The Moth Radio Hour: Live from Anchorage

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From PRX, this is the Moth Radio Hour.

I'm Sarah Austin-Janes.

This time, we have a live main stage from the Atwood Concert Hall in Anchorage, Alaska, which was supported by the Anchorage Concert Association and Alaska Public Media.

The show took place in February and it was cold outside, but as you'll hear, the crowd of almost 2,000 was very warm.

The theme was Twist of Fate, and these stories are all from folks who moved to Alaska at some point in their lives.

Here's our host for the night, writer and educator, Jacoby Cochran.

Oh my god, y'all are beautiful tonight.

And to be real with you, I can't actually see most of you.

It's very dark.

It's hard as hell to get to this place, but

once you get here, it's pretty damn nice.

This is the sixth time we've hosted a main stage here in Anchorage.

But make some noise if this is your very first time seeing the moth live.

All right.

This is my very first time, not only in the great state of Alaska, but in Anchorage.

And the truth is, I didn't think that I'd ever have an opportunity to visit this place, right?

Growing up on the south side, we don't see mountains.

We do not discuss nature.

The closest I ever got to outdoors was them Girl Scout cookies I bought two weeks ago.

And they was good.

Make some noise for all of our storytellers who are going to get up here tonight.

The theme this evening is twist of fate.

All of the stories you hear tonight are going to be about the unexpected, things that people did not see coming.

All of our storytellers have a great bio in your program, but we're not going to read their bio to you.

We're going to introduce them by way of a question.

And that question is, what was something you

did not see coming?

When I asked our first storyteller tonight, what was something you didn't see coming?

They simply said, being here tonight, make some noise for the one and only Lamar Sloss.

I grew up with a single mom at home and only saw my dad probably on the weekends every now and then.

And even though I grew up with a lot of love and affection, I missed my dad at home and always wondered what kind of dad I would be.

And because my mom was working, I got to spend a lot of time with my grandmother so she could get a break probably from my brother and I.

And I remember sitting at her house some mornings and watching the prices right as I eat a fried bologna egg and cheese sandwich.

A little grape jelly on the side because I had a very sophistic palate as a young man.

And I'd probably end up taking a nap, watching the younger restless in the afternoon.

And if I was lucky enough, she would make me my favorite soulful meal of fried chicken and hot water cornbread, which is boiling water and cornbread, and you zip into the fryer.

I don't know if some of these northerners know about that, but it's good to be soaping up the mac and cheese and green beans on the side.

She was always a phenomenal cook, but she always knew how to make a little extra money on the side.

And in the summer months in Tennessee, where the air was so thick you could chew on it and walk outside and your upper lip start sweating.

She would sell fish sandwiches and popsicles and cold drinks to kids around the neighborhood.

I remember helping her run these orders out and seeing how elated these kids were to have a cold treat on these hot, muggy days.

One day I took it upon myself to follow in her entrepreneurial footsteps and took a box of chocolate that she was selling for a church fundraiser to my Christian middle school.

And I remember doing so good, I was taking a lot of my classmates' lunch money.

And eventually it would get shut down because apparently you can't take chocolate and sell it at school, even if it is in the name of Jesus.

I ended up going to business school because I had dreams of going to Wall Street and taking everybody's lunch money.

Somehow ended up back home living with my mom and not really sure what I was going to do.

I ended up working at this crepe cafe in my hometown.

And I made a lot of money, a good $12 an hour, and plus tips.

So you can imagine my mom's disdain for me taking this position.

But this is where I fell in love with the food industry and just crepes in general.

There's something about spinning the crepes and the steam rising up and you filling them with sweet and savory fix-ins that really captivated me.

But I think something else that made me stick around was this fair-skinned, blue-eyed Alaskan girl, her name is Samantha, that I would meet.

I also worked there.

And somehow, she talked me into moving up here, and that's how I'm here today.

Yeah, right.

I

worked in a lot of food places coming up here, because it's easy to get a job in the food industry.

And as I continued working for a while, I missed making those crepes.

So I talked my wife and mother into getting me two crempois French crepe makers for Christmas.

And I think they lived on my home counter for several months before I ended up doing anything with them other than making breakfast for myself and the fam.

And we started doing pop-ups around town.

And eventually business was going well enough that I decided that I would quit my job and start making these crepes full-time.

Everything was going great.

I was probably top of the world, you know, being a young business owner and still figuring out how to make money, but happy nonetheless making these crepes and one day my wife says that she wants a baby so I think like most guys we just kind of follow along and start practicing

and end up having a son later that year and this is when I first get to try this dad thing out.

