Posted on Thu, Apr. 01, 2004 Only 21, she's leading steak-shop fight Scarred bias victim focused on campaign to change name of Chink's By MYUNG OAK KIM kimm@phillynews.com When SUSANNAH Lynn Park Ayscue arrived in the United States from a South Korean foster home, the 4-month-old infant gripped her bottle with a strength that shocked her new mother. In third grade, she defended herself against a taunting bully by whacking the boy with her clarinet case. But as she grew older, the staunch courage of Susannah - one of the only Asian kids in her West Virginia town - withered. Susannah, an easy target because of her delicate figure and quiet personality, remembers constant taunts by classmates and strangers while growing up in Clarksburg, a predominantly white town of 17,000 people 110 miles south of Pittsburgh. She came to see her black hair, olive skin and dark, almond-shaped eyes as marks of shame. Classmates routinely called her "chink," threatened to beat her up, and slammed her against the lockers. She was too afraid to fight back. Until now. The 21-year-old AmeriCorps volunteer is leading the movement to change the name of Chink's Steaks, a popular steak shop on Torresdale Avenue in Wissinoming. Since first speaking out against the business name, Ayscue, who previously used Park as her last name to protect herself, has endured a torrent of nasty criticism from steak-shop supporters and from people here and across the country who want her to shut up and go away. But Ayscue isn't backing down. To her, the campaign is not about political correctness but about righting a wrong and making people understand that a business with this name legitimizes a racial slur that has been used in attacks - some fatal - against Asians in Philadelphia and across the country. "A lot of times, I've been afraid to stand up for myself, and I think that's the way some Asian Americans think, too," she said. "There's this ‘don't make waves’ mentality. But I know that I'm right. "I feel like I finally have a voice." Her relatives say the steak-shop campaign is the result of a remarkable transformation from a punk-rock high-school outcast to a thoughtful, focused community activist. "She told me, ‘This is what I think I'm supposed to be doing, ’ " said Sharon Ayscue, Susannah's mother. Joseph Groh, who owns the steak shop, said more than 8,000 people have signed a petition to keep the business name. He says changing the name would hurt his business. He insists that he is not a racist. The name comes from business founder, Sam "Chink" Sherman, who died in 1997. Sherman, whom some neighbors called the mayor of Wissinoming, got the nickname from neighborhood boys when he was 6 years old because of his "slanty" eyes, according to his widow, Mildred Sherman. Ayscue, supported by 15 local and national Asian and civil- rights groups, including the Asian Bar Association of the Delaware Valley, has been trying to arrange a meeting with Groh. Groh refers calls to his lawyer, Lane Fisher, who has not returned their calls or calls from the Daily News. Groh told the Daily News he's willing to meet with the Asian group. Philadelphia's Asian leaders credit Ayscue for galvanizing the often-timid political community. "We are glad that she did because all of us have had some experience [with the slur] and we want to see that experience stopped," said Tsiwen Law, a local lawyer and Asian-studies professor at the University of Pennsylvania and Temple University. "At some point you have to say for future generations of Asian kids, they shouldn't have to go through that." "She's not about passing the buck. She started this thing. She's willing to see it through. That I'm pretty impressed about." A January Daily News story about the Chink's Steaks controversy triggered a huge response - both from people who are offended by the business name and those who ridicule the protest. Ayscue has been widely attacked. She's been called a troublemaker, an idiot, a b----, and a business wrecker. Even some Asian people have criticized her. Thomas Admonsky, a former Wissinoming resident, wrote in an e-mail to the Daily News: "Let Chink's good name and memory remain intact. Park can take her 'baggage' and go back to wherever she came from." Ayscue said she was overwhelmed by the bitterness. She insists she is neither trying to destroy the business nor force a name change. She hopes Groh will change the shop name on his own. To most Asians, the word "chink" is among the most hateful racial slurs. Hao Trinh, 24, remembers well when a police officer used the slur against him during a confrontation in early 1996, when