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  • - [switch clicks] - [electric razor buzzing]

  • SOPHIA CHANG: If you ask Asians in the creatie

  • if their parents can describe what they do,

  • no.

  • What does that mean to manage a?

  • The gift that hip-hop gave me ws

  • expressing myself in a way that was... raw.

  • Wu-Tang helped give voice to my.

  • [crowd shouting]

  • I am now an author.

  • I wrote a book.

  • My story speaks to the world.

  • ALL: Woo!

  • SOPHIA: But the people that I most wanna impact

  • are women of color.

  • What I am doing with any of thes that I'm telling my story

  • is cracking open the world's imn

  • on what an Asian woman can be,

  • what a single mother can be,

  • what a middle-aged woman can be.

  • My daily existence is an act of.

  • CARLOS WATSON: The most extraordinary lives

  • follow undefined paths.

  • To find your voice,

  • you may need to journey into the unknown.

  • I'm Carlos Watson, editor of OZY,

  • and these are "Defining Moments"

  • instrumental music

  • - Hey.

  • Do I get a hug or a shake?

  • SOPHIA: [laughs] You get a hug.

  • - Nice to meet you. - Hello, Mr. Watson.

  • Nice to meet you too. - Thank you for having me in yo.

  • - Thank you for coming. - Yeah.

  • - This is an Asian household, so you have to take off your sh.

  • I don't, though. - Oh, you don't but I do?

  • - Yeah, kind of, that's how it ,

  • because mine are clean, and I'm, and I get to keep my shoes on.

  • - You know what, your house, yo-

  • - Thank you. My rules. I apprec.

  • - That's great.

  • Hi. Thank you for having me her.

  • - I'm so excited that you're he.

  • - Um... you're not a New Yorker.

  • - I'm not. I'm, I'm from Vancour

  • but smash cut into New York.

  • Hip-hop was kinda my first introduction to it.

  • CARLOS: What would have happened if you had not gone into hip-ho?

  • SOPHIA: Oh, I don't think I woue the same woman I am today.

  • If it wasn't for Wu-Tang, I wouldn't have the kids I have.

  • I simply don't know what my life would have looked like

  • had I not gone into hip-hop.

  • I was born and raised in Vancou.

  • Child of Korean immigrants.

  • My mother escaped North Korea.

  • She left behind siblings and he. She never saw them again.

  • And she met my father at the University of Seoul.

  • They got married, and they came to Vancouver

  • probably in '64, and I was born.

  • Where I grew up was almost exclusively white,

  • so I faced lots of overt racism.

  • I got called chink, I got calle,

  • I got called gook.

  • HEESOK CHANG: My sister put a lot of energies

  • into wanting to be assimilated,

  • especially I think in the high school years.

  • SOPHIA: Every image I see of bey and power and sex appeal

  • is whiteness.

  • I was ashamed of being Asian fot just a little bit, but for a lo.

  • When I had to talk about my parents' names,

  • that was embarrassing.

  • Listening to my parents talk with heavy accents was embarras.

  • When people came over and they smelled our food,

  • it was embarrassing.

  • HEESOK: There was a period when she, uh,

  • I think was kind of reacting against family traditions,

  • sitting down at, uh, the table ,

  • which was very important for myy and eating Korean food.

  • Sometimes my sister would see what my mom had cooked

  • and she would make herself a grilled cheese sandwich.

  • It created a lot of tension bet,

  • her and my father.

  • SOPHIA: I was always defiant.

  • I was angry.

  • And hip-hop showed me

  • how to fine-tune that anger and.

  • The first time I heard Grandmaster Flash and the Furio,

  • the first time I heard The Mess,

  • it was such a light bulb moment.

  • - ♪ It's like a jungle sometime

  • It makes me wonder how I keep from going under

  • - In retrospect, I believe

  • that the reason that it resonatd with me so deeply

  • is because... it was

  • people of color taking control of their own narrative.

  • CARLOS: How old were you? - I was 17.

  • - I do remember her being very d

  • when she first discovered hip-h,

  • and I could tell that it was moe than the music.

  • SOPHIA: If you're the child of , most of us were raised

  • to take safe jobs.

  • My father, God rest his soul, a math professor.

  • My mother, a librarian.

  • My brother is now a tenured English professor at Vassar.

  • There's no doubt that I was supposed to be an academic.

  • There was nothing academic that really stimulated me.

  • Hip-hop just opened my eyes, like, oh my God.

  • I was so anxious to get to New k that I skipped

  • my graduation from University.