My wife goes on maternity leave and because my schedule is so flexible being an entrepreneur, I get to stay at home with him during the days.

And we just would do my events in the evening.

So I would do the bottles and the diapers and we could take the day midday naps with them, which is always a pleasure.

And occasionally we would go out to the Costco and with all the other stay-at-home moms and you'd get some some weird looks going around.

It's like, what's this young man doing on a Tuesday here at Costco?

But, you know, some people would give you a little head nod out of respect and some people would be like, Okay, where's your wife?

And you know, I'm they say I'm on dad duty today and you kind of see the look of surprise when you know it's it's e cool to see a dad maybe with a toddler, but most people don't see a dad with a six-month-old out in the store.

So

we would, Eliza would then come with me to the shop, and we would, as I was prepping, I set him on the table in his car seat and work on whatever the menu items were that day.

And he occasionally would come with me to a pop-up.

And this one in particular, as I usually wrap Eliza on my chest in a little baby Moby, and as he's sitting there, I'm greeting guests and spinning crepes and serving the food.

And I kind of look down at him.

He's thinking he's probably fallen asleep at this time.

And I just kind of think, like, wow, am I really a young black man here in Alaska making crepes with a baby on my chest?

It's

not really what I imagined.

But

life was good, business kept growing, and we lived like this for a little bit until the spring of 2020 when the coronavirus stepped on the scene.

And crepes not being an essential business, maybe I think they should have been, I really became a stay-at-home dad at that time and watched my son Elijah full-time.

All this was cool for a while, you know, got to take the naps and play a lot of video games.

Call of Duty Warzone came out, so I got a lot of dubs.

But eventually grew a little tired of just hanging out and

took a page out of my nanny's book and started cooking food for family and friends to make a little extra money.

So I made some fried chicken and some hot water cornbread and sweet potatoes with marshmallows and the mac and cheese which is considered a vegetable in the South if you didn't know.

And Elijah, while he was a little too young to run food, he would help do some quality control and taste testing in his high chair

until and this is how it went for a while until one day I got a call that the local cheese shop was closing for Maggios and the owner Helen called and said you know she's selling some equipment and she'd like me to come check it it out.

And I didn't have a kitchen at the time, but I just, you know, I was just going to go support and see.

Maybe I can get like a table or a refrigerator to store for later.

And as we're walking around the place, she says, you know, I didn't think about this before, but what do you think about taking over the cheese shop?

And I had never thought about taking over a cheese shop.

I don't think many people do, but

so for one, I didn't know much about cheese other than, you know, your basic cheddar, Gouda Swiss, maybe a blue and brie.

And two, I was a little lactose sensitive, so I don't think I was the prime candidate for this position.

Anyway, I ended up, after a long seven days of deliberation, deciding that we would take over the shop.

And before I knew it, I had signed a lease and was in there learning probably too much about cheese.

I mean, like, did you know that there was like a blue goat cheese from France or like a five-year cheddar or

how toothsome a Gouda could be?

It's not

a little different dialogue than I grew up with.

But it was fun nonetheless, and business was great.

We actually did more business than they had done, not the COVID year, but the year before.

And I was on top of the world.

So my wife says, hey, it's time, good time to ask for another baby.

And

she ends up getting pregnant.

And we go to this ultrasound appointment.

And as the doctor is looking at her belly I remember her saying oh you know it's it's two and out of shock I think we thought she was talking about two o'clock in the afternoon but it was

we got lucky and had a two for one and got have twins on the way

and I remember

pretty cute

And I remember as a kid, my mom would say, like, I would always tell her, I got this, I got this.

And most of my life, you know, moving to Alaska, starting the crate business, you know, opening, reopening the cheese shop during the pandemic, I did feel like I had this.

And up until this point where I was like, okay, I might be in over my head here with twins.

And fortunately, the shop was doing well, and we had some systems in place.

So my wife would return to work, and I would be doing the stay-at-home dad again.

Fortunately, I did have some help.

My mother-in-law was off, or she had just newly retired, and I would watch them a few days a week, and she would watch the mother a few days.

So, typical day on daddy duty at my house is: my wife goes to work, try to cook a little breakfast and coffee, get her out the house, and have some alone time before mayhem starts.

And twins would wake up or Elijah, depending on the day, and you know, while balancing, feeding the bottles, and getting Elijah his breakfast,

changing some diapers, and getting everybody loaded up, and then doing Elijah's hair because it's out of control.

