I'd like to thank everybody for coming. I know I was competing with Gloria Stewart as another event that's going on across town. And the library has been extremely supportive of Chinese playground. The book was self-published. There are specific reasons why I took that route. I'd be more than happy to answer those questions relating to the publishing of the book and that process. Because the program is being videotaped, I'm going to be reading from, oh, I would say, till a little bit before 7 p.m. And then we're going to take questions at that point. I really encourage you to establish a dialogue regarding the story. I'm also going to be available after the reading and the questions and answer right outside, where I will be signing books, talking to you, answering any questions, any personal comments, stories that you may want to share. But during the question and answer session within the auditorium, Laura is actually going to be, the process is Laura is going to be moving around and actually directing with a microphone for your questions so we can actually tape it as well, because that's important. And we hope that the program is going to generate additional interest, as well as insight into my story, as well as other problems that continue to plague our communities. A chronology of Chinese playground I wanted to present. Since the book was self-published, there was virtually no publicity. There was no advertising budget. It started off as a project that I wanted to present, not only to people in San Francisco, but throughout the country and throughout the world. And at the same time, when I was talking to agents and editors, I knew there was a sense of urgency within myself, because I knew that there was still a lot of recruiting and a lot of activity going on in San Francisco, although it's actually a lot more subtle these days. I hear from people and I recall in the 70s, it was very difficult to even walk through Chinatown. There was a lot of violence and a lot of intimidation, a lot of extortion. And there is still a lot of crime that occurs, but again, it's much more underground these days. And a lot of it has to do with the fact that the law enforcement intelligence is much more on top of the activities that are going on. I mentioned that someone before the program started that. It's not unusual that you even have law enforcement people from even Hong Kong, the Royal Hong Kong Police, or people in other international Asian crime investigation branches studying the activities in San Francisco and the Bay Area, because there's very strong activity that goes on. So back in January, the first exposure I got for Chinese playground was on the cover of Asian Week, where they did a story and it was titled Excaping the Hood. I'm actually gonna be reading an introduction that I wrote specifically for Asian Week. But later on in March, as Laura mentioned, Julie Chow, a reporter from the San Francisco Examiner, did a story and it appeared on the front page as well called Inside Chinatown's Gangs. And this is probably what kind of blew the lid on what I was doing. And that's when there were starting repercussions, were surfacing, people expressed the fact that they were unhappy because in the, not only in the Chinese community, but the prevalence of the problems that we actually have has to do with secrecy and fear. Because this is actually the first personal account of the Chinese underworld from the inside. Even sharing the story is a taboo because many who actually go through the rituals of the Chinese underworld swear to themselves the secrecy. And again, the reason why they're able to grow and to prosper is because of the community and the fear within the community. And as I'm now talking to students, people who are actually at risk or in the gangs right now, troubled kids, I encourage them to break that pattern because if they can actually find someone, maybe it's not a teacher, maybe it's not a parent, maybe it's not someone in law enforcement, but someone that they can at least share and let them know what is really going on in their schools and how they're being victimized that we can actually, that's how we can actually break the cycle. So let me go ahead and read from the introduction of Asian Week. Like thousands of other youths who grew up in San Francisco Chinatown in the 1960s and 70s, I graduated from high school, attended a four year university, launched a professional career and started a family. For the better part of the next 20 years, I climbed the corporate ladder in Fortune 100 companies and top Silicon Valley firms where my employers consistently rated me as a stellar performer. They attributed part of my success to good family upbringing and cultural background. I was amused by their presumptions. My peers, bosses and friends had no idea I concealed horrible secrets from my past that haunted me, secrets that dated back to even before my birth. The secrets continue into those years I spent in San Francisco Chinatown's underworld. Chinese playground and memoir is the story of that dark journey, one that spanned from the 1950s to the 1990s. I have recounted it all. My book exposes the dark side of the Chinese culture that few outsiders are aware of, but its force procreates problems that continue to shame and terrorize our communities throughout the world. From the back alleys of San Francisco Chinatown, where I mimic talk hatchet men as a small child, to the playground where I hid, fought and hustled, to the gang wars I enlisted in, the book recounts my experiences and observations. Family problems, gambling gangs, Chinatown politics, extortion, massacres. Beginning in the late 60s, I watched as my closest friends were recruited into powerful street gangs. Even though my father and uncle ended up heading the Gauntman Dawn Nationalist Party in San Francisco and overseeing top and evident associations, they couldn't keep me out of trouble. For the first time I tell the complete story of the gang wars that ravaged Chinatown in the 1970s, including details of the 1977 Golden Dragon Massacre carried out by my blood brothers. Unfortunately, criminal elements continued to plague our neighborhoods, tearing apart many families. Problems associated with gambling, drugs and at-risk youths continued to baffle parents, teachers, counselors and community leaders. The San Francisco Police Department's gang task force, which was formed after the 1977 massacre, continues to operate at a frenetic pace. In writing Chinese playground, I hope not to shock but to educate. I want kids attracted by the glamour of stepping out or banging to be fully aware of the dark hole they may fall into. I also want them to know that the horrors of the streets do not end easily merely when one decides to quit. The second part of my book recounts how I struggled to fit into the business world. I found myself continually drawn to hostile violence situations, sustaining the personal war that I carried on with the world. I progressed from being a contemptuous neighborhood bully to becoming a corporate ogre in many ways. But in 1988, I found myself at ESL in Sunnyvale on the day that a gunman stormed into my building and began killing people. Accepting my fate, I employed my street instincts and rescued approximately 40 of my coworkers. 11 years later in my memoir, I tell of the five hour siege and the turmoil and of the healing and recovery. My story concludes in San Francisco's Chinese playground where I returned in 1996 to search for my runaway son and to confront my own dark past. The crisis led to the transformation of my life and the strength to present this book with the proper message.  I spent most of my life hiding my past, trying to honor my family and the Chinese culture. My intent in revealing my experiences isn't to bring shame to my family or the community. My recovery involves sharing my pain and wisdom in hopes of inspiring others haunted by their own demons to seek help so they too may break free. Let me also take this opportunity to thank the San Francisco Public Library. They have been supportive right from the start. They were aware of the galley, they read over it, and they let me know that it was a story that they were very interested in and they felt that the community and the public should have access to. There's 35 copies of the book that is available through the library system. There's been a constant waiting list for it, but to me it's more important that it's available through the library system than at bookstores because it's never been about selling and making it a best seller in the commercial market. The book has actually offered me an opportunity to make amends and to make up for a lot of the bad deeds that I had committed and for the life that I have led. And I really do believe that my purpose is to share my story with the world. Let me begin by going over the table of contents of Chinese Playground. It begins with a preface, part one, chapter one, Chinatown's Dirty Secrets. Chapter two is Chinese Playground. Chapter three, Keeping Up with the Wongs. Chapter four, Haxia Wui, The Chinese Underworld. Chapter five, Doing the Nine Ball Hustle. Chapter six, Riding the Water, Secret Society Executions. Chapter seven, Joe Boys. Chapter eight, The Golden Dragon Massacre. Part two, Chapter nine, A Chinese Soap Opera. Chapter 10, Dial of Corporate Warfare. 11, High Tech Warrior. 12, Massacre in Silicon Valley. And the book ends with an epilogue, which I will definitely read during this program. Let me start with the preface. Chinese Playground began as an assignment for my psychology class in 1975. Undergraduate students were required to write an autobiography. Before submitting my work, I secured absolute confidentiality for my professor. Needless to say, he was shocked at the contents, which included an expose on my family as well as the Chinese Underworld. After the Golden Dragon Massacre in 1977, followed by the subsequent arrest and convictions of my close friends, I was compelled to write my version of the Chinatown Gang War under a suit in them. I soon realized that my identity was apparent and the risks were too great. The fact remains that to my knowledge, there has never been a complete literary work presented from inside the Chinese Underworld. Journalists, educators, and sociologists have reported on specific crimes, conducted interviews, or indirectly recounted experiences from former gang members. Facts were either inaccurate or voices of the characters diminished. Following the ESL Massacre, I had a riveting story to share regarding the rampage in five and the five plus hours siege. In compliance with a gag order issued on the case by the presiding judge, I decided to wait until Richard Farley, the mass murderer that his trial had ended before going public. After Farley was sentenced, I lacked the motivation and discipline to complete the project. Writing this memoir during my emotional recovery allowed me to express myself honestly and with humility. The process served as a cadarsis and was a milestone in my healing.  