  • University of British Columbia is where my father taught,

  • it's where my mother worked, it's where my brother graduated.

  • And then their daughter's like, nyeh, I'm just gonna go.

  • That was probably really disappointing for my par.

  • CARLOS: Unhappy with the future her parents prescribed for her,

  • Sophia rejected her native cult,

  • and would forge her own path

  • motivated by the need to create her own identity.

  • hip-hop music

  • HEESOK: My sister lived in a tit right above the subway.

  • - I just fell into the scene, I got ensconced,

  • and it was just

  • this world that was so

  • new and vibrant.

  • - I was in graduate school, and she would make me hip-hop t,

  • and they were, uh, they were fa.

  • Big Daddy Kane, EPMD,

  • Public Enemy, Leaders Of The Ne.

  • SOPHIA: This is a letter that I sent to my brother

  • on June 8th, 1988.

  • "Not much to write, but here are the tapes I promised so long ag.

  • "I started writing a song-by-sos

  • "of the hip-hop tape, but that will take me a while th

  • so it's forthcoming."

  • soft music

  • HEESOK: So I used to visit my sister, uh, fairly often,

  • and she took us to, uh, these cs that were playing hip-hop music.

  • She was in the eye of the storm.

  • SOPHIA: There were these three promoter.

  • They had this brilliant idea to have clubs,

  • and they named them after choco.

  • Payday is the one that I remember the most.

  • There was also 100 Grand Bar. There was Mars Bar, I think.

  • And they would move from spot t.

  • Like, I remember one I'm prettye was at a Ukrainian hall.

  • One was at a deserted Chinese r,

  • and it was just such a sense of.

  • There was no social media.

  • There were no cell phones, so wd just get the flyer and call eac,

  • oh my God, it's gonna be here, it's gonna be there.

  • It was like going on, like, a wild goose chase. It was awes.

  • One of the people that I met in New York was Sean Carasov,

  • this surly Brit who was doing A&R Jive in New York,

  • and he was moving to LA.

  • And he said, "Sophie,

  • [in English accent] I think youd come and interview for my job."

  • [in normal voice] And I was like, "Really? Wow, o"

  • I went and I interviewed with Bs who was the president of Jive,

  • and he told me later, he said, "The minute you walked in the d,

  • I knew that you wouldn't get th"

  • I'm sure Barry had doubts aboute because I'm a woman,

  • I'm Asian, I'm Canadian,

  • but after an hour and a half of, he gave me the job

  • and I asked him recently, I sai, "Barry, why did you give me the"

  • And he said, "Because you were . deeply embedded in the scene

  • that I knew that you would be a good scout."

  • Rico Wade and Ray Murray, two of the guys in Organized No.

  • CeeLo... 40...

  • Gipp, Joe.

  • Historic.

  • MICHAEL OSTIN: I had the good fe of meeting Sophia

  • through some, uh, mutual collea,

  • and I was taken with Sophia imm.

  • She's such a... incredible force of nature.

  • I mean, there's no doubt Sophia was a fish out of water.

  • I mean, hip-hop and that world was misogynist

  • but she just was super-enthusia,

  • uh, very knowledgeable, and she was fearless.

  • - Were you the only Asian--

  • - I was the first. I was the first Asian woman.

  • There were other Asian men and women that came after me

  • but '87,

  • they're not like I was in there and not working.

  • So were there other Asians in the clubs? For sure.

  • But I actually had a formal posn as an A&R person,

  • which was pretty striking.

  • When I was at Jive, I did A&R which means I'm the talent scou,

  • and it means that you're getting a whole bunch of demo tapes

  • and you're listening to them,

  • and a lot of them are garbage.

  • And the Wu-Tang demo, three songs.

  • Protect Ya Neck, Tearz, and Met.

  • I remember putting it on and gog

  • "Wow!

  • What is this?" There were nine .

  • Nine MCs. I mean, that's crazy.

  • That didn't really exist like t.

  • So there's no way Jive would si.

  • Loud ended up signing them, but I was still so excited.

  • I was a Wu evangelist.

  • I was playing that shit for any. I was like, "Listen to this!"

  • I knew that I wanted to meet RZ.

  • I knew that he was the brains b.

  • And I got a meeting with him and it was the summer of '93.

  • He was gangly and taller than I'd expected.

  • He greeted me with--

  • RZA: Hey, Soph.

  • SOPHIA: We went down the streete to Lox Around the Clock for lun.

  • I then grilled him with questios about the Clan.

