After months of planning and extensive outreach, BBHS welcomed over 125 guests to the highly anticipated Chinatown by the Sea Reunion on Saturday, August 26 from 1 – 7 PM.

Multiple activities including a dumpling demonstration and tasting and a traveling exhibit from the Museum of Chinese in America (MOCA) took place in the festive Bradley Beach Firehouse Banquet Hall.

Bradley Beach Mayor Larry Fox helped serve dumplings before taking to the stage to declare the designation “Chinatown by the Sea” to encompass Newark Avenue, Cliff Avenue and all those neighboring streets that generations of Chinese Americans have called home. The afternoon program featured author Ava Chin, who read from her “thoroughly researched and powerfully told” memoir, Mott Street: A Chinese American Family’s Story of Exclusion and Homecoming and actor Jodi Long, reading from her autobiographical play, Surfing My DNA.

The program concluded with a panel moderated by Yue Ma from MOCA, who encouraged the audience to come to the Museum to record their personal oral histories. Stories told by long-time residents John Mok and Tim Pon generated a lively discussion full of warm memories shared by many people who had not even met until the Reunion.

Part 1 – Introduction and Ava Chin presentation
Part 2 – Jodi Long introduction and Q&A
Part 3 – A panel discussion moderated by Yue MA from MOCA (Museum of Chinese in America)