Although a number of publishers, local New York base, expressed interest in the book, I decided to self publish in order to retain my voice in the narrative. I discovered the literary world to be extremely subjective and the developmental input I received from agents and editors were inconsistent. This is his true story about destiny involving my dark journey through life. It is presented simply and straightforwardly. All events in the book occurred. Some names, dates, and locations have been altered to protect the identities of victims and those who wish to remain anonymous. There's a second part of the preface is what I call the prologue and it's a nightmare. A tiring police officer chases after me as I run out of the playground into the alley. Heading north past Uncle's Cafe, I crash into start-up shoppers who scream at me in Cantonese. Each time I look, he's gaining ground. As I reach Washington street and turn left, the rattling of his keys, whistle, and handcuffs indicates that he is extremely close. Before I know it, he lunges and grabs hold of my jacket. Instinctively, I extend both arms back, slipping free. Running into the street, between moving cars as they blast the horns, I reach Ross alley. Tiger, a fellow gang member who was murdered a few blocks away, is standing on the corner.  The sun's rays are passing through his fatal gunshot wound. Curious, I stop and put my hand through the opening. It feels like I'm sticking my fingers into a jacuzzi. Tiger, are you all right? Hey, William, where's all the guys, man? Everybody got busted for the massacre, Tiger, I reply. They were getting revenge for you. So what happened to you, he asked. Hell, the cops question me about the murders and some of the guys thought I was an informant. They almost bumped me off by mistake. Oh, I saw your father, Tiger says. Is he in heaven or hell, I ask. He went down there, he replies, pointing midway down the alley. Go on, look for your father, just be careful. I slowly enter the alley, which is darkened by shadows. It is deserted except for what appears to be two winos lying on the ground a few feet from one another. Moving closer, I see blood gushing from their bodies. The streams of blood from the men are flowing along the asphalt cracks and dripping into the gutter between them.  He is bleeding profusely and moaning. Recognizing the victims, I begin retreating backwards. As I glance at a storefront window, I see a reflection of a little boy, barely four feet tall. It's me, wearing my old favorite Levi's jeans, a hand-me-down plaid shirt and white Converse high tops. Approaching the pawn shop where my grandfather worked, I recognize the man inside, Duty Arringgate. He's fondling the breast of a half-naked young woman. It's my father when he was younger.  Spotting me, he rushes over, holding my chip rice bowl containing one of his herbal brews. As I'm standing still, unsure of what to make of his appearance and behavior, my father aggressively pushes the potion up against my mouth. The stench is sickening, the look in his eyes frightening. You're trying to poison me, I scream. You weren't supposed to be born, he shouts. I slap the bowl away and take off running. Approaching the far end of the alley, I see a large group of yous blocking the path. Moving closer, I recognize my old blood brothers as well as rival gang members standing on opposite sides. They simultaneously draw their guns.  Click, click, click, triggers being pulled or heard. God, they all want me dead. With everyone closing in on me, I back up and leap into a doorway. It's brown metal frame with tinted glass stands out among the deteriorating wood of surrounding structures. Above the entrance is a Chinese theft number four, say.  Only I can't seem to move. I twist and turn but my legs are restricted. I wake up and my feet are entangled in the blankets. The room is completely dark and my wife laying next to me is snoring like a little mouse. As I sit up on the bed, we leave that it was only a nightmare. My throat feels bone dry. Longing for a glass of water, I simply flop back down, half asleep and exhausted. Entering what appears to be an office building, I see rows of bright fluorescent lights hanging from the ceiling. The first room to my left has a door with wire mesh glass panes. Looking in, I see the bathroom of my family's Chinatown apartment.  The sink, tub and walls are covered with giant cockroaches rapidly descending on her. My child self begins yelling, "'Mommy, mommy!' Desperate to reach her, I try turning the knob on the door. Not only is it locked, it's sizzling hot. The nuns at St. Mary's warned us that suicide will lead you to hell, I remind myself. Dashing down the dark narrow hallway, I peek into a room on the right side. Jack Carson, the chairman of the startup company I work at, is screaming at his executive staff in a smoke-filled conference room. The profanity he's using is loud and clear. As I'm about to open the door, notations on a flip chart behind Jack causes me to stop. The words ICD versus Bill Lee are written in big bright red letters.  Next, I hear gunfire coming from above. One shot followed seconds later by another, caused my little body to jump. The sounds of the blasts are deep, most likely from a shotgun. Near the stairway, I see Rich Farley, the mass murderer, slowly making his way toward me. Dressed in battle fatigues, he is holding a shotgun on one arm. On his left side, he's hoisting a boombox radio on his shoulder. You're supposed to be in sand quitting on death row, I shout. As I turn to run, a kid I got into a fight with as a teenager comes at me from the other end of the hall. He's holding a short club, tapping it against his palm. I charge at him swinging. As I'm landing my punches, he's screaming, but it's a woman's voice. What the hell's going on, I wonder? Help, wake up, help, wake up, the voice continues. I suddenly realize I'm punching my wife in bed next to me. My fists are clenched, I'm out of breath and tears are streaming down my face. I'm disoriented and drenched in sweat. Are you awake now? She yells from under the covers. Oh God, I'm so sorry, honey, I cry, putting my arms around her. Are you all right? I'm okay, I'm okay, she replies. That was another bad one, huh? It sure was, I answer, as she turns to hold me. In fact, it was a two-parter. It has taken a lot of courage for my wife to sleep with me night after night, rolled up in a ball to protect herself. I didn't know how she puts up with me. Lately, the nightmares have increased. Even after all these years, flashbacks of my dark past continue to haunt me. They say that time heals, but the intensity remains fresh and raw. Chapter One, Chinatown's Dirty Secrets. Children love their parents unconditionally and naturally seek their approval. In the Chinese culture, we're taught as children to honor and obey our parents no matter what. I never doubted my mother and father's love for my siblings and me, but in our home, the most horrible acts conceivable against children were also committed. We never knew the exact age of my father. He was born in Tuishan, Southern China, around 1908 into the Yi family. Due to severe financial hardships in his family, my father was sold as a young boy to Mr. Qin Wai and raised as his number one son. The brokering of sons was common in Tuishan where many families were impoverished. Children, especially sons, were regarded as valuable commodities. Couples with financial resources who were not able to bear male infants resorted to this practice in order to carry on a family legacy. Daughters were also sold. The lucky ones became servants while others were sexually exploited. My mother once shared with me that grandpa Yi was a heavy gambler, which was the source of the family's problems. My father never talked about his birth parents and we were supposed to pretend that the Yi family never existed. My father said that, my mother said that although a year grandpa Qin provided a comfortable loving home, my father never forgave his biological parents for giving him up. The only time my father cried was in his sleep when he was screamed like a little boy in anger at grandpa Yi for not wanting him. Once when I was about 10, I ran to him and held him as he sobbed in his sleep. As my father awoke, he pushed me away and pretended everything was fine. He loved a year and his eyes gleamed when he smoked of Nian Nian grandma Qin, who spoiled and showered him with affection. Two other boys were born into the Qin household, which included servants. The marriage of my parents was arranged. My mother had settled in Hong Kong with her siblings, eventually reunited with Gong Gong, who was indigent after the war. My father twice married before meeting my mother had five children. His first wife died after a short illness and he remarried almost immediately. When he arrived home unexpectedly one day, he walked in on wife number two brutally beating the children and banished her. My father first entered the United States in 1939 as a paper son. Ah Ye found a way around the Chinese Exclusion Act by arranging for a merchant with a certain name of Li to sponsor my father as a son. My father returned to China in 1949 to take another bride as the communists were dominating the country. With his five children scattered and cared for by various relatives, my father was seeking a better life in Gumsong or Gold Mountain as California with his gold prospects was named by the Chinese. My mother, a beautiful woman with baby cheeks, fair skin and a mischievous smile, was 18 when a matchmaker approached Gong Gong to discuss the prospects of a marriage and an opportunity to live in Gumsong. The expectation of course was for the eldest to pave the way for the remaining Chu clan to join her in America.  She presumed my father would love and adore her just like her father had. My mother was smitten with my father's handsome looks, self-confidence and charming wit. My mother had no idea how difficult life would be for her. Although my father would become one of the most powerful and respected men in San Francisco's Chinatown, he was also an alcoholic, compulsive gambler, womanizer and much worse. My parents arrived in San Francisco by boat in 1949. The journey took 23 days.  