  • He told me that most of them had met in Staten Island,

  • which they called "Shaolin."

  • RZA had a unique worldview and clear vision for the group.

  • When we parted, I thought,

  • that's one of the smartest mother [no audio] I've ever met.

  • As I walked north on 6th Avenue wondering when we'd next meet,

  • he called out-- RZA: Yo, Soph.

  • SOPHIA: I turned quickly. RZA: Next time, lunch is on me.

  • - And immediately, they take me.

  • You know, "Come here, Soph. You're with us now."

  • I went to the studio and I had met Method Man

  • and he rushes me into the backrm and he says,

  • "Sophie, Sophie, you gotta come. You gotta watch my,

  • "you gotta watch my video.

  • I, I just got back the video for Method Man."

  • And he shows me the video and sitting across from me

  • and watching me is this guy,

  • and when the video's finished, ,

  • "Where are you from?"

  • Now, any person of color can tet

  • that's rarely a question, it's a statement.

  • It's saying

  • who the [no audio] do you think?

  • 'Cause you don't belong here.

  • Before I could answer, Method just flew in between us

  • and he yelled,

  • "That's Sophie Chang, and she's down with Wu-Tang.

  • Never disrespect her again."

  • On the one hand, I'm getting,

  • "You don't belong here. This isn't for you."

  • But the flipside of that is hern

  • saying to him, "This is for her.

  • "This is her home.

  • She is our family."

  • Growing up as a yellow girl in a white world

  • wanting to be white,

  • I didn't really belong.

  • Growing up being raised by Wu-T,

  • I belonged perfectly.

  • So in the process of working at, I think what I discovered

  • was I'm a hustler,

  • and I love looking for opportun.

  • So I met somebody who worked at.

  • Uh, she did marketing and I did.

  • So those are, those are two sids of a record. Right.

  • And so it occurred to me, wow, I have both sides of the coin h.

  • I have me as a talent scout, and I have her as a marketing p.

  • We should combine forces and start a company.

  • Um, and we did.

  • Michael, who was the head of A&, Warner Bros. Records,

  • gave my partner and I a consult.

  • But then the first person that r asked me to manage him was

  • Ol' Dirty Bastard from Wu-Tang.

  • And then I was managing RZA,

  • and he was the first person to e to general manage a label,

  • Razor Sharp Records, and I was .

  • Hip-hop embraced Sophia Chang,

  • but Wu-Tang claimed me.

  • - Sophia Chang is the yin to ou.

  • Sister. Sometimes she's in a sisterly spirit with us.

  • Mother. Sometimes she's in a motherly spirit.

  • All these different female chars at different times, you know,

  • Sophia has been able to be towards the Clan.

  • - It was interesting and excitig to see my sister

  • discovering her Asian-ness through hip-hop,

  • and it coincided with her relatp with Wu-Tang Clan.

  • It was sort of a perfect storm.

  • - Wu-Tang's infatuation for Asie was really intriguing to me.

  • Wu-Tang loved kung fu movies,

  • and the themes resonated so deeply with them.

  • Loyalty.

  • Brotherhood.

  • Oppression.

  • Few against many.

  • I didn't think,

  • well, this is weird for you as a Korean to enjoy

  • these Chinese movies.

  • I-I loved it.

  • All of Asia draws so much of ite

  • from China.

  • And I think, you know what, I wanna, I wanna study kung fu.

  • Me and my girlfriend Miriam went all over Manhattan

  • looking at different kung fu sc,

  • and they were all kinda trash.

  • And then we heard there was a Shaolin monk teaching kung fu,

  • and we were like, "No way!"

  • I walked into the temple and I just knew that

  • this was my destiny.

  • Yuanfen, the Chinese call it.

  • So I go and I study kung fu, and who, who becomes my master?

  • Thirty-fourth generation Shaolin monk Shi Yan Ming.

  • Once I met Yan Ming,

  • I went home that night and I called my parents and I s,

  • "I met the man I'm gonna marry."

  • soft music

  • But we were master and student.

  • SHI YAN MING:

  • - I started training more and It started hanging out with him mo.

  • Five months after I started tra,

  • we were together late one night and he kissed me.

  • [gasps] This is me and Yan Ming.

  • We were so in love.

  • So many pictures like this

  • of us hugging and kissing.

  • The first time Yan Ming and I m,

  • it was in this little room at t,

  • and... it was so titillating bee

  • it was at all levels, you know.

  • Of course it was physical, it w, but it was also spiritual

  • and emotional and psychological,

  • everything all at once.