We drop him off at daycare and no longer really go to Costco anymore, but we go to airport to pick up cheese.

It's kind of obvious when I'm pushing a double stroller in, you get some funny looks from people and ladies obviously look at them, but then there's some like, you know, where's your wife?

Like, you doing this by yourself?

I'm like, oh, yeah, we got this.

And now, anyway.

And

some guys, you know, you get a little nod of respect from some of the cargo guys who have kids at home, which is always a good little pump-up.

But this is definitely the most trying time in my life, and we're beyond sleep-deprived at this point.

I think Navy SEALs go through hell week.

We're in hell like season at this point.

With balancing, operating a cheese shop that I know very little about, and supporting my wife post-pregnancy with a toddler still running around getting potty trained, we went, somebody somebody said it best, and you go from two or one to three.

In this case, you go from man to man to zone defense.

And that couldn't be more true in our situation.

But

nevertheless, we persevered.

And

as one day I'm double-fisting bringing my twins, August and Abram, into the cheese shop, the boys, as we call them, come help me unload.

And as they're playing with my boys, I kind of sit down and wish Nanny could kind of see me now and all the love and affection that she's given.

And I realized that I had become the dad that I wanted.

And not only the dad I wanted, but the dad I never have.

And maybe the model or blueprint for what dads can be.

Thank you.

Make some noise for Lamar, y'all.

Lamar Sloss is still operating from Maggio's Artisan Cheese in Anchorage.

After 10 years in the culinary world, he's still passionate about bringing new and old-world cheeses and charcuterie to isolated Alaskans.

He's also taught us at the moth what a toothsome cheese is.

It's chewy.

Thanks, Lamar.

To see photos of Lamar, his wife Samantha, and their three children at Costco, in Nature, and in the cheese shop, go to themoth.org.

In a moment, the Poet Laureate of Wisconsin is asked to move to Anchorage for love.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by PRX.

The Moth is supported by AstraZeneca.

AstraZeneca is committed to spreading awareness of a condition called hereditary transthyroidin-mediated amyloidosis, or HATTR.

This condition can cause polyneuropathy like nerve pain or numbness, heart failure or irregular rhythm and gastrointestinal issues.

HATTR is often underdiagnosed and can be passed down to loved ones.

Many of us have stories about family legacies passed down through generations.

When I was five, my mother sewed a classic clown costume, red and yellow with a pointy hat.

It's since been worn by my sister, three cousins, and four of our children.

I'm so happy this piece of my childhood lives on with no end in sight.

Genetic conditions like HATTR shouldn't dominate our stories.

Thanks to the efforts of AstraZeneca, there are treatment options so more patients can choose the legacies they share.

This year, the Moth will partner with AstraZeneca to shine a light on the stories of those living with HATTR.

Learn more at www.myattrroadmap.com.

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Sups, the new musical has made Tony award-winning history on Broadway.

We demand to be home.

Winner, best score.

We demand to be seen.

Winner, best book.

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It's a theatrical masterpiece that's thrilling, inspiring, dazzlingly entertaining, and unquestionably the most emotionally stirring musical this season.

Suffs, playing the Orpheum Theater, October 22nd through November 9th.

Tickets at BroadwaySF.com.

This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX.

I'm Sarah Austin-Janess.

We're bringing you stories from our main stage show in Anchorage, Alaska, with the theme Twist of Fate.

Our host for the evening is Jacoby Cochran.

I hope y'all have been enjoying y'all self thus far.

When I asked our next storyteller, What was something you did not see coming?

She told me

these damn hot flashes.

Make some noise for our next storyteller, Dasha Kelly Hamilton.

Make some noise, y'all.

I met my husband at a spoken word festival in San Francisco.

He was living here in Anchorage and I was living in Milwaukee.

So we dated long distance for a couple of years years and then finally decided to get married in Homer, Alaska.

And the plan was to live in Milwaukee for a few years and then move to Anchorage.

And you know that feeling you get on Thursday about those Friday plans you made way, way, way back on Monday?

I was starting to get that feeling inside when it was my turn to move to Anchorage.

And not for any small feat, I was in the middle of my term as a poet laureate for the city of Milwaukee and had just been named laureate for the entire state of Wisconsin.

Now I had every intention of keeping my word.

The promise that I made to my husband when we made this wedding plan was that I would not do a bait and switch when it was my turn to move.

And I'm not going to walk away from a laureateship in 20 years of really, really, really hard work.