Mary was the firstborn followed by James, Dorothy and May. I was not yet in the picture. My father worked out of the living room as a Chinese doctor and herbalist. Witch shelves against the kitchen wall were stacked with glass jars containing herbs in various forms, pill, bark, leaves and powder. My mother, like many other immigrant women from China, worked as a seamstress. As frugos they were, they were not able to make ends meet. Ah Ye who worked as a pawn shop where he also lived helped as much as he could. Money had to be borrowed from friends. When my mother unexpectedly became pregnant with me, my father decided to abort me. Applying his medicinal training, he concocted a mixture of herbs which he coerced my mother to ingest. His scheme failed. I was born on October 8th, 1954 with serious birth and developmental defects. How they discharged me from the hospital as a healthy baby boy is a mystery. Due to continuing poverty, my parents entered negotiations to sell me to a wealthy childless couple. This transaction would have been disguised as a private adoption. The brokering of children in China found its way to America. However, a decision to keep me was apparently influenced by the emotional trauma my father endured as a child who was sold. The reality is that I would have been better off with another family. Being left handed was considered bad luck in our culture so I was forced to eat and write with my right hand. Sharp taps to the knuckles served as reminders.  Seven of us occupied a two room apartment on the corner of Washington and Stockton Streets above Fung Loy restaurant in the heart of Chinatown. We didn't have a refrigerator, had to heat our water on the stove and we shared beds. It was a typical ghetto tenement. Peeling paint dangled from the ceilings, hallways were morose and smelled of urine and roaches outnumbered us at least a thousand to one. There were 12 apartments in the building and of course everyone knew everyone else's business. There was screaming and fighting hurt regularly in the halls, but no other family could match the drama we dished out. An unwritten code existed in the building. No matter what was seen or heard, everyone stayed indoors and kept it themselves. You can be sure that when we ran into the neighbors, the question how is everything was never asked. Instead, it was usually, sikh faan mea, have you eaten yet? The polite response was sikh baola, ate plentifully. Violence was common in our home. It was easy to provoke my father after he got drunk, which occurred nightly.  Perhaps he felt compelled to take on the role of the man of the house and didn't know how to maintain control, resorting to constantly beating the shit out of my sister mea and me in order to rule his domain.  My arms and legs were twisted to the brink of snapping. As I lay on the floor in tears, the savage would suddenly become a charmer concerned about what he had done. James decided he should be forgiven. Because I reserved the right to stay angry, another beating was administered. I had my first job even before starting kindergarten and shining shoes for 10 cents. My brother and I ventured to St. Mary's Square Park in Chinatown and worked afternoons and evenings, shining shoes till dark. On good days, businessmen handed us quarters in appreciation of our efforts. Unfortunately, we also had to be wary of men in the park, trying to lure us with money to satisfy their sikh urges. We didn't know what pedophiles were back then, only that these men who approached us with devious stares had to be avoided and dealt with.  At times, we turned to older street kids for assistance.  They were robbed for good measure. This was never reported not even to our parents. I accepted early on that there were bad people and lots of secrets in Chinatown. One learns quickly about survival on the streets. Categorizing us as latchkey kids would be an understatement. Lacking supervision and a sense of right or wrong, we passed our time stealing, feeding, fighting, and gambling. We climbed rooftops, scaled elevator shafts, and played cat and mouse with the police. Most of the activities involved high-risk behavior, which we carried into our teens and adulthood. Jason Fung and Frank Lauer, my best friends, both were recent immigrants from Hong Kong. Frank was a strong gutsy one. Jason was tall and shy. I was known as the conniving one. We spoke cat and mouse among ourselves and did everything together. We even went to the bathroom together. The three of us would stand around the commode and pee at the same time, crisscrossing our streams. We didn't have any hang-ups about silly things like that. All of us came from troubled homes and endeared similar pains. I shared secrets with them that I never trusted anyone else with. We discussed fears about our homes and lives where God approved of us. We talked seriously about running away together. We were only in second grade. Who could have guessed all of us would end up in gangs and one of us would be convicted of murder? This is from chapter two, Chinese Playground. We didn't develop the right social skills at Chinese Playground. The environment represented the dark side. We learned to cheat and lie. What you could get away with prevailed over fair play.  It's conflict resolution meant throwing the first punch. We were overly sensitive, hostile and aggressive. Revenge was always sweet. That's how you earn respect. I learned to hide my emotions at the Playground. Fear was a sign of weakness and humor was usually at the expense of someone else. Our days were filled with dares and ridicule. Any sign of vulnerability was callously exploited. A lot of fights took place behind the clubhouse and usually went unnoticed.  Even if you didn't want to, you had to fight or never stepped foot in the Playground again. There were times I was so frightened I'd do the first punch so my friends wouldn't notice my knee shaking. After a while, it was no big deal. I started fights in order to save face because someone was perceived to be making me look bad or to gain respect with other kids. I pretended that blows didn't hurt by ignoring the pain or by faking it. This is from chapter four, Huxiel Warrior, The Chinese Underworld. I was eight when I witnessed my first shooting. There had been an ongoing feud between Chinese kids and bloods, blacks from nearby Telegraph Hill. It was the 4th of July weekend. A street carnival was operating on Waverly Place in Chinatown and a rumble was declared for 10 p.m. My father was out gambling while my mother was putting in a 14-hour shift at the garment factory. Kids at Chinese Playground had been whispering about the showdown all day long. I thought to myself, nothing's gonna stop me from being there. At 9.30 p.m., my friends and me, pint-sized little rascals, were walking around and keeping an eye out for any bloods as well as the police. Guys from opposing sides showed up around 9.45 p.m. The groups each numbering close to 40 gathered and faced each other at the south end of the alley near the Ferris Wheel. Not a single cop was in sight. Clubs, pipes, and chains were brought out as well as rumble belts, butterfly and switchblade knives. I was in a neutral zone with the bloods to my left and our guys on the right.  As they began charging one another, I heard someone scream, no! To my right, two Chinese dudes facing one another appeared to be grappling with something. Suddenly there was a loud bang. I thought it was a firecracker. There was a puff of smoke that I saw one of the guys keeling over. Gun, a dude screamed. As people scattered in different directions, I was shoved from side to side. Just as I began to run, someone clipped my shoe causing me to fall. Two older kids I recognized from the playground tumbled over me. Diving into a narrow doorway, I pushed the heel of my foot back into my tennis shoe and dashed back out. I ran straight home. Inearing the apartment, I didn't dare look at my mother for fear she would see right through me. Back then, guns were unheard of in Chinatown. I couldn't sleep that night.  Don't be afraid, that's for chumps, I told myself. At the playground the following day, one of the older guys said, yeah, John's brother tried to stop him from shooting the hawk-wise black devils, and he accidentally shot him. He's in the hospital and John got busted. Yeah, I was there, man, it was real cool, I said. I already knew how to act like a big shot to gain respect. The Wacheng gang hung out at Chinese playground and the first clubhouse was on Clay Street across from Portsmouth Square. I generally stayed out of their way. If you were playing basketball, ping pong, or volleyball, and they approached, common sense dictated that you step aside. I got to know a few of them and on occasion they invited me to join in. By 1969, numerous gangs were formed from the original Wachengs. At first I found it exciting to know some of the gang members. At time, in time it became clear that they couldn't be trusted. They had ulterior motives. When they were friendly toward me, there was a catch. Hold this for me. Give so-and-so a message. Hide this for me. When the police come, say this. Don't tell anyone you saw this. I came to believe that everyone was a user and your friends can betray you. There were times I felt I couldn't take it anymore. There were so many things hidden at home and now the streets and playground were filled with hush-hush and CD characters. My passion for Gong Fu movies brought me to the cinema on a weekly basis. The great stars Sun Xing, Grandville, World and Palace theaters were Chinatown landmarks. I couldn't wait for the new Shaw brothers and Golden Harvests flicks to arrive. The one-armed swordsmen, boxer from Shantung, the Shaolin series were classics. The genre had an interesting theme. The heroes were Robin Hood types defending the common people against corrupt, oppressive officials and their imperial forces. Crimes committed by the rebels were somehow justified. Brotherhood, courage and loyalty prevailed over oppression, greed and betrayals with revenge thrown in for action. These movie houses were also where gang members gathered and established their turf. At times there was more violence in the theater than on the screen. One Sunday afternoon inside Sun Xing Theater, a man and his girlfriend were seated near the screen. I was about three rows behind them. Suddenly about 15 gang members entered. They marched past me and approached the couple. Through the darkness, their shadows and movements were frightening. I knew they were on a violent mission. Let's talk outside, everything's okay, one of them said. The man whispered something to his girlfriend. He then stood up and walked out with them. I sat there and began counting in my head. One thousand one, one thousand two, one thousand three, anticipating the outcome. As they were leading the man up the aisle, surrounding him on all sides, he was jumped. I knew the routine so I tried to keep my eyes locked on the screen. It lasted no more than 15 seconds but it was horrific. The attack was much worse than others I had witnessed. Oh my God, somebody please help him, his girlfriend screamed as she ran to him. I wanted to stop her for her own safety but I knew better than to get involved. After the assailants left, I walked over and saw the victim on the ground badly beaten and bloody. A number of them had bottles and smashed the man with them. His face was slashed up and down and side to side from the broken glass. Honey, don't move, she cried. Shit, look what they did to him. Finally he was helped out of the theater. The lights never came on and the police never showed up. While most of the patrons left, I slowly returned to my seat and just sat there. My heart was racing but the rest of my body felt numb. I was curious as to why so many of them attacked them. They were pushing one another aside to get in on it as though they were competing. I was trove at the time. For weeks I couldn't shake the image of the man's bloodied face. The loud stomping sound of his beating and his cries for mercy also played over and over again. As each day passed, the violence became increasingly brutal.  