  • It was amazing.

  • - That's a sexy story.

  • I mean, that's just a sexy stor.

  • I fell in love... - It is.

  • - ...with a, like, 34th generat.

  • - Yeah! And he shaved my head.

  • YAN MING:

  • - It was, for me, just a reasone

  • my devotion to Shaolin to the n.

  • Shaving my head for me is repree of non-attachment.

  • It's a central Buddhist tenet of non-attachment.

  • The way that my head feels after I've shaved,

  • It just feels so good, I'm rubbing it all the time,

  • like a Fat Buddha belly.

  • And it just reminds me to just ,

  • can't be attached to things, ju.

  • We became really serious really.

  • There wasn't really much of a c.

  • It was just, "Okay, this is what we're going to do."

  • INTERVIEWER:

  • HEESOK: When Sophia began to train with Yan Ming,

  • she was certainly devoting her, all the energies

  • she had put into the music induy

  • into Yan Ming and the temple,

  • um, trying to raise its profile, trying to get Yan Ming

  • into commercials and films,

  • introducing celebrities, um,

  • to, to join the temple and train with Yan Ming.

  • - 1995, Wu-Tang Clan,

  • they were at the height of their popularity and relevan,

  • and I introduced Wu-Tang to Shan and Shaolin to Wu-Tang.

  • RZA never said no to the temple.

  • Every interview, every appearan, he was always there.

  • And then I got Yan Ming simultay

  • on the cover of the four biggest kung fu magazines in the world.

  • Yan Ming, I would say that, other than the movie stars,

  • was probably the most well-known martial artist in the world.

  • Eventually, I made a hard right out of the music business.

  • instrumental music

  • - I do remember her telling me she was walking away

  • at a moment when she could be mg a lot of money,

  • but she just couldn't, uh... she just couldn't do it.

  • She found her next, uh, passion.

  • - Never looked back. Never had .

  • Never sat there going, should I or shouldn't I?

  • I just knew that that's what I was supposed to do,

  • but that's who I am.

  • MICHAEL: This was her new partner,

  • and they were embarking on having a family.

  • She took all of that ambition

  • and poured it into helping him build his business.

  • - My decision to leave hip-hop g to do with what hip-hop was doi.

  • It had everything to do with what Yan Ming was doing.

  • - But that's Sophia.

  • Anything she commits to or gets involved with,

  • she's gonna give a thousand per.

  • CARLOS: Just as quickly as she left Vancouver for hip-h,

  • Sophia was ready to keep it moving once again.

  • Her pursuits were now being driven by a desire

  • to be a part of something greatr than herself.

  • SOPHIA: You know, you fall in love with somebody

  • and you don't think you could l,

  • and then you have a child.

  • YAN MING:

  • - I always knew that I was going to have kids. Always.

  • But being a mother is the most

  • defining identity of my life.

  • God, Christmas is so soon, isn'?

  • JIAN LONG: Yeah, I-- Do you want to get a tree, by the way?

  • - Do you want a gift? JIAN/JIN LONG: No.

  • - Okay. - Well, I mean--

  • Why did I say no? I, yes, I wan.

  • Yeah, but--

  • SOPHIA: Well, I already got your gift.

  • Oh no, you paid for them.

  • JIAN: Yeah. - Who paid for them?

  • - Dad. - I paid for them.

  • - Grandma, in a way. SOPHIA: Oh, Grandma--

  • JIAN: She also-- - You talking about the hoodies?

  • - The hoodies, yeah.

  • - No, Dad paid for those. - Oh, he did.

  • JIAN: Oh yes. Yeah, yeah, sure.

  • - Watching Yan Ming as a fathers

  • amazing.

  • It was amazing. He doted on the.

  • I never told you guys there was a Santa Claus, did I?

  • Did you guys ever believe in Sa?

  • JIAN: I think I suspended my disbelief

  • up until there was... a tag on .

  • - Oh! But I wasn't like

  • the whole thing about Santa Clas and North Pole

  • and the reindeer and stuff like that, right?

  • JIAN: No, I don't think-- JIN: I feel like I--

  • - I-- Didn't I, wasn't I just l.

  • There's no such thing as a [no audio] tooth fairy.

  • You're gonna fall asleep. I'm gonna put $5 under your pil-

  • JIN: No, she actually did used to say that.

  • SOPHIA: I did? - That's kinda messed up.

  • SOPHIA: But around when the kids were two and four

  • was when the fissures started t.

