A classroom of third-graders at St. Paul’s Jie Ming Mandarin Immersion Academy sat on the carpet, listening to a story.
“My eyes that kiss in the corners and glow like warm tea are a revolution,” read Gia Vang.
Vang, a former KARE 11 news anchor who now anchors the weekend program for NBC Bay Area, had come to deliver books full of Asian characters to the third-grade classroom.
When she concluded the reading of Eyes That Kiss in the Corners, by Joanna Ho, she asked the class what they liked about it.
“I like how at the start it says that this girl has different eyes,” said one Asian girl in the front row. “But we all have a good eye shape, and it doesn’t matter what it looks like.”
“Just because you’re different from other people doesn’t mean you’re weird,” added another child.
“We’re going to leave this book with you guys,” Vang said. The children gasped and pumped their fists in excitement.
Vang’s reading marked the first Minnesota book delivery for the Very Asian Foundation, which Vang co-founded with St. Louis news anchor Michelle Li. The two initially connected after the Atlanta spa shootings targeting Asian women in March 2021.
Then, in January 2022, Li received a racist voicemail from a viewer unhappy that she had described her Korean tradition for New Year’s Day—eating dumpling soup—on a television newscast. The viewer criticized her as “very Asian.”
The two Asian news anchors quickly jumped on…
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