Trinh was a senior at Central High School. He and a friend were waiting for a friend on the sidewalk at Broad and Morris when two cops jumped from their police van, grabbed Trinh and his friend, threw them against a wall and searched them, Trinh recalled. The officer grabbed Trinh's brass knuckles and whacked him on the head. "He was screaming. I remember he said, ‘What's this, chink? ’ " Trinh said. When he found out about Chink's Steaks, Trinh, a graphic artist from South Philadelphia, called the restaurant, but could not reach the owner. He is now working with Ayscue's campaign, which includes a Web site called www.Perilmovement.com. The steak shop name "symbolizes that we really haven't gotten anywhere as Asian-Americans," Trinh said. "Before, the word ‘chink’ was used by ignorant people looking to degrade me. Now I see a business name. It's a slap in the face. It says that I'm not American." Ayscue is uncomfortable with the media attention. But Trinh said he admires that she is willing to endure the spotlight to further her cause. Ayscue's mother, Sharon Ays-cue, said she was surprised by her daughter's activism. "Because of her shyness, to stand up and confront is a surprise to me. I can't tell you how proud I am. "She's saying ‘No more. Never again. It's been done to me and it's wrong.’ " Susannah was born Young Joo Park in a South Korean hospital. The next day, her mother left. For Susannah's first four months, she was cared for by a foster family in Korea. Escorts brought her to the United States when the Ayscues adopted her. She first lived in Westminster, Md., with her parents and older sister, Robyn. When she was 2, her parents divorced. In early elementary school, her mother took Susannah and Robyn and moved back to her hometown in West Virginia. Her mother, a school librarian, struggled to support the girls. She could buy them clothes only on their birthdays and for Christmas. From the beginning, Susannah was reserved. She clung to her mother and seldom spoke. In third grade, she was tested for the gifted program on the advice of a teacher. But she wouldn't answer the psychologist's questions. During a spelling bee, she didn't respond when the intimidating principal gave her a word. The racial taunting, she remembers, started in kindergarten. While riding home on a school bus, a boy turned to her and called her a chink. The ridicule was regular after that. In high school, strangers would phone her house, call her a "dirty chink" and tell her to go back to her country. Ayscue said she sometimes talked with her mother about her problems with racism. But she found little comfort in her mother's words of support. She felt alone, ugly and freakish. Her thinness and voluminous black hair made her stick out even more. In high school, Susannah stood 5-foot-5 but weighed barely 85 pounds. She withdrew, not caring about school and hanging out with troublemaker kids. She sometimes wore a dog collar around her neck and dyed her hair purple. Her once-good grades slipped to C's. Her parents forced her to go to West Virginia University. She found solace in art. Her mother still has an 8-by-10 charcoal portrait of a young woman that Susannah gave her in 12th grade. Susannah said it isn't a self-portrait, but her mother swears the face is identical. The woman is looking down with an expression of despair. "It makes me want to cry," Sharon Ayscue says. Ayscue dropped out of college in fall 1992 and joined the Americorps program, which brought her to Philadelphia last summer. As part of the federally funded, volunteer community-service program, she tutors public elementary-school students in reading and coordinates an environmental-education project. When she moved to Philadelphia, Ayscue met other Asian- Americans. She began reading books by Asian-American authors and exploring issues of race, identity and politics. Sharon Ayscue said she didn't fully understand until recently how wounded her daughter was by racism. Robyn Ayscue, a graduate student at West Virginia University, said she has never seen her sister so focused and passionate as she is now. "She is a ball of energy," Robyn Ayscue said. The steak-shop campaign "brought out all the good in her." "I think it's awesome what she's doing. This is from a person who never ever spoke as a child." Moving to Philadelphia was the best thing that ever happened to Susannah, her family and friends say. Her surprising spotlight role in the controversial steak-shop campaign may have been the next best thing. Said her mother, "I think it was meant to be." «Close»
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