Thousands of People Rushed into the Streets (SCMP May 2008) – This story was in reaction to the Wenchuan Earthquake of 2008 that killed an estimated 80,000 people in Sichuan Province. I wrote a few pieces about this event, some for my personal blog and one for Chengduliving.com. This one for the SCMP was written right afterwards, before we had a good idea of the extent of  the damage.

 

Treasure Hunt (SCMP May 2006) – One of my favorite places to wander around in Chengdu was the Songxianqiao Antique Market. I loved that place. There were some real gems there: distinguished woodworkers and artists, painters and chop carvers, booksellers and trinket hawkers. There were all sorts of river lake craftsmen and hustlers at the market and I hope it still exists, and if it does, that it hasn’t changed much in the decade or so since I last visited.

 

Unlikely Band of Brothers (SCMP Feb 2006) – This story came out of the weeks I spent in Hong Kong during the World Trade Organization’s annual ministerial meeting in late December 2005. I was there as a correspondent for Antiwar.com, and I wrote a few columns for them about my experience there. After I got back home from Hong Kong, I stayed in contact with one of the men I was in jail with, Wen Zhiming, and he told me about his more profound experience being held by Hong Kong authorities for more than a month. This story is dense, and filled with legal details – I remember how exhausted I was reporting on this one. It does paint a picture of the legal system in Hong Kong, but for a better look at the Ministerial itself, check out the Antiwar.com columns linked here and again further below.

 

Burn Identity (SCMP Aug 2004) – Southwest China is home to a number of ethnic minorities who celebrate the Torch Festival, held in the late summer, during the Monkey moon, just before the harvest season. I traveled up and down this region for years, from Kham in the north to the borders with Laos in the south. This feature, in my opinion, does not do the festival justice, but it was one of my first forays into long form travel feature writing. I would get better as the years went on.

 

The Food that Grows on Water: Harvesters and state agencies seek to protect Minnesota’s wild rice legacy (The Growler Mag, Aug 2017) – This story was something of a follow-up on a story I wrote for Roads and Kingdoms a year earlier, about wild rice and the MPCA’s efforts to regulate and protect wild rice waters.

 

East Meets West: Minneapolis restauranteurs are crossing the river to join in St. Paul’s restaurant resurgence (The Growler Mag, Sept 2017) – a little feature about St. Paul’s resurgence as a food and culture spot.

The U of M houses the nation’s largest collection of core samples (Minneapolis Star-Tribune, May 2016) – This was one of my first features for the Minneapolis Star-Tribune and it turned out to be a fascinating experience learning about the role lake and ocean cores play in re-creating ecosystems from centuries and millennia ago. The research has all sorts of practical applications, not least of which is predicting what our world may look at if it grows any hotter.

 

Where to find authentic Chinese food in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis Star-Tribune, July 2016) – This little feature as well as Get the kids, and tube, skate, explore in the metro were both fun to write. Just little blurbs about life in the Twin Cities for the local paper.

 

The shockingly normal life of one Twin Cities prostitute (Minneapolis City Pages, Oct 2016) – This story was a big deal for me. I spoke to a sex worker in Minneapolis who clued me in on the scene in Minneapolis and I learned a lot about the industry, the way the city deals with it, and the way American society wrestles with the issue of sex, money, and women.

Linsey Williams, Minnesota MMA fighter, bends but won’t break (Minneapolis City Pages, Nov 2015) – This was my first feature for City Pages and it was a blast to report on and write. I got to meet Linsey’s family and follow her around for a bit while she fought and trained, and also got to glimpse a bit of the MMA scene in the city as a whole.

