Longing To Return Home
“My family and I thought this would be over soon,” Volodymyr Shyshkin says. When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Shyshkin thought that the war would end
Tag: portland
The Search for a New Home
After 11 years apart, Pyae Sone Aung finally has hopes of reuniting with his wife and son. Originally from a small town in Myanmar, Aung has gone from country
You Know What, This Is Me, Okay?
Franke Tokem Powell was born in Central Africa, in the city of Douala, Cameroon. Growing up in the 90’s, Franke did not feel that he’d ever be
To Bear Witness: Closure
On a journey to come to terms with their losses, a group of Holocaust survivors from Portland, OR, travel together to six of the locations where concentration camps
A Different Kind of Inner Calling
Balamurali Balu, who goes by Bala, immigrated to the United States from Southern India. He completed his PhD at Georgia Tech.
History Keeps People Thinking
Jack Boas counts his career as historian as beginning at conception. “Or maybe even before,” he suggests. “I could not avoid it, as a child of
A Rebellion Against Silence
Sindy Avila-Gutierrez looks back undaunted on her life as an undocumented immigrant. “I’ve always been a rebel in that way,” she says. “You tell me
I Create So It Cannot Be Erased
Portland artist Roberta Wong is the daughter and granddaughter of Chinese immigrants. She grew up partly in Chinatown, itself a product of segregation.
East-West Encounters
The first time Susan Chan saw snow was also the first time she spent a winter in the United States, away from her childhood home in Hong Kong.
Choosing the Road Less Traveled
From the start, Barbie Wu was determined to forge her own path. Born in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1986, she comes from a family of scientists.
Art and Life: Trusting the Process
Mauricio Villarreal, co-founder of the design firm PLACE, takes a pragmatic approach to daily existence. “Life just happens,” he reasons
A Lifetime of Listening
One of Margaret Stewart Clark’s earliest memories is of sitting, at age two or three, with her sister, who was blind, as the older girl taught Clark how to
To Bear Witness: Building Community
After the Khmer Rouge killed her husband, Saron’s mother gathered her three small children and made her way to a refugee camp in Thailand and, finally,
Finding Identity in Resilience
Looking back on the many changes in her life, Sara Houranpay likes to quote her father’s advice: “When life throws you down, you get up,
Past Passions, New Horizons
For Ningshu Fang, the lessons that her grandmother taught her as a child are an invaluable part of who she has been, and who she has become. “She was a […]