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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 16, 2001)
‘Taste of Asia’ comes to county fairgrounds ■This year’s Asian Celebration will feature a performance of Taek Gyeon, a Korean martial art, by Kyung-Hwa Jung By Lindsay Bucnele Oregon Daily Emerald A Korean national treasure will perform the dying art of TaekGyeon at this year’s Asian Celebration. Also known as “Intangible Living Asset #76,” Kyung-Hwa Jung has worked to keep Taek Gyeon alive and is being featured in the celebra tion, hosted by the Eugene-Spring field Asian Council. “He started as a dedicated student and reached National Living Trea sure status in the 1980s,” said Tim Greathouse, who owns and operates Eugene HMD Academy, a Eugene martial arts school. “He’s carrying on the past and the future by keep ing this art alive.” Each year, celebration organizers pick a certain group or culture to be the focus of the celebration. This year’s chosen culture is Korea, and the celebration will include a spot light on a Korean dancing group from Tacoma, Wash., called “MorningGlo ry” and the performance of Jung. For the past 16 years, the Eugene Springfield Asian Council has been bringing an array of Asian entertain ment, food, and culture to Eugene in the form of the Asian Celebration. This year’s celebration, “A Taste of Asia,” will fill the Eugene Con vention Center/Fairgrounds Satur day and Sunday with entertainment from every Asian culture. “There’s nothing like this celebra tion in the state,” said Carrie Mat sushita, the marketing and public relations manager for the city of Eu gene. “It’s non-stop entertainment for two days.” Brent Tokita, president of the Eu gene-Springfield Asian Council, said the celebration combines per formances and exhibits, including musicians, dancers, martial artists, an Asian market and an Asian food court. “We draw in everyone with this celebration,” Tokita said. “It in cludes all the different Asian groups.” Asian groups range from the Ori ent to the Middle East, Tokita said. Tony Lum, co-chair of the cele bration and the chairman of enter tainment, said he tries to find an ar ray of diverse groups that like to “show off.” “We devised this celebration so that the people involved are allowed to express their culture through art forms and food,” Lum said. Every one of the estimated 500 people who perform at the event is a volunteer, and is someone who un derstands his or her culture and roots, Lum said. There will be two main stages this year, one designated as the main performance stage and the other for martial arts performances. One smaller stage will be located in the courtyard and will feature soloists and small craft demonstrations. Many martial art forms will be seen on the separate martial arts stage at the Asian Celebration. Jung will also be performing on the main stage, even though his performance is technically a martial art. Taek Gyeon is a martial art form that is thought to be the precursor to tae kwon do. Jung is the most recent in a line of three Grand Masters who have kept Taek Gyeon alive. Greathouse visited Jung last sum mer and helped to bring him to Eu gene for the celebration. “When the Japanese occupied Korea in 1910, they attempted to eliminate all Korean culture, in cluding the martial arts practiced there,” Greathouse said. “Just a few Grand Masters continued teaching the martial arts underground.” The council has worked to keep politics out of the celebration, some thing Lum said is hard to do when martial arts are involved. “Since there is such a long history of Asian countries fighting each oth er, we’ve asked for the martial arts demonstrations to be expressed more as an art form rather than com batant,” Lum said. That’s why Jung’s performance is so important to the celebration, Lum said. “The Grand Master’s performance is of the purest form,” Lum said. The Asian/Pacific American Stu dent Union at the University is help ing the American Red Cross bring in bone marrow transplant candidates at the celebration, is selling drinks to raise money, and has asked television anchors Christine Chang of local net work KEZI and Nina Liu of local net work KMTR to take part in a cooking demonstration. Kim Nakayama, who does com munity outreach with APASU, said the Red Cross is looking for bone mar row from minority groups, particu larly Asians, to meet the needs of those who need stem cell transplants. “Bone marrow candidates need more Asian donors,” Nakayama said. “Asians carry similar traits, in cluding bone marrow, which makes it easier to make matches. ” Cocaine continued from page 1 come down. “It’s not a good feeling when [the cocaine] wears off,” Smith said, explaining that coming down from a cocaine high can be a physically painful, depressing process. “Your body is really heavy,” she said. “It feels like ce ment is filling up your body. You can’t pick yourself up. I think that’s how people get addicted: They take more to feel better. ” Smith also pointed out that the people she knows who use cocaine are not “typical” drug abusers. They are the children of people who find themselves at the high end of the in come bracket. “They were the athletes and the country club kids,” she said. “The image goes along with the drug. It’s high maintenance; models use it. Other drugs don’t have that. Like, heroin is a dirty drug. ” Sophomore journalism major Will Charters has tried cocaine sev eral times. He explained that he tends to have strong opinions, and that he had just seen the movie “Traffic,” which made him think more about the social issues sur rounding cocaine. “I have a twisted logic because I decided to try cocaine just because it was a drug I hadn’t tried,” he said. “But I think most people try it be cause of the image. When people think of heroin, they think of nee dles and stealing and people falling over and twitching on their backs. Someone on coke is not going to stare at a lava lamp. They won’t be standing in a corner tripping out.” Instead, Charters said, “They will be talking and socializing with everybody else at the party. ” Charters thinks that the drug ecsta sy is a natural gateway to cocaine. “The effects are similar,” he said. “I think ecstasy is the most danger ous drug out there because people don’t think it’s dangerous. There were all these articles about it in Time and Newsweek that were not entirely negative. It got all this me dia attention; kids started doing it more. Why not try cocaine? “It’s like the media jumps on new designer drugs: ‘What’s the new thing that’s killing our kids?’ Co caine has fallen out of media atten tion,” he said. But according to Charters, lack of media attention does not signify a decrease in drug use. “Cocaine is still out there,” he said. Bead It! 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