About

Journalist. Writer. Scholar.

I’m a journalist, writer, and scholar residing somewhere between the newsroom and the classroom. I’m usually based in Hong Kong, while having led a peripatetic life across North America, Western Europe, East Asia, and the Middle East.

I’m currently working on my first book — a narrative nonfiction account of everyday life in Beirut, Lebanon, blending literary reportage, cultural studies, history, and memoir.

I’ve concurrently ventured into academia, where I’ve developed and taught writing courses that merge journalism, creative nonfiction, literary studies, and composition at the University of Pittsburgh, NYU Shanghai, and the Chinese University of Hong Kong. I approach both my creative and critical practices with a decolonizing intent, and I’m deeply attuned to the politics of reporting, writing, and teaching in English, particularly when working with non-white, non-American, multilingual students.

I’ve worked as a digital reporter and producer at CNN’s Hong Kong bureau and as a subeditor and features writer at The Daily Star newspaper in Beirut. I’ve also contributed stories on politics, business, and culture to a wide range of print and digital news publications.

I hold a bachelor’s degree in Asian studies from Cornell University; master’s degrees in journalism and literary and cultural studies from the University of Hong Kong; and a master of fine arts (MFA) in creative writing from the University of Pittsburgh. I am also pursuing a Ph.D in East Asian studies, exploring inter-Asian intersections of race, language, and colonialisms.