  • And a lot of it was around justa how we were raising the childre-

  • Uh, Yan Ming and I had different parenting styles.

  • I was kind of more the drill se.

  • I was more the disciplinarian, which is ironic

  • considering how harsh the discis that he was raised in.

  • You know, I wanted to let them cry themselves to sleep,

  • and he couldn't stand the thoug.

  • - I think that our lives were s.

  • Professionally and personally and then you add children,

  • and it was just impossible to s.

  • I found condoms.

  • That was the moment that I knew

  • the writing was on the wall.

  • This was looking at my life

  • and him getting immersed into md and meeting all of my friends.

  • You know, he defected here from.

  • He didn't have a big social sce,

  • and so my friends became his fr, and of course they all,

  • they loved him to death. How could you not?

  • There was no moment that brought on the end.

  • It's not like I caught him in bd with somebody. It wasn't that a.

  • Death by a thousand cuts.

  • It was just an erosion, like so many marriages.

  • HEESOK: The relationship between Sophia and Yan Ming

  • had, uh, deteriorated to the pot

  • that, um,

  • myself and my girlfriend at thee

  • were actually advocating for them to break up.

  • It had become so toxic.

  • SOPHIA: Well, he met a woman, he flirted with her,

  • they exchanged numbers.

  • That's acting single.

  • That's cheating in my mind.

  • It's not physically cheating, but it's emotionally cheating.

  • If we were just a couple, I would have just left

  • or he would have just left.

  • But you have children.

  • The calculation is totally diff.

  • It was a good three or four yeas that I was in therapy.

  • - To my traditional Asian paren,

  • the idea of separation or divor,

  • especially when children are in,

  • seemed to them, uh, you know, a catastrophe.

  • somber music

  • - You never imagine a relationship not working out

  • when you fall in love with somey because you're just starry-eyed.

  • But I tried and I tried and I td and finally, you know, I realizd

  • you've done everything you can.

  • It's over.

  • Uh, this is Yan Ming in his abbot's robes.

  • The abbot is the head of the te.

  • Walking away from Yan Ming absoy meant walking away from the tem,

  • 'cause that was a cult of perso, cult that I helped build.

  • Sure that was a low point in my. Sure it was.

  • I felt... undervalued. I felt u.

  • I felt betrayed.

  • But it was eye-opening.

  • There was one time that I went k

  • three months after I left Yan Mg and the temple,

  • and immediately

  • these two of his disciples, two men, like six feet tall,

  • walk up and they just stand in front of me like bodyguards,

  • and I'm like, "You see this pla?

  • I built this [no audio] house, "

  • That was ten years ago.

  • YAN MING:

  • [Yan Ming speaks in foreign lan] SOPHIA: It's cold.

  • [laughing] Oh, it's cold. YAN MING: Hi, Sophia.

  • YAN MING: Cold? - It's so cold!

  • And you're always so warm.

  • - Yeah. - Ah!

  • YAN MING: Yeah.

  • Nice, huh? SOPHIA: Yeah.

  • It looks even different than when I was here last time.

  • - It's because there, there is some cleaning.

  • - Yeah. Like, the chairs are mo-

  • - Yeah, move around things.

  • - It's more open. - Yeah.

  • - Good. - Pretty, huh?

  • - Yeah. Oh, it's great. It still looks great.

  • - Nice. Yeah.

  • - Altar looks beautiful. - Pretty.

  • - Yeah. It's all good.

  • Okay. I'm gonna get changed.

  • - Okay. All right.

  • - Those were difficult times, both emotionally,

  • uh, psychologically, and financ.

  • - When I left Yan Ming, I left my job,

  • and I had to pay for everything.

  • I have a rent now.

  • I am paying for the rent as oppd to splitting it with somebody.

  • - This is your-- All right, this is your size.

  • - Thank you.

  • CARLOS: Despite her best efforts and intentions,

  • Sophia's life was taking another major turn.

  • But for the first time in her l,

  • she faced a future filled with more uncertainty

  • than enthusiasm.

  • SOPHIA: I was barely making anyy working at the temple as a non-,

  • and I was broke.

  • CARLOS: You went somewhere for a second there

  • when you started thinking about.

  • - About? - About being broke.

  • - And about being broke, yeah, it was, you know--

  • I think the hardest thing for t, of course, is that I had childr.

  • - She never once asked to borro.

  • She had too much pride for that.

  • - I'll never forget missing the.

  • And I was late for something and I had to be there on time

  • and I was forced to take a taxi, and I got in the cab and I star.