This was my home. At the playground, gang members shared stories of jobs they were hired for which included beating of people and robbing of patrons as they left gambling dens. Various tongs ran the games and kids were played as looksies signalling when police or trouble loomed. The word tong translate into a meeting hall or club in Chinese. Haxiouhui, which means black society, encompasses the entire Chinese underworld including tongs, triads, and organized street gangs. In the Orient today, one particular triad has a reported membership of more than 50,000. It is my belief that the Haxiouhui embodies the most powerful criminal element in the world. This is from the chapter, Joe Boys. I'm gonna describe how we function in the gang and how we actually recruit it. Kids beginning in middle school and younger were targeted for recruitment.  The rebellious period these juveniles were going through at home and at school played to the gang's advantage. Many felt self-conscious and usually gained confidence by joining up. Some were bullied and had scores to settle. The majority were angry and frustrated lacking skills to deal with their emotions constructively, including myself. Virtually all of us resented our parents. Families who immigrated here got a rude awakening, expecting the gumson to offer a better and more prosperous life. Instead, they faced limited opportunities and discrimination, often by their own countrymen. Instead of admiring our dads and moms who worked long hours to stay afloat, we turned their absence into a sense of neglect or outright abandonment, which manifested as anger. Kids realized that running away from home wasn't necessary since no one was usually in the house. When we stayed out late, no one seemed to care. Society regards hardworking Chinese as the model minority, but our family system was compromised. The guys who turned to the gangs were desperately seeking identity empowerment. Most were willing to do anything to be accepted. Without a doubt, our self-esteem was lacking to begin with. We also desired the finer things that represented status and success, but we were ashamed of our parents working coolly jobs. It's as though they failed us. We wanted cars, clothes, and cash to come fast and easy. And we wanted to live on our terms and to make up our own rules.  The dark side seemed more attractive. Guys didn't get jumped in to be a member or jumped out to leave the gang. Secret societies whose origins date back to the first century AD in China had specific initiation rituals and bylaws which demanded allegiance for life. Members who switched to a different clan or committed other acts of betrayal faced death. But with the independent gangs I became involved with, they were traditional yet less formal. Animals were not sacrificed and ceremonies were not always a prerequisite. That didn't mean a guy could just walk in and out. Members who were critically wounded or served hard time on behalf of the gang earned exit passes. Reform kids learned that being labeled and connected has serious liabilities. Once you made enemies, you relied on the gang for protection. Putting the word out that so and so was no longer affiliated meant it was open seizing on him. Most who gave up the gang were forced to move away. Keep in mind that these gangs were organized and had chapters in virtually all Chinese communities. If you became privy to sensitive information on the group, you were vulnerable. These guys survived by being extremely careful and trust didn't come easily. They couldn't afford to have underlings out there suddenly developing a conscious who may turn against them. Keeping close track of the members was mandatory. Instilling fear was a common deterrent. The Chinese underworld had its own idiosyncrasies. I was surprised by how superstitious most of the guys were. Sure, they would abide by established codes, but other factors also regulated their behavior. For instance, it was bad luck to commit a crime when it was raining. Depths were settled prior to year's end. Conflicts were avoided the first week of the new year. The morning period following death of members was also sacred. Statutes of Guangdai, the god of war, were positioned high on the premises of businesses to guard against shoplifters, robbers, and other negative forces. The belief was that those who misbehaved faced the spiritual wrath of this hero. Some of us took this seriously, especially since Guangdai was also our protector in the underworld. I actually returned stolen knives from a store after being up all night with Guangdai's image haunting me. His intimidating figure was more of a deterrent in guards, alarms, or video cameras. It felt silly returning to the shop the following day, discreetly taking the knives out of my pocket and putting them back on the shelf. Yet I was convinced that it was the only way to make amends with Guangdai. Guns were the weapons of choice. From revolver's automatic pistol, semi-automatic rifles to shotguns, by the mid-70s, gangs in Chinatown had easy access to firearms in all sizes, shapes, and calibers. Virtually everyone had a source. Some of the middle school kids were rewarded with guns. Stephen Lam, 13, a student at Marina Middle School, was being groomed to head up his own Joe Boy Group. One day his mom was going to his room and found a loaded .22 revolver. She had never seen or touched a gun in her life. Mrs. Lam picked it up and inadvertently pulled the trigger back, locking it into firing position. She was stunned and didn't know what to do. She gently placed the gun in her purse and ran around the neighborhood, looking for Stephen or any of his friends to help her. She ruled out going to the police or telling her husband for fear of bringing attention to Stephen. Mrs. Lam finally arrived at Tiger's house and he took the gun from her. She insisted that he keep it. It's a miracle the .22 didn't go off as Mrs. Lam was transporting it. We really put our parents through hell. Many felt guilty not being there for us and they assumed that if they worked hard, the family would be fine. Attorney fees, jail visitations, and funerals weren't exactly what they had in mind. Drive-bys occurred, but the traffic congestion in Chinatown limited as a regular mode of attack. Quite a number of killings involved assailants on foot who maneuvered into close range, hit their target, then disappeared into the crowd. Cars were also torched in the war. Once Dave Tam of the Hop Singh Boys parked this beautiful white mid-60s Chevrolet and Pala in front of Matt's house in North Beach. This occurred shortly after one of our cars had been firebomb. Most of the warring gang members knew where one another resided. Yet when he returned, Dave was shocked to find his pride and joy toasted to the ground. In the mid-70s, the San Francisco police went out on strike and the Chinese underworld capitalized on the opportunity. Virtually all gangs were involved in the crime spree. Jewelry stores in Chinatown were hit, restaurants and garment factories were robbed, and selective looting took place. It was anarchy, but most of the crimes were unreported. It didn't do any good. Police were not adequately staffed and police reports weren't needed since most businesses were uninsured. In fact, most of the establishment had their own secrets to conceal and didn't want to risk drawing attention to themselves. Liangjiai's punks were known to enter bars and restaurants extorting the owners by simply sitting one per table.  Without lifting a finger, the message was clear. No payoff, no customers. When we ventured out, money wasn't needed, especially if we stayed around Chinatown. At nightclubs, people were always buying us drinks to get on our good side. Some owned businesses and wished to be left alone while others wanted to be a peer connected to us. When we ate out, one of us would simply sign his name on the bill. Once about 20 of us had seal year, late snack at CyEarns on Jackson Street. When the check came, Peter went through each item with the restaurant manager, questioning the prices and demanding that certain dishes be deducted because they didn't meet our standards. He even suggested how each dish could have been prepared better. After a lengthy dialogue, the manager agreed to adjust the charges. Okay, gam zhong am le. Okay, now that's correct, Peter said, and simply scribbled his name on the check. We couldn't stop laughing as the manager wore the most disgusted look on his face. He knew when we walked in, we had no intention of paying for our meal. Haggling over the bill and insulting the chef was just rubbing it in his face and dishonoring him. I knew if the restaurant was tongue affiliated, our actions would be perceived as an insult, provoking them to come after us. At the very least, there were consequences. I didn't eat much during those stunts and avoided my father when I got home. Chapter eight, the Golden Dragon Massacre. The Golden Dragon Massacre was the worst mass murder in San Francisco's history. The crime threatened the city's sanctity and livelihood. It uncovered the dark side of the Chinese culture. For more than 10 years, beginning at age seven, I peddled illegal fireworks in Chinatown. My friend Tread and I retired after the summer of 1972 as we approached our 18th birthdays. The timing was appropriate as the business had turned real ugly. The Hua Qing started demanding protection money from dealers. On top of that, these gangsters were selling fireworks themselves. You were supposed to pay and compete with them as well. Increasing the price to cover the payoff wasn't prudent because the phageites undercut everyone's prices. Kids from the Dong, East and Zhong, Middle Ping, Yun housing projects, half a block apart, made up most of the fireworks dealers. Some stood to ground and refused to pay. The gangs counted the number of dealers and demanded a specific amount be collected together. Those who held out placed a burden on others to come up with the money. Arguments and fistfights broke out among dealers who were friends. The only alternative was to drop out and let the hawk sale away. Chinese underworld monopolized the business. But dealers from the projects had to sell off their inventory one way or another to recoup their initial investments. On May 31st, 1977, Ken Louie, the 20 year old leader of the Hopsing Boys in forces of the powerful Hopsing Tong organization was murdered near his home. Witnesses stated that he was spotted being chased by an agent youth as he stepped out of his house at 2.30 p.m. in the city's North Beach neighborhood. As the gang leader jumped into his parked car attempting to flee, his killer approached from the passenger side and fired into the vehicle. After Ken was wounded, the assassin reached in through the shattered window and continued blasting away. Most of the dozen shots fired from the wall to automatic hit their mark. Ken was highly visible in the extortion racket and there was talk in Chinatown that he recently beat up an old man who was a member of a rival tongue. The bottom line is that many in Chinatown had motive. Still, the police focused their investigation on us, the Joe boys. With the fireworks season underway, our gang with a loose membership of about 150 to 175 negotiated to protect the project dealer during the 4th of July period, which has skyrocketed into a six-figure business. On the evening of July 4th, the Hopsing Wee enforcers came to collect their final payoff.  