Stacey Ann Chin

sooooooo i just left from seeing Staceyann Chin at the Brooklyn Library. it was
AWESOME!!!
they had 13 or 14 other speakers that spoke prior to her. some rapped, some read poems, and some did spoken word...which, if you haven't seen it before, is somewhere in between rapping and reciting a poem; there is a flow one must have that is smooth at some points and choppy at others, humorous at times and heart achingly sad at others.
i've posted some of her videos in another post on here.

coming from a small town in Alabama, seeing famous people (famous in the sense that they have a book published, record deal, or have been on some type of television show) is startling, and surprisingly normal. most of the people i get roused about meeting (or spotting) are somewhat lesser known. so, like Sia (who was just chillin on a rail in Union Square) the famous people i notice aren't being attacked by droves of fans or escorted by bodyguards.

Staceyann came in maybe a half an hour before the event began, when it was just me, my pal Yvette and around 10 other people...just strolled in....shook the host's hand..said a few words...sat down and began to read through her papers.
do i go up to her and tell her i've made blog posts about her, posted her videos under my facebook status updates, tell her i've read her book and it almost made me cry, tell her that i've watched every single video she has on youtube and that i'm signed up for e-mail updates on upcoming shows from her website? ( ha...no, this is not stalker territory.) do i ask for an autograph? a photo? maybe i should have brought my copy of her book and asked her to address a small message to "Nell" on the inside.

but i didn't do any of those things. i have an issue with treating celebrities like celebrities. i don't like to get photos or autographs. to me, those things are just for validation for others ("see, i really did meet _____. here's a picture of me and her..."). but i really don't care if someone knows i met someone or not. pictures and autographs fade, disintegrate, and get lost. the moment of meeting or seeing someone is much more valuable. and that won't be going away any time soon (hopefully). i should have gone up to her, at least, and told her that her book meant a lot to me.

but...anywho....i did get to see her. she got the biggest reactions from the crowd. and if you ever get a chance to see her in person reading her poetry or speaking, you MUST go. she's so candid, honest an open with everything-about being a lesbian, about what she can do to a woman, about her pussy (a word she used this interchangably with "coco bread", "poonanny", "vagina" and "va-jay-jay"), about her rough childhood, masturbating for the first time, about growing older (she's 37), and about the homophobia of Jamaica.
she read 4 or 5 haikus and one about this idea that there are no gays in jamaica. i can't recall it exactly, but she said along the lines of "WHO'S PUSSY WAS I EATING?!"

at the end of this video, she does the reading where at the end, she yells "WHAT HAPPENED TO ME WAS NOT MY FAULT! WHAT HAPPENED TO ME WAS NOT MY FAULT! WHAT HAPPENED TO ME WAS NOT. MY. FAULT!" she did this poem at the end of her reading today too. i think its like therapy for her. screaming period can be therapy, right?

comment. check out some of her videos. read her book.