I pitched a story to Fightland about a foreign fighter competing on the regional Chinese circuit, and that first feature turned into a relationship that lasted more than two years, and produced a host of stories on martial arts in China and later in the Midwest. This gig not only brought me in touch with China’s martial roots and the new fighters coming into the MMA scene, but also kickstarted my own martial arts journey, which continues to this day at The Cellar Gym in Minneapolis. There are so many fun stories from this period of my career, including trips to UFC events in Tokyo and Macao, stories on the history of martial arts in China, and recaps from small circuit events in Mongolia, Sichuan, Iowa, and Shanghai. Many of the stories I wrote for VICE were expunged from the VICE site after VICE: Fightland was folded into VICE’s sports coverage, so many of the links to the older stories are gleaned from the Wayback Machine. Unfortunately, only a small selection of the stories I wrote are still available on his VICE Author archive.

 

I think it’s important to add that I owe a tremendous debt to Ben Judkins of Kung Fu Tea, who helped me explore and understand some of the deep history and culture of martial arts, particularly in China.

 

Why Kungfu Masters Refuse to Teach (Jan 2016) – This link takes you back to the Archive page on this site, which is a collection of twelve good features I’ve written throughout the years. The post describes a bit of background, and has a link to the actual story. In this piece, I tried to convey the culture of martial arts in China, and why a lot of it seems like smoke and magic to the outsider, when in fact some of the greatest martial artists I have ever seen are in China, training every day. They just don’t seek out the limelight very much, because the limelight isn’t what they’re seeking.

 

Wild Monks: Origins of the Shaolin Martial Arts (April 2015) – This was one of the first stories I wrote that delved into the history of Chinese martial arts. This was a very fun and rewarding process, and I have to tip my hat to Ben Judkins of Kung Fu Tea. My conversations with him, and reading his work, were incredibly influential in my own articles about Chinese martial arts.

 

The Practical isn’t Pretty: General Qi Jiguang on Martial Arts for Soldiers (Mar 2015) – This is about a manual written by a general regarding hand to hand combat. The Chinese written corpus is really astounding. There are mountains and mountains of writing on every topic conceivable – this manual is one of the surviving tomes that is considered by scholars to be a solid look at historical views on Kung fu.

 

Shaolin Warrior Monks and the Japanese Wokou Pirates (Mar 2015) – This is a bit legend a bit history, but it describes some of the interesting political struggles going on in East Asia in the last centuries, between Japanese, Korean, and Chinese forces trying to maintain control and expand influence around the Yellow Sea.

 

Karate’s Sacred Tome: The Bubishi and the Evolution of the Martial Arts (Feb 2015) – This is a really cool story, and I tried to do it justice. Basically, scraps of many different Chinese Kung fu manuals made their way to Okinawa, where they were pieced together and turned into a manual that became the ultimate bible for karate, the Japanese martial art. Super interesting example of cultural transmission.

 

Building a Buddhist Army: MMA Reaches into the Himalayas (Nov 2014) – About Tibetan kids learning BJJ and Muay Thai in the mountains of western Sichuan.

 

The Night Everything Changed (Sept 2014) – This story was written from a capsule hotel at Tokyo’s Narita airport after UFC Japan in September 2014. Someone commented that it read like something William Gibson might write, if he were to write about Japanese MMA. I like that.

 

Mother of Elbows: A Kungfu Contribution to MMA (June 2014)- About the 36 Elbows movement taught by my own Kung fu master, Li Quan.

 

The Hard Knock Life of a Foreign Fighter in China (Feb 2014) – This is a raw story about MMA fighters in China’s very young, very raw fight scene. This story led to a deep dive into the Chinese regional combat sports world and for three years few foreigners knew more about it than I did.

 

China-based Freelance Stories for The Economist, ChinaFile, and others (2012 – 2016)

The Bamboo Bicycles of Chengdu (China File 2016) – I loved writing this feature, but it was a slog going through the editing process. I really wanted to link the ancient bamboo technology in China to the modern sustainable bikes being built by my two friends in Chengdu, but it seemed to be a difficult mix. It turned out well, I believe, and this story gives a good look at bamboo as a material, as well as the deep wisdom available to ancient Chinese scholars.