It was Dodge City in Chinatown. Weapons were drawn and gunfire erupted with gangsters running up and down the street, ducking behind cars and into doorways, blasting at one another. Matt, Ewan, and Ted Jung from our side were shot while a Hopsing Boy named Dave Tam, who was wearing a bulletproof vest, got hit in the left hand and right arm. More Joe boys arrived and surrounded the Zhongping Yun. Tiger and two others approached the stairwell. He opened the door and entered first. As Tiger started up the stairs, he found himself staring into a gun barrel. He turned to run, bang, Tiger was hit. Shot in the back, he fell forward in the courtyard. As he lay motionless, a bystander rushed to his aid. As Tiger was turned over, blood gushed out from his chest. The bullet had passed through his heart and he bled to death. He was just 17. Our guys took Matt to Harbor Emergency, a community clinic a few blocks away where Dave Tam was also treated. Ironically, both were transported to the hospital in the same ambulance. Ted sought help by limping into the police station. It's a blessing I wasn't with them that night. As I was leaving the house to join the guys, my mother pleaded with me to drive her to my sisters across the bay for their annual summer party. My brother, who had been expected to take her, wasn't able to do it. No way, I said, I have plans and I'm already late. As I was leaving, the phone rang. It was my sister Mary. William, please do me a big favor and drive her over here. That's the reason I never made it to Chinatown. Without a doubt, I would have been with Matt and Tiger when the shootings went down. We were usually together. My guardian angel was watching over me again. Let me jump ahead and read the epilogue and start taking questions after that. The epilogue is dated fall of 1996. The San Francisco Police Department's gang task force was formed after the 1977 Golden Dragon Massacre. Its officers had me under surveillance and they were presently tracking my runaway son. When I filed a missing report on Eric, the GTF informed me that he had been recruited into Chinatown's most ruthless gang. It was after 3 a.m. on a cold foggy morning as my car crawled through Waverly Alley and came to a stop at the entrance to Chinese playground. Haunted by the violence and other horrifying experiences that took place here, I swore nearly 20 years ago never to return. The sidewalk was deserted as I walked in the main level, which was pitch dark. Scowling and frustration at the burnt-out bulb atop the streetlight, I prayed to find Eric unharmed and willing to return home with me. I had not seen or heard from him in weeks. Officers of the gang task force who were closely monitoring gang activity in Chinatown reported that an Eric Lee, age 14, was questioned there earlier in the evening when a major fight broke out. That unnerved me. Rival gangs, including those I fought against in the 1970s, were still clashing over the playground to claim it as their turf. As I combed the grounds with bore no resemblance to my childhood sanctuary, there wasn't a single so in sight. Returning to my car, I sat and reflected on my upbringing of Eric, wondering what I did wrong. Perhaps being more open about my past, might have deterred Eric from the gangs. He also said something dark about his grandfather, which I concealed from him. When my father passed away in 1992, we held one of the most lavish Chinese funerals in the city's history. Eric, who was only 10, was curious about a particular group of men who participated in the final rites. They were the top elders of Chinatown's most powerful tongues. As each took their turn and bowed in front of the casket, a Cantonese-speaking woman sitting behind us made a comment. Dad, what did she say? Eric asked. It was nothing, I replied. Her comment was that she had never seen all the dragon heads, or underworld leaders together in one place. I didn't see any purpose in tainting Eric's perception of his grandfather or his associates. I wanted Eric to have positive role models and to keep them as far away from the underworld as possible. My next stop was a video arcade on the Broadway strip, where three Asian youths, Eric's approximate age, were hovering around a loud flickering machine, cussing in both Cantonese and English. Lid cigarettes dangled from the sides of their mouths. Two of them turned quickly and gave me the ones over. The third one with streaks of dyed blonde hair was gripping the zippered edge of the black jacket with his elbow tucked in, a conspicuous sign that he was packing. Whether or not they knew the whereabouts of my son, I had to restrain myself from attacking them out of frustration.  My fear was that Eric was following in my footsteps and experienced similar horrors on the streets. I knew all too well how to die lows or gang bosses exploited fresh recruits. I was in a state of panic. All the trauma in my life combined didn't equate to the anguish I felt, knowing that my family's dark legacy had been passed down. My father couldn't keep me out of the haxia wui and now I faced the same predicament with my son. That's really seeking out my longtime psychotherapist, Ellen, who had always been there for me. I discovered that she was no longer available. Ellen, who was only in her 40s, had passed away unexpectedly. The difficulties with my son and the loss of Ellen unleashed all my past demons from Chinatown to Silicon Valley. I felt hopeless and alone, suspecting God of using me, just so he could save others. And now he was abandoning me in my greatest time of need. I was emotionally bankrupt. That's when I hit rock bottom. The crisis I went through was a humbling experience which forced me to examine and transform my life. I realized now that returning to Chinese playground was essential for me to let go of my past and move away from the dark side. This is where it all began. My obsession with winning, bullying people, making money and being a good soldier. The playground is where I sought refuge and learned to numb my childhood pain of feeling unwanted and worthless. My parents' crude attempt to abort my birth and to sell me away was simply the start of my problems. Beginning as a young boy, my engagement in high risk and self-destructive behavior served as a powerful narcotic for me and I became addicted to the action. When I jumped across rooftops, gambles, fought, dodged bullets or won a corporate battle, the euphoria offered a temporary reprieve for my suffering. My view of the world was bleak but the more I lied resorted to violence so cheated and hustled, the worse I felt about myself. Sadly, the reason why I was able to stay calm and assist others in crisis situations is due to the fact that I was constantly on edge. I didn't feel safe anywhere or anytime. Life in my view was one giant minefield. I survived by tiptoeing around, being cautious and suppressing my emotions, especially fear. God has guided me on an amazing journey. On numerous occasions, he chose me to save others. God never abandoned me. He brought me back to Chinese playground for my most important mission, to save myself. My initial objective in writing Chinese playground was to draw attention to the dark side of the Chinese culture. As my life has been transformed and my soul is healing, I hope this story touches and provides encouragement to people of all cultures struggling with their own childhood demons. The world is a terrifying place for a child who doesn't feel safe or loved.  They cope with their pain by obsessing in food, diet, alcohol, narcotics, gambling, shopping, sex, self-immutilation, cosmetic surgery, violence, competition, work, and the list goes on and on. But if I can learn to trust and find decency in myself, others can as well. The tendency is to try to do it alone but the miracle of recovery fellowships is love and support that is bountiful. The vulnerable child in all of us deserves to be loved and cared for. I am presently on hiatus from the high tech industry and continue to work hard on my recovery. I am committed to serving as a good role model for Eric who is entering college. Thank you very much. Again, I really encourage you to ask questions. You can also speak with me outside of the auditorium for the book signing, but I really would encourage you to establish some dialogue now. Anything regarding the story about my past or even about the publication of the book and Laurel come around and, yes. Who's he asking about writing the story? Well, thank you for asking that. I had actually thought about writing the book after I left the gangs and again I thought about writing my story about what had happened in Silicon Valley with that massacre. And I really do believe that if the story had been written at that point, it really would have been very arrogant and very dark. It would have probably been encouraging for people to probably get obsessed with winning, making money and competition. But my enthusiasm for writing the book had to do with a somewhat of a cadarsis. It was like a healing process for me where it was basically written right when I was very much at a low learning to kind of picking myself back up. And it was also extremely painful because of a lot of the past and the visions that were very vivid that at the same time it was kind of rehashing them over and over again. I went to Galileo and it's actually, and the book details my time, dear, I was actually expelled from Galileo and I fought to get back in. Did you hate writing? Actually, I liked English and that was one of the few classes that I attended. I couldn't figure out why. And I guess, again, more than anything, it doesn't make sense for me to actually have any type of proficiency in that type of academic subject. But I really