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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [REVIEW] “A Messy Magnum Opus: Mai Jia’s The Colonel and the Eunuch” by Kevin McGeary Mai Jia (author), Dylan Levi King (translator). The Colonel and the Eunuch, Apollo, 2024. 400 pgs.…
![[REVIEW] “A Messy Magnum Opus: Mai Jia’s 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐶𝑜𝑙𝑜𝑛𝑒𝑙 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐸𝑢𝑛𝑢𝑐ℎ” by Kevin McGeary](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/mai-jia-author-dylan-levi-king-translator.-the-colonel-and-the-eunuch.jpg?w=977)
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Editor’s note: Through a sequence of transient homes across Singapore and Malaysia, Sia Ling Ee’s essay “To All the Homes I’d Known Before” traces a childhood shaped by precarity, familial strain, and longing for stability. Contrasted with her husband’s rooted…
![[ESSAY] “To All the Homes I’d Known Before” by Sia Ling Ee](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/pic-1-amk-rental-flat.jpeg?w=1024)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Hope and Despair in Post War Japan: Akira Kurosawa’s One Wonderful Sunday” by Jeremiah Dutch Akira Kurosawa (director). One Wonderful Sunday, 1947. 108 min. It cannot be said often…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Hope and Despair in Post War Japan: Akira Kurosawa’s 𝑂𝑛𝑒 𝑊𝑜𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑓𝑢𝑙 𝑆𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑦” by Jeremiah Dutch](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/https-mubi.comenbefilmsone-wonderful-sunday.jpeg?w=299)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS Editor’s note: Qinxian Bonnie Ran’s essay examines Amitav Ghosh’s incorporation of Cantonese into English in River of Smoke. She argues that the novel’s multilingual Fanqui City creates a space where economic…
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Fragmentation and Repair in Leslie Shimotakahara’s The Breakwater” by Jonathan Han Click HERE to read all entries in Chaon The Breakwater. Leslie Shimotakahara, The Breakwater, Cormorant Books, 2026. 350 pgs. Since committing his…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Fragmentation and Repair in Leslie Shimotakahara’s 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑘𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟” by Jonathan Han](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/the-breakwater.jpg?w=900)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Bearing Witness in Gigi L. Leung’s Everyday Movement” by Rebekah Chan Click HERE to read all entries in Cha on Everyday Movement. Gigi L. Leung (author), Jennifer Feeley (translator), Everyday Movement, Riverhead Books. 2026.…
![[FIRST IMPRESSIONS] “Bearing Witness in Gigi L. Leung’s 𝐸𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦𝑑𝑎𝑦 𝑀𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡” by Rebekah Chan](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/everyday-movement-by-gigi-l.-leung-translated-by-jennifer-feeley-.jpg?w=993)
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [ESSAY] “Sleep, Baby, Oh Don’t You Sleep: Thailand’s Northeast in Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Cemetery of Splendour and Thunska Pansittivorakul’s Isan Odyssey” by Peixuan Xie ❀ Apichatpong Weerasethakul (director), Cemetery of Splendour, 2015.…
![[ESSAY] “Sleep, Baby, Oh Don’t You Sleep: Thailand’s Northeast in Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s 𝐶𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑆𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑛𝑑𝑜𝑢𝑟 and Thunska Pansittivorakul’s 𝐼𝑠𝑎𝑛 𝑂𝑑𝑦𝑠𝑠𝑒𝑦” by Peixuan Xie](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/apichatpong-weerasethakuls-cemetery-of-splendour-and-thunska-pansittivorakuls-isan-odyssey.png?w=1024)
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Editor’s note: Leslie Shimotakahara reflects on how a childhood encounter with an institutionalised great-uncle, silenced by internment-era injustice, became her latest novel The Breakwater. She recounts research, family reticence, editorial reshaping, and the imaginative recovery of erased places, presenting writing…
![[ESSAY] “From Scrapbooking to Novel Writing: Giving Voice to an Unsettling Family Secret in 𝑇ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝑟𝑒𝑎𝑘𝑤𝑎𝑡𝑒𝑟” by Leslie Shimotakahara](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/leslieshimotakahara_photo.jpg?w=1024)
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Read Leslie Shimotakahara’s essay on the writing of The Breakwater HERE. [EXCERPT] “From The Breakwater” by Leslie Shimotakahara Leslie Shimotakahara, The Breakwater, Cormorant Books, 2026. 350 pgs. I wasn’t a week past my seventeenth birthday. Freshly kicked out of the…
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茶 FIRST IMPRESSIONS 茶 REVIEW OF BOOKS & FILMS [ESSAY] “We Are What We Read: Reading Zheng Liu’s Cultural Mavericks” by X. H. Collins Click HERE to read all entries in Cha on Cultural Mavericks. Zheng Liu, Cultural Mavericks: The Business and Politics of…
![[ESSAY] “We Are What We Read: Reading Zheng Liu’s 𝐶𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑎𝑙 𝑀𝑎𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑐𝑘𝑠” by X. H. Collins](https://chajournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/cultural-mavericks-the-business-and-politics-of-independent-bookselling-in-china.jpg?w=971)
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Header artwork by Annysa Ng 茶 First Impressionsclick for information 茶 Essays click for information 茶 Proposals click for information 茶 En Routeclick for information 茶 XI XI—Can We Sayclick for information 茶 Write to Powerclick for information 茶 Auditory…
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