  • I was so stressed out.

  • I was like, I do not have nine s and 50 cents for this cab.

  • I'm not somebody that gets down very easily.

  • I'm not somebody that goes home and cries herself to sleep.

  • I'm not somebody that can't getd because I'm so devastated by so.

  • I am resilient.

  • I am... powerful.

  • - When Sophia left Yan Ming and, um, also left the temple,

  • she had to, in some ways, start from square one.

  • hip-hop music

  • SOPHIA: I absolutely didn't thit going back into the music busin.

  • At that time, the music business kind of in a really big state o,

  • and a lot of people were out ofs because of mergers.

  • So the first time I-- this notion ever crossed my mind

  • was my mentor, Michael Ostin,

  • who started running a managemeny with the legendary Nile Rodgers.

  • And Michael said, "I'd like you to run the compan"

  • and I said, "Why me?"

  • He said, "Because, Soph,

  • I've never known anybody as good with talent as you."

  • So Michael and I worked togethe,

  • and the biggest client we had was Raphael Saadiq.

  • And working with Michael was a dream because,

  • you know, Michael can get anyboy on the phone.

  • You know, I could never get the record company president,

  • the president of Columbia Recors on the phone,

  • but I did kind of all of the day-to-day stuff.

  • I read all the contracts, we talked about every deal,

  • I didn't make a move without hi,

  • and we really worked as partner.

  • MICHAEL: She, at times, can be overly aggressive.

  • She can be a bit of a bull in a china shop.

  • There's no doubt about that. Sh.

  • - Again, I'm a little Asian womn coming up in hip-hop.

  • I'm surrounded by men. There's so much testosterone.

  • And I, you know, there's a way that I present it,

  • in a way that I had to

  • maneuver.

  • MICHAEL: Raphael, at one point, decided that

  • he no longer wanted her as part of our management team.

  • - Raphael has the dubious distinction of being

  • the only person who's ever firee as a manager.

  • - He just felt she was too aggr.

  • I actually think he made a mist.

  • - I think that if I was a man, he probably would not have felt.

  • And that's when I realized,

  • I spent 30 years of my life helping the men tell their stor.

  • - I think the huge pivotal momet for this decision

  • and confidence to decide she wat gonna completely be her own wom.

  • She was never gonna have a job n

  • and that she was gonna be in the Sophia Chang business.

  • [indistinct chatter]

  • WOMAN 1: Do you want me to toss the salad already?

  • SOPHIA: Yes, please. WOMAN 1: Okay.

  • - Silverware is right there underneath the shelf.

  • WOMAN 1: Is this from Trader Jo? WOMAN 2: I don't know.

  • WOMAN 1: Ooh, it came out a lit. I hope that's okay.

  • Soph, should I go ahead and cut?

  • SOPHIA: There's a smoked gouda in there too.

  • WOMAN 1: There's a what? SOPHIA: There's a smoked gouda.

  • - Whatever you like, Miss Sophi.

  • SOPHIA: There's a line in Voltak called Candide, and it's...

  • [speaks French]

  • Which means, one must cultivate your garden.

  • And cultivating my garden,

  • part of that was finding my voi.

  • My name is Sophia Chang, and I'd to say that I was raised by Wu-.

  • [audience cheering]

  • I did an audiobook.

  • I feel more powerful than I've ever felt in my life,

  • and I'm only getting stronger.

  • There are other books in me.

  • There is a scripted television .

  • What I am doing

  • with any of these ways that I'm telling my story

  • is I'm out here telling the word in no uncertain terms

  • that I am the baddest bitch in .

  • - I'm very excited and proud about my sister's latest chapte.

  • She seems to be writing it, lit.

  • SOPHIA: I was a yellow girl, I was ashamed.

  • Wu-Tang showed me the beauty of my culture.

  • SOPHIA: I learned the greatest lessons of my life

  • training in Shaolin kung fu and learning Chan Buddhism

  • all because of this man.

  • Um, I will carry those lessons for the rest of my life.

  • I will train kung fu for the rest of my life.

  • YAN MING:

  • SOPHIA: You know, people always, how are your kids?

  • And you know what I say? They're good people.

  • They're kind, just, empathetic.

  • [clicks tongue]

  • They are amazing.

  • So Buddhism is being present.

  • Just being right here right now.

  • instrumental music

  • [chatter, laughter]

  • I am right [no audio] here.

  • And I love right here, right no.

- [switch clicks] - [electric razor buzzing]

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