do believe it's my purpose to share my story with the community and also with other cultures as well. And my enthusiasm for writing the book is that the story is needed because of the healing and a lot of the demons that are still within not only us but in the community. There's, as I go and I talk to the schools, I talk a lot about the unique dynamics that happens with Asian families where you're looking so much at the hardworking type of people. There's strong emphasis in academics, but when kids are going through a rebellious period, it's horrible for them because not everyone get into low or into cow and sometimes when the parents are working so much, there's a disconnection that happens and the kids mention that the only time they ever connect with their parents is when their parents are yelling at them for getting in trouble or not doing good enough in school and what have you. And then you've got the organized gangs that are ready to take them in and to give them a whole new life that no one can really compete against because you're talking about having money, cars, sex, muscle, no one can mess with you and you're going through a period where you don't think you need your parents and the gangs are actually telling you you don't need your parents. Yes. Do you still keep in touch with your friends or the ex gang members? No, the only time I had had contact with them was recently when they threatened me at a book signing. I had not seen them for over 20 years. I'm fairly aware of what they're involved in but it's unfortunate that when they approach me to threaten me, that basically blew their cover and confirmed that they are still involved in a lot of underworld activities and it brought a lot of attention to them from a number of law enforcement agencies. I think there was a question here. How did you feel about the gang shooting last year? The gang shooting last year at Chinese playground? It didn't surprise me because I still spend some time in Chinatown and when I go down there, I sense that there's still a lot of activities and I knew that Chinese playground was still a turf that a couple of the groups were basically kind of fighting over and I think there's positive that can come out of it because the city initially did not want to acknowledge that it was gang related but eventually it came out and a reporter as well as other people came out with some information about it and so I think it actually could help draw attention to the fact that the gangs and the organized gangs and the elders in Chinatown are still manipulating a lot of the and exploiting a lot of the use. I'm curious what kind of psychology you used on your son to counsel him since obviously you were in an awkward position, right? You were once a perfect negative role model so that seems tricky to me. Well actually, I failed initially because I tried to protect him and I tried to shield him from my past. When he was very young and in grammar school, he used to talk to me and says, Dad, I bet you were a troublemaker when you were younger. He would just figure I was probably a class clown, someone who might have gotten mischievous here and there and but at the same time, the fact that we spent time together, I didn't serve as a very good role model, I thought I did. But sooner or later I realized that he was actually a target for the gangs because they knew he knew how to make money, he knew how to hustle and he learned that from me because I actually helped him start a business when he was only 10 years old that became a national mail order business and he began to realize that what was important was to make money and to win and that he basically learned from me that it was a doggy dog world and when he ran away, I took the wrong time to share with him my past and that backfired because suddenly he realized that it was probably in his blood and it gave him more of a reason to go into the underworld and it wasn't until it went through a long period of time that we were really disconnected and he hated me and he didn't want anything to do with me and I was basically afraid of our relationship. I was afraid that if we got back together that I would continue to serve as a negative role model and it took a lot of healing for us to get back to where we are right now. So as far as with the psychology, I think that's the perfect example of why physicians don't treat their family members and people who are in counseling or in therapy actually need to get to outside resources and to get support themselves. He actually was involved in the process as far as reading it through and he also needed to give me permission to share what information that he was mentioned in there. Some people actually stated that they wanted more information on him but I'm not in a position to exploit his life and I also need to guard his privacy and it's also unfortunate because his life has also been threatened because of the book. What gang were you in? Starting very young as far back as I was probably five, six years old. There was already gangs I was affiliated with in Chinatown that sold fireworks and ran around and got into fights and then when I was older, we had a gang at Marina. We had gangs at Galileo. There were different names and so forth but the more the formal one that was highly organized was the Joe boys and that was the one that was, that was the gang that was involved in the Golden Dragon Massacre.  Absolutely, the last part?  Well, leaving the gang, that's probably a good point because in 1978 when the Golden Dragon Massacre, when the trial came up, they basically, there were informants in the gang so the gang was totally blown apart from the inside. The trial involved the organization, all the members were stated, they were all laid out. My name was up there. I was actually the first one that was questioned about the Golden Dragon Massacre and because of the fact that the gang basically disbanded and I was mistaken for an informant, that was somewhat of my way out. But as far as my fear of them wanting to kill me, they've actually, there has been members who have approached me who have made it clear that writing the book was not good for me or my son and that was basically interpreted as a death threat and there's probably besides former associates I'm sure there are other people in the underworld who would also like to set an example of the fact that someone should not be speaking about the Chinese underworld and sharing revelations about the details of it. Is the Chinese underground very disconnected with the Vietnamese underground and underworld or do you know who's in which gang and who's doing what illegal activity in what part of town? Well, when you say you, I guess I mean this let's say law enforcement or I don't know you say me in particular. So Chinese gang member, do they keep track of the gang members in the other ethnic neighborhoods? They're okay, in the past, there are groups that kind of bad track a little bit. A lot of Vietnamese are of Chinese ancestry and many who actually come over are actually fluent in Cantonese and in Vietnamese and there are Chinese gangs, there are Chinese Vietnamese gangs. In fact, this is public information that there's been reports that in fact, when in 1995, there was a shooting on Stockton Street and they stated that it was different factions of the Jackson Street boys, they talk about how there was one that was exclusively a Chinese group and another group that had Chinese and Vietnamese and they were actually in conflict over some turf and some other issues within their own group. So the gangs, they tend to know, yes, there's generally just a few groups right now, the main groups that law enforcement are keeping track of. But at the same time, there's also a lot of disorganization. I'm sure people in high school know that sometimes someone gets beat up, they don't think there's someone who's connected, then they find out that if someone's uncle or brother or what have you and then kind of all hell breaks loose. So it's not a perfect scenario. Are there any other questions? But the book, the publication of it or anything else? I'd like to just ask how the publication of the book and sort of what's happened to you emotionally since you wrote the book? It hasn't been an easy ride, it's probably one of the most difficult things that I've done. It's actually been very well received and the important for me was to retain the voice because I think for the community especially for the kids because if there was one audience that it was written for is actually for the teens. So that if, and I know it's actually made an impact because I've gone to specific schools to talk about the story and about what it took to write the book and I've gotten some feedback. It hasn't always been positive but the fact that it's made a difference to them that has impacted them. For myself, it's still a very difficult process because I'm still working on the distribution of it. We're right now negotiating. There's been a lot of interest in the film rights but I wanna make sure that it's not just a shoot them up type of a stereotypical film. I want the story to be communicated and I want it to be presented in the right manner so that there's an important message. Even if it means a couple of kids who are attracted to gangs go into the theater or read the book because they think it glorifies it and find out that the real message of it is that there's a lot of repercussions that happens for even myself where I thought I left the gang and I left the behind but it was still in me and I just manifested it in different ways. So right now, basically I live a total different lifestyle. I'm not obsessed and I don't measure myself through the success of money or status or prestige or anything else. And I actually openly share that every time when I have I don't do many appearances just security issues involved and plus this has not been about going to bookstores and do book signings and selling books. Most important for me is to get to the kids into the schools. I think there's one last question there. I think we do probably need to wrap up. I have an SF since you wrote about people in Chinatown. I'm sorry. Do you live in like SF since you still live since you wrote about people in Chinatown? I can't hear the first part. Do you live in San Francisco? Do I live in San Francisco? No, like since you wrote about people in Chinatown and stuff. I'm sorry. I'm having a hard time.  Yes, in fact I'm actually under basically all of the appearances that I do. My activity is monitored by law enforcement. Okay, thank you very much. Like I said, I'm actually gonna be outside for a little bit. I'd be more than happy to meet all of you just to even shake your hands or anything you'd like to ask me personally and what have you, but I really appreciate you coming and especially the ones have come from far away and also from Galeo. Thank you. Thank you, Billy.


