Ep 16: 'Exit West' & 'Tikim' w Liza Gesuden

Today's guest is Colin's dear sister, comrade, and peer mentor of over 15 years. Today's guest and Colin met at San Francisco State University as Graduate student Teaching Assistants for Dr. Jeff Duncan-Andrade in his Raza 580: Educational Equity course. They became fast friends and also fell in platonic love with each other’s partners, Virak and Em shortly after. They formed a powerful friendship quartet that despite a global pandemic and a move from the Bay to Long Beach, continues to grow and stand the test of time. This connection now also includes their children's wonderful bonds to one another. Today's guest and Colin taught together in Richmond, CA while organizing together with People’s Education Movement-Bay Area for many years, prior to her and her family's move back to So Cal. 

Liza Gesuden (she/ her/ siya) has been an educator for over 20 years, teaching Ethnic Studies, English, and Social Studies in schools across the Bay Area and Los Angeles. She is currently a Leadership & Ethnic Studies teacher at Jefferson Middle School in Long Beach, CA, where she advises the gardening club to bring young people closer to the land. She has worked within and beyond the Filipinx community as a community and cultural organizer via PEP San Francisco, the Free Minds Free People Conference, and other organizations. She is a certified Breathe 4 Change Yoga instructor and teaches trauma-informed, accessible movement classes to diverse communities. She also makes up one half of @ginataangang, a Pinay duo dedicated to gardening and growing in Long Beach, CA

Today, Liza and Colin discuss Mohsin Hamid's magical novel, "Exit West," and Doreen G. Fernandez powerful book of essays on Filipinx food and culture, "Tikim."

The Paper Plane is a podcast created and hosted by Colin Masashi Ehara, where he interviews people he is blessed and honored to share community with, and asks them about a book(s) that have had a transformational impact on their lives. In a society where literacy rates are steadily declining and a growing number of podcasts hosted by cishet men, un/consciously champion expressions of masculinity that come at the expense of women, femmes, and LGBTQIA2S+ (especially BIPOC) folx, this space aims to operate as a counter-narrative.

The Paper Plane is a space that intends to highlight the dire importance of relationships, community, dialogue, perpetual learning, honest expression as art, art as honest expression, and freedom for literacy and literacy for freedom. It speaks to planes of existence attached to the act of reading, but also as a metaphor for the “flights” we take as we sit in what Ta-Nehisi Coates calls “a one way interface” as readers, and how these “journeys” shape us...