 

Freelance News, Travel and Feature Stories (2007 – 2011)

Weekly Columns for Antiwar.com (2001-2008)

For Antiwar.com, I wrote primarily geopolitical stories and first-hand accounts of Chinese responses to certain geopolitical events, such as the Hainan Spy Plane Incident and China’s Word Trade Organization membership bid. Some of the writing is very raw, and all of it is passionate. At the time, I was given a lot of freedom to express my own ideas and emotions regarding life in China and the economic and political realities of both the national and international situation. I was just forming those ideas at this time, and many of the articles for Antiwar.com were thought experiments as much as reportage.

China’s Manifest Destiny (Dec 2009) – This was the last story I wrote for Antiwar.com and it reflects some of my ideas regarding China’s “coming of age” process in the 21st Century. By this time, after the Beijing Olympics, China’s self-confidence as a modern nation was almost completely intact, and the relationship dynamics between China and the West was shifting toward a balance, as opposed to the imbalance so often present when the industrialized West, backed by U.S. military power, interacts with the rest of th the world.

 

The Security Blanket (Aug 2008) – I wrote this one in the middle of the Beijing Olympics about the measures China took to keep the Games safe and to make sure every damn corner in the city (and beyond) was monitored.

Setting the Stage (Dec 2005) – This is the first story I wrote for Antiwar.com while on assignment covering the WTO Ministerial in Hong Kong in 2005. I stayed in the infamous Chungking mansions from December 13, 2005 until Christmas of that year, attending Ministerial events and forums, following protests, and filing stories from mys coffin-like room at the end of the night. I was there when the protestors broke through police lines on the last day of the Ministerial and rushed the building where WTO delegates were holding their meetings. Although I tried to stay impartial, it was hard for a young man to not get passionate about the protests and the movements; I was arrested along with everyone else protesting and sent to a jail cell way out in the New Territories for ten days. it just so happened that I was in the same cell as the leader of the Korean Peasant Army, a bookish librarian with intense convictions. The other stories that came out of that trip are: Let the Hostilities Begin (Dec 2005), Livelihoods at Stake (Dec 2005), and Drums in the Streets (Dec 2005).

In Defense of Piracy (July 2004) – This was a fun one to write, and was inspired by my regular trips to the low-key pirated DVD spot near my house in Chengdu.

Chinese Dreams, American Dreams (November 2004) – I loved writing this one. It was inspired by some Immortal Technique beats and lyrics and also came at a time when I was full of ideas regarding Sino-U.S. relations and my place in the worlds between them.

Reporter at the The Minnesota Daily (1997 – 1999)

The first bit of reporting and writing I did was for The Minnesota Daily, from 1997 – 1999. Some of those stories are still available online, but generally without the media that came with the story, and without formatting. I had a lot of great experiences at the Daily. The U of M paper was an award winning publication and several of the people I worked with went on to do great things. One of them, Nicole Vulcan, currently edits The Source in Bend, OR; in 1998, Nicole, me, and photographer Scott Romsa went on an epic adventure through Ireland together. We toured much of the west coast, Dublin, and up to Belfast. I later hitchhiked around the north, visiting Omagh, Derry, Portadown, and back to Belfast before returning to the U.S. via another wild adventure in London (a tale to be told at another time). Those experiences culminated in “On the Brink of Peace (April 1999),” still one of my favorite stories:

 

University facilitates students’ globalization (Dec 1999) – This was my last story for the Daily and was actually part of my graduation requirements. I did a ton of reporting for this one, and spoke to some big wigs throughout the U. I didn’t follow through the way I could have,m though, and ended up with a C. Not because the story sucked, but because I had started a project that probably required a series, or at least a lot more space than this one took up, and never finished it.