The thought that when we go and make Tawaf around the Kaaba, that she's buried there. The fact that the like the most blessing you can get, like inside of the Hidrismail, like in that area, that's what she's buried, right? The fact that subhanallah, this is the woman that literally most people, if you're looking on the outside of it, you're thinking her husband abandoned her. You're thinking that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has just thrown her away literally in the desert. But subhanallah, Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala leaves her in the desert with the child. So many stories of like just a woman and a child. She's alone in the desert subhanallah. And as Ibrahim alayhi s-salam, Prophet Ibrahim alayhi s-salam is walking away. Where are you going? Where are you going? Ah, did Allah tell you to do this? That has to be Allah, that Allah is sufficient for me, and Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala will take care of me. He leaves. He leaves. She runs out of water. She runs out of food. I always think about how, how was she when it got dark? You know, you know, we think about like mashallah, all the lights from the clock tower in the McDonald's and all the hotels. No. None of that was there. She was literally a woman alone in the desert with a child. And it got dark.  Did you send me here to be eaten alive? Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is in the same. The seed of iman that's in your heart, they're going to witness it to the end of time. The seed of iman, the seed of towanqum, the seed of takwan that's in your heart, people are going to walk in your footsteps just to complete their faith. That you don't have, we don't complete our Islam of the body even until you walk in the footsteps of hajj, until you make hajj, until you go and visit her grave. Your, your iman is not even, you haven't finished it yet. You want to earn benefit? You want to become closer to Allah and go make umrah?  Go do that. Literally Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala builds the holiest city in the world around her. The holiest city in the world is built around her in her iman and her takwan and her towanqum. There's no secret why that would be the place that Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala would reveal the final message. There's no secret why that the Prophet Muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam would say, not only would be born there, not only that that the Quran would be recited there, subhanallah. But when the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam is going to Isra and Mi'raj and the angels come and wash his heart, they open his heart and what do they pour inside? Samzam, the fruit of her labor, the fruit of her iman. That's what the angels pour into the heart of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam for him to be able to take that journey of ascension. Subhanallah. That which remains of her iman gets poured into the heart of the Prophet sallallahu alayhi wa sallam. There's something special about that. When the tribe of Jorham comes and they come to her and they say, can we stay here? This is after Samzam, after Jabrayil comes, splits open the earth for her, which I just want you guys to keep. Like Jabrayil comes and descends for her. Right? Crocs open the earth for her. Samzam flows to sustain her. Subhanallah. Tribe of Jorham comes and they ask her, can we stay here? And she says, yes. But I control the water. When I love, this is one of those moments she's just like, what? What? Allah. First of all, how bold are you? Right?  There's no man here to protect you. What do you mean? Right? What are you talking about? We're an entire tribe. Woman who could take you over. But that kind of confidence comes from what? From a woman who knows her Lord. That kind of confidence comes from a woman who knows Allah. I'm that subhanallah. Inna Allah ma'a sabirin. Inna Allah ma'a muslinin. She has jaqeen. She has certainty despite what it looks like. Despite the apparent reality, she has absolute certainty without doubt, without question. My Lord is there for me. My Lord will take care of me. That as long as I remain firm upon surat al-mustaqim, Allah will never leave me. And so they honor that. They honor it. She controls the water. She controls the water. Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala has given each and every one of you a zemzem. Watch your zemzem. What is your gift? That is a means of healing and nurturing. That is a means of nourishment for those in your family, in your community.


So we trained in your network. Can we understand what is in there and how it works? Could we make sense of all the weights that are there, all the connections, everything they do together? Well, it's hard to know. We have written a paper recently with Tim Lallecrap, who's at Google DeepMind, where we argue that maybe no. But there are some aspects that we can visualize and we will do that because it will help us understand a few of the things. So what could, for example, be an idea? Now, we could start, for example, with a gray image and we look at a neuron and we can ask how can we change that image so that that neuron gets to be as active as possible? Now, what's the idea there? We want to basically optimize the image so that we optimize the output, which how would we do that? Well, we'd follow the gradients. So there's a beautiful literature that tries to visualize these aspects. And here's, for example, a set of findings from such a study where you can look at very low-level features on the left-hand side. What is that there? We find that there's some neurons that like local oriented filters and then some neurons that like local colors or color contrasts at the lowest level. Then, neurons are most activated by certain curvatures or things like that at the mid-level. And as you go towards higher levels, it's almost like we find things like the beaks of birds. Now, we can compare these results from the visualization of the early layers with the early layer with real neurons in early areas like primary visual cortex. And there we indeed find that we have very similar neurons in the real brain as we find it at the early layers of convnets.  We will not be doing exactly what they did in the previous studies I talked about, but we will take the network that you trained before and we will visualize which aspects of space matter that basically allows you to know where in space are things important. And now, do the results make sense to you?


And so we have three, well, two lovely women and me presenting their work today. We'll start with Helen Crump, who is a good friend of mine, a lovely, lovely human being. And she, her presentation is about her interpretation of open practices. And her title is Enacting the Value of Openness by Sharing. I'll leave you with her and then I'll introduce the next speaker, who is me. So you have everything, here's your clicker if you need it. Okay. I'll check the time for you, don't I? Okay, yeah. Why shall I tell you, wait, let me put the clock. I put 15, okay? So I can tell you when you have five minutes. Yeah, so, yeah.  So ready? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hi, my name is Helen Crump. I'm a PhD research student at the Open University in the UK. And my research is into open educational practices within the context of networked participatory scholarship. In this presentation, I'll outline how I conceptualize openness and how I utilize the idea of self-OER, that Suzanne Kossioglu and Mahabali proposed at OER 16. And how I used it as an interview prompt for discussion about open practices and the relationship with open educational resources. I'll then go on to outline how my analysis and interpretation is progressing, highlighting the role of sharing and little OERs in open practices before going on to consider how value is created and the nature of labor that this involves. In the term self-OER, Kossioglu and Mahabali propose that understanding of open educational resources should be widened from one that primarily regards open educational resources as openly licensed content to include individuals in the learning community. That is to see individuals or their practice as an open educational resource. They contend that an individual or the self and their practice can become an open educational resource by the process and products of open scholarship. Essentially, this is the connections or relationships that are formed and resources that are produced. Within this, they also contend that many individuals hold openness as a worldview or are open as a way of being. The idea of openness as a way of being really resonated with me. What's more, I was certain that it would resonate with others, so I used the idea of self-OER to facilitate interviews with 11 participants. Relative to their own practice, participants were asked to comment on the particular framing of openness and the depiction of practice within the idea of self-OER and to present a selection of texts or resources that exemplified their openness. This show-and-tell method proved a very useful way to surface aspects of practice, particularly the meanings that participants attribute to it and the relationship between practice and resources. And yes, the concept of self-OER resonated. All 11 participants, for a whole host of different reasons, said openness as a worldview or as a way of being was how they framed their practice. And for many, openness directly equates to sharing. Participants said openness for them was sharing. It was the human element. It was identity. It was being open to others. It's about life and it's about freedom. Before I move on, I have to say that I was really challenged in the early stages of my research with questions like, how does the self become an open educational resource and how might practice be seen as a resource and also the nature between discourse and materiality, which came out of my Emirates study. To resolve this, I adopted Karen Barad's idea of a phenomenon which derives from quantum physics. Instead of focusing on separate entities or agencies with inherent boundaries and properties, it means that openness is seen as a phenomenon in which there are no predetermined boundaries between the individual self, the resources produced, and the technology. Consequently, openness in my study is regarded as a single phenomenon. It's a process or a doing and it's enacted in practice. And my study is an interpretive case study which essentially seeks to describe openness in its distributive nature. At this point, I need to highlight the sorts of texts and resources that participants presented as exemplifying their openness and that they shared in practice. But let's see what Anna and Kimmons regard open or networked participatory scholarship as referring to teaching and research practices that espouse openness. And this takes three forms, open access publishing, open education, including OER and open teaching and networked participation. Participants refer to all these forms of scholarships and the texts or resources they presented covered this spectrum. But what was most noticeable was that everyone, to a greater or lesser extent, positioned their openness in relation to networked participation. This was either exemplified by their blog, their Twitter, an online community they belong to or a combination of similar things, Flickr and Instagram even. It seems that the aspect of social media and networked participation adds a certain vibrancy to openness. That is, it adds the human element. I was really struck by just how much meaning, purpose, desire, care and support that was on display.  