. During his stay, he rediscovers the music of harana.

6am Filipino American Lives #102
This film tells the story of farm labor organizer Larry Itliong and a group of Filipino farm workers who instigated one of the American farm labor movement's finest hours — the Delano Grape Strike of 1965.

7am Pacific Heartbeat “A Place to Call Home”
Two women are at odds over a plan to rebuild one community with houses taken from the other.

Sunday, 5/21
7pm Doc World “One Child”
One Child follows the journey of three families as they try to restore a sense of normalcy and struggle to move past the loss of their children after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake.

8pm Global Voices “Here Comes Uncle Joe”
As the young leave rural areas in southeastern Korea to acquire higher education and find high-salary jobs, there are no services or people to support old people – except one man named Uncle Joe.

Tuesday, 5/23
5am Chinese Couplets
An intimate family story reveals the impact of America's Chinese Exclusion Acts on one family, over two centuries, in three countries on four generations of women.

Thursday, 5/25
5am Giap's Last Day at the Ironing Board Factory
In 1975, Giap, a pregnant Vietnamese refugee, escapes Saigon in a boat and within weeks is working on an assembly line in Indiana. Decades later, her aspiring filmmaker son documents her final day of work at America's last ironing board factory.

7am Independent Lens “Brakeless”
Is Japanese society bound to the pursuit of efficiency at all costs?

Sunday, 5/28
6am America ReFramed “Breathin’: The Eddie Zheng Story”
This program paints an intimate portrait of Eddy — the prisoner, the immigrant, the son and the activist — on his journey to freedom, rehabilitation and redemption.

7pm Doc World “Out Run”
This film provides a unique look into the challenges LGBT people face as they transition into the mainstream and fight for dignity, legitimacy and acceptance across the globe.

KQED 9 is available over the air on DT9.1, 54.2 and 25.1 and via most cable systems on Channel 9. It is on XFINITY cable from Comcast (Channels 9 SD and 709 HD) and on Wave (Channels 9 SD and 164 HD). It can also be found on DIRECTV and DISH satellite systems (Channels 9 SD and HD).

KQED Plus is available over the air on Channels 54, DT54.1, 9.2 and 25.2, and via many cable and satellite systems on either channel 10 or 54. It is on XFINITY cable from Comcast (Channels 10 SD, and 710 HD) and on DIRECTV (Channel 54 SD and HD) and DISH (Channel 54, SD only) satellite systems.

This schedule also lists programs airing on KQED Life (XFINITY 189, Channel 54.3) and KQED World (XFINITY 190, Channel 9.3 & 54.5).

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