 

 

Educator

 

Sichuan Teachers College: (2010 – 2012)

Sichuan University (2005 – 2010)

During this five-year stint at Chengdu’s most prestigious university, I elevated my teaching skills dramatically by diving into small, focused classes. I taught Creative Writing and Literature, Business English, and of course standard ESL. I also taught German for a semester, which proved to be very difficult, even though I am a native speaker.

Quantum Trading and Services (2003 – 2006)

This was my bog foray into big business in China. I parlayed my network and a bit of cash I earned from the closing of the Guan 9 bar into an apartment/office in the most famous and well-equipped high rise in Chengdu, at the time. I tried all sorts of businesses. I worked with a German friend to try and import industrial printing machines; i worked with the same German to import electromagnetic mats that realigned one’s internal frequencies to a healthier and more natural state; I tried to help local Sichuanese and also Cantonese plastic mold manufacturers enter the U.S. market; I tried to sell Sichuan tea to U.S. and European markets; I tried running a team of performers on a 29 -city tour across China to promote Coors; I tried selling German ATM cleaning cards in the Chinese market; I tried selling Chinese pool tables to the U.S. market.

I tried a many other things as well, I can’t even remember them all. Most of these ideas failed.

 

In 2006 I closed the doors of the office after getting paid a very large sum by Coors following the end of the tour. It was the only really successful business I did. I was exhausted, demoralized, and jaded. I had tried very hard to bring people together to pursue a common goal. I held so m,any meeting with my good friends at the time, meetings I hoped would bind us together as a team and help us to face the business world in China together. I knew I couldn’t do it alone. I had friends in Shanghai who were able to rely on family money and business lines to kickstart their career, but I had no such support. I was on my own. In trying to bring my friends together, i almost lost them. Money and profit and work made everyone act different, turn suspicious, and forget the ties that bound us together. I myself began to view things from a profit lens, and I spent hours staring off into the distance and trying to envision the ways I could make money, maneuver things, who I needed to talk to, sit with, give a gift too. When this business closed I took what little money I had earned and went on a trip around the world. I went and trimmed weed in the hills of Northern California. I reconnected with my people, and tried to reconnect with my family. It was a dark time, but a time in which I figured out what I wanted to do and how I wanted to live the rest of my life. It was during these days that I decided i wanted to be a writer, nothing more, and I spent the next 15 years of my life building a living off of that (as well as many other odd jobs, because writing doesn’t often pay). It was hard, and it still is hard. But running a business like this was an invaluable experience and taught me what I’m capable of, what I love to do, and what I don’t love to do.

 

It taught me that my friends are more important to me than money; social connection is more important to me than social climbing; and that although I probably could have been a good businessman had things been slightly different, my true calling, and the calling I have accepted as my own, is Storyteller.

 

Guan 9 Bar and Restaurant (2002 – 2003)

This hippy backpacker bar was arguably the first of its kind in Western China. Paul’s Oasis might have been first, but Guan 9 was bigger and had better decorations, so I’d argue with Paul about it even though it would be a waste of time. I was a partner in this bar and at the time I thought I was pretty much an owner, even though I had literally zero stake, had not seen a single document, and my main partner, a trailblazing Chinese philosopher, had taken off for Dali right after opening night. I ended up running the bar with the team from the Dragontown Hostel. Dragontown was a very successful hostel in the old part of Chengdu, built into a renovated Qing Dynasty building. Billy, the man who ran that hostel, was a true businessman and he helped turn Guan 9 into a marginally successful joint for a year, during SARS, before selling it off to someone else. I walked with a bit of cash, and felt like I had been a part of a cultural moment in Chengdu. Later on, people would come up to me in various parts of China and ask if I had been a part of Guan and I would proudly say yes, of course. There was nothing more satisfying to me at the time than being associated with a bar that everyone thought was “cool” and fun to hang out in. Being the host appealed to me; I am good at it, and watching people party and have a good time and trying to find ways to enhance that good time was fun for me, even if the whole business was slapdash and rickety.

Sichuan American Chamber of Commerce (2002 – 2003)