As such... Right, you got it, there's humanity. As such, the majority of texts or resources presented were not typical OERs. They were what Martin Waller refers to as little OER, individually produced, low-cost resources that don't have explicit educational aims or learning outcomes. Consequently, their use can be unpredictable in unpredicted contexts. So broadening the definition of OER to include little OER means that we can now consider a continuum of resources. But this begs the question, how little can a little OER be and what exactly is viable as an OER? Back in 2006, Stephen Downs asked whether people could be considered open educational resources. And since then, a number of people have asserted that yes, they can. Okay, so when researching a phenomenon, Scott and Orlikowski ask, what does the phenomenon depend on? What drives practice? Well, overwhelmingly, and no surprise, openness is enabled by sharing. Kennedy points out that all those sharing is a central concept of networked culture. Its conceptual boundaries with other social theories of exchange haven't been established. Nor has a concept been adequately critiqued. And moreover, there are few empirical studies on how sharing is practiced when mediated by social media. Added to this, the notion of sharing presents many possible meanings. It relates to the distribution or division of physical resources, as well as to the sharing of an experience or disclosure of personal information. Good shared can be material or immaterial, and immaterial goods are intellectual or affective. Consequently, sharing has both social and economic dimensions, which are counterpoised in networked culture. That's a condition in which opposing forces are equal to one another and have balancing or contrasting effects. Typically, sharing in networked culture is explained in relation to gift-giving and its feature of reciprocity. Across the board, in some way or another, participants in my study equated openness with reciprocity. Explaining sharing in terms of gift-giving and reciprocity distinguishes it from commodity exchange. But you know what? Turns out there's no discreet theory of sharing. Following the work of Marcel Maus in 1954, sharing has conventionally been explained as a subcategory of gift exchange theory. However, anthropologists such as Wiedlach, who mainly study hunter-gatherer societies, have a host of empirical evidence that refutes sharing as being reciprocal. Gift-giving involves giving, receiving, and reciprocating, as such it's a two-way exchange between two people. It's about establishing and strengthening social bonds as in kinship relations. But sharing, on the other hand, is not reciprocal because although you receive something through sharing, you're not obligated to give something back to the same person. Sharing, then, is a one-way transfer that's multi-directional. It's not about strengthening social bonds per se, it's about enabling, indeed maximising, access opportunities all around. It's an economic mode of transfer that enables others to access what's needed or resolve intrinsic value. Sharing provides an alternative to both gift exchange and market exchange. And whilst more sharing is not initiated by the giver, rather it's prompted by the receiver in the form of a demand. This demand is on the basis of individuals, humans, sharing needs derived from the fact that they share the experience of life itself and that they recognise this as such. So this demand can be spoken or silent. The silent demand is founded on bodily presence. In the context of human sociality, bodily presence by itself constitutes a demand, a demand for being acknowledged as a human being with legitimate needs. For example, in anthropology, it's frequently observed that a person who silently positions themselves next to a fire or a cooking pot will most likely be given something by the person tending to it. And online, bodily presence equates to embodied presence and the invisible other or the lurker. Sharing practices are established, as I've said, through bodily co-presence. Ah, and Kate mentioned co-presence earlier. But they also involve communication or speech acts to structure the process. Plus, they also depend on the relationship or affordance of the thing being shared, as well as being influenced by the nature or materiality of the physical space involved. So the internet then is fundamentally a sharing technology. Its surveilling properties enable us to imagine the watching presence of others. Its infrastructure facilitates efficient resource sharing. And the addition of social media enables a social dimension of communication. The upshot is that the internet enables both the sharing out of resources and the sharing in of life experiences. In like this, and in contrast to gift giving, sharing is about creating opportunities and gaining access to what's needed or valued. It's not a matter of obligation and the imperative to reciprocate. Rather, it's about the opportunity to request. Which means the initiative is with the potential recipient. It enables them to request what they need. Things that are not already out there or not easily located. Sharing is a way to achieve one's needs or reach one's goals through the help of others. It's the recognition that fellow human beings can provide what's needed and it's the power that's asserted based on the recognition that we share life and we understand what others require. Oops, have I got the wrong thing? Oops, sorry. So, given this understanding of sharing in relation to openness we can see that when Pearl in my study says I ask for help that we're not talking about gift giving because people don't generally ask to be given gifts. She's demanding access to what she needs. Pearl was struggling with an aspect of her research so in order to get help she set up a Facebook group to get the help she needed. Now others can join the Facebook group and ask for help. Then there's a silent demand from the invisible imagined other. It was noticeable just how many participants were conscious of having an audience and the possibility that there were people out there with unfulfilled needs or who'd find something that they had to be of value. They hoped their posts, their comments or their resources would be useful to others. It was also noticeable just how much the texts or resources presented exhibited personal or social aspects. That is affective goods. There was such a lot, such a lot of lived experience on display relating to both professional and personal life. Jeff narrates his course Design Decisions. Sheila blogs about her struggles with openness. Rebecca shared her best cancer story and now research is in this area and Laura openly documents or narrates aspects of her professional life and professional life and personal practice. As we can now appreciate, sharing is about opportunity. The opportunity to request access to things we need or solicit opportunities for ourselves. Laura puts her finger on it when she says, the interrelated practice of sharing and openness is partially controlled and partially serendipitous. Either way, it's about it's about creating opportunities for yourself. She gives the example of provoking a discussion on Twitter by making a deliberately controversial statement. The exchange resulted in her being asked to contribute to a podcast. Maybe I should click this in more often. Right. People participate in communities and networks because there's value in it. People don't get value. People don't get value. People can't participate. In the first instance, value is derived in the immediate term from the experience of participation itself. This can simply be through connecting with others, asking a question and passing on information or providing feedback or just being with others who understand your challenges. On the other hand, value in the form of knowledge capital is something that can be realised later and this can take a number of forms. Participating in communities and networks helps develop an individual's skills and competencies. That is, it helps develop their human capital. Social relations and connections are also a form of knowledge capital and the cultivation of one's reputation is a social achievement that can also operate as a knowledge resource. Undoubtedly, open practices contributes to a reputational economy. Amongst the participants, there was no shortage of benefits derived from cultivating one's reputation. Invitations to speak at conferences, for example, reputation translates into a form of value as does... reputation translates into a form of value exchange as does human capital. However, it's the role of use value that intrigues me in all of this and commodification. It seems that open sharing practices are built around the concept of use value and that this helps foster the way in which value is created. Scholars such as Bertha and Bowens argue that the peer-to-peer sharing economy is founded on the promise of use value over exchange value and the partnership between the peer-to-peer economy and the market. However, I'm not sure how this works exactly because we've already acknowledged that once something like a little OER is out there its use is unpredictable in unpredicted context so it could easily become a commodity. As Kennedy points out, the exchange of information, data and immaterial labour that constitute open sharing practices gets transformed into a commodity to be exchanged. As Audrey Waters has highlighted, the aspect of value and the invisibility of labour in open practices. The relationship of openness to the labour market and the precarity of higher education was a noticeable feature in my study. Five out of eleven participants related to it in one way or another. Maeve and Libby acknowledged that they could see the benefits of sharing open practices in order to secure employment in precarious circumstances and Gabby said she was appreciative of the identity and support that open scholarship afforded her when she was in between institutions. It's important to analyse what's not included in material discursive practices. What's excluded matters because it remains in play as a constitutive element and guess what's not included in the discourse of open? Labour. Well-meaningly, the emphasis is on the product not the producer. Labour is downplayed and labelled as creativity and possibly and care. Considering that networked participatory scholarship requires the construction and performance of identities which are essentially established through a range of strategies involving some aspects of our life or our bios I'm drawn to Foucault's idea of bio power a disciplinary form of power over life and how this seems to have been appropriated into the workplace for productive processes, purposes. Moreover, how sharing seems to feed into this, considering that we're practically compelled to share as we recognise the needs of others. So under the term biocracy, Fleming highlights how productivity is increasingly dependent on social and personal aspects of human life for its value-creating qualities. Much of this tacit dimension can't be sourced or nurtured inside the institution. It's not just a matter of formal learning and explicit codified knowledge anymore value is increasingly derived from aspects of tacit knowledge that's learnt socially or informally. Moreover, it's generally developed beyond the formal remuneration process and as such it takes on the form of free work. Free work or free labour in the Biocratic Academy harnesses our free time and our self-organisation and our capacity for self-development. So why does this matter? What's at stake? Because it represents the enclosure of social value. It's the social commons that's at stake. It's the onslaught of the social factory. After transcribing participant interviews I wrote in my notes the word total capture and I've been trying to understand what this means ever since. In closing social value and the capture of the social commons in closing social value and the capture of the social commons forms a basis of neoliberal human capital theory that is we're no longer just participants in an economic exchange relationship rather we're the living embodiment of capital. Sharing practices capture value production from forms of socialisation founded on a communistic nature. Utilising our bios the diffusion of sharing practices promotes a systemic integration of ephemeral forms of sociality into value creation chains. Consequently scholars are beginning to see sharing as the indication of a broader process that re-socialises economic exchange. That is market exchange or commodification is becoming increasingly embedded in society in new and antagonising ways. Ok so yes life is sharing ok. But to what extent is life capital that is a question and to what extent is the self an open educational resource or simply a human resource. As Maeve concludes in my study ultimately I am the resource I have explained my research clearly and my concerns and apologies that I read it rambled. Thank you. Perfect timing. Is there any question? No, you don't want questions. It's a very dense work very theoretical and very incredibly well written. Ok, no questions then? Yes. Helen I'm sorry you have one. Sharing an example, I had an email the day from somebody who was struggling with something they wanted to understand and so I devoted a couple of hours of my time to this person because I believed they were acting reasonably but sometimes people come to me with a question and I know they haven't really tried to answer it they just see me as a short cut so that seems unfair so if I am an open educational resource I exercise a judgement whether the person is being reasonable fair, whether they merit my time or whether they are just being lazy so there seems to be a dimension here that's missing. Correct, because as there are three parts in my reading to giving, receiving and reciprocating there are actually three parts and it's a demand to request but you are also not obliged to answer the request I don't know what the third R is it's reject, you can ignore them and then the final one is relinquishing it's about giving things away just giving up something so you're right there is actually a little bit missing there you can actually not acquiesce to the demands but basically from what I'm reading is not a gift because it's like two way reciprocal kinship thing it's not about obligation it's the emphasis is on opportunity so that person asks you for something you don't do that in gift giving you don't ask for a gift so yes there was a little bit missing thank you any other question