So we agreed agreed that we would live separately for my two-year term, and then Rona showed up.

So with everything else in the world going virtual, I thought maybe this laureateship could do the same.

So I made this pitch to the laureate commissioner, and I just remember him blinking really, really hard.

Now, my thing is, look, I'm not the governor or anything, but I understand that nobody wants their state rep of any kind, not in the state.

But I made the case for doing everything virtually, and he ultimately agreed, but told me to keep my Alaska profile low.

Cool, so I moved to Anchorage under the cover of COVID.

Now, going from regular visitor to resident

was different, and I wanted to like this city that my husband loves so much.

Especially because he really went went all in and embraced Milwaukee.

And Milwaukee, statistically, remains one of the five worst cities in America for black people to exist.

I'm not kidding.

Black men, especially.

So it was no small feat that he came and made a home and a life there, and he actually thrived there.

But I don't know if I could thrive

here.

First of all, everything that anybody really wants to do happens outside.

And anything that happens inside is decorated like outside with wood panels and bear paws and moose antlers everywhere, everywhere, really, everywhere.

And the summers, I firmly believe that summers are meant for sandals and sundresses.

My first summer, it did not crack 70 degrees.

My husband and his friends got us out here camping and having cookouts and going to the beach and carrying on like they don't know these are hot water, hot air activities.

Why do I have on a hoodie right now?

So picture me.

I'm dressed like February in July

and I am just silently glaring out of the window.

And my husband comes in the room and sees this and he says, you know what?

Let's go fishing.

Now there's nobody else in the house.

But I'm looking around anyway because he can't be talking.

He's not, he is talking to me.

Oh, this is a desperate man right now.

Okay, what's one more Alaskan disappointment if it will please my wonderful husband and give him one less day of worrying of whether I'm secretly planning to move back to Milwaukee?

Now he knows I wouldn't do that, but we both know I could be thinking about it a lot.

My husband is the only important thing to me that's here.

My work and my friends and my family and my community and my attention and my summertime, everything

is not here.

But we're here together.

So I've got on fishing waders,

fuchsia lipstick, and a hot pink hoodie with Alaska across the front.

So my husband has experienced fishing, but he's not experienced.

But he knows enough to get me started.

So we get down to Ships Creek, which is this channel of waterways where the ocean kind of touches downtown.

And I'm really surprised at how many people are down here after work.

So my husband gets me set up and he tells me to cast.

And so I cast once, tug twice, reel the bat.

Well actually that first time was kind of a flub because I was nervous.

I was going to cut my finger, and then I realized, no, that's Dasha, that's piano wire, not fishing wire.

Get over yourself, get it done.

So, my second cast, tug twice, reel it back.

Now, my husband is behind me, bending over, getting his gear together.

And when I call his name, he assumed that I had gotten caught on a branch or something.

But when he turned around,

your girl was pulling a fish.

Salmon fish.

So, we come in, we're excited, we lay it down, you know, take away little fishy selfies and everything.

And there are these two women who had come down to Ships Creek at the same time that we did.

We had all walked down from the main road together.

And one of them came over to me and said, Hey, do you live here?

Yes.

I look at my husband, he explained, she's asking because you need to be an Alaskan resident to catch a king.

Did you know that there were different kinds of salmon?

I did not.

So this woman wants to say so much.

But she can see that my husband and I are clearly winging this thing a thousand percent.

So instead, she just takes a breath and says, you really want to bleed that now.

Otherwise, the meat might be affected.

I'm sorry, ma'am, what?

She takes out a baton and a knife out of her wader belt.

She bends down, clunks the fish on the head, slices the gill, reaches in, snatches out this blood sack, and leaves me to sit with this draining fish for the rest of the afternoon.

Hmm, because the law says when you catch a king salmon, you're done for the day.

So

I'm sitting back,

and I'm making a point not to be camped out on my phone, you know, while everybody else is fishing.

So I'm just sitting, watching, taking in all of this scenery, all of this active quiet.

So on the drive home, my husband and I are just cracking up at how silent the river got when I caught my fish.

All that cheering for everybody else, crickets for me.

He said, yeah, babe, I think it was a sweatshirt.

I was like, the sweatshirt?

He goes, yeah, we can spot tourists a mile away.

No one who lives here would ever wear one of those airport sweatshirts.

Excuse me, sir.

You bought this from me.

He said, yeah, when you were out there living like a tourist in Milwaukee, never here.

Whatever.

So for the next few days, I got a kick out of listening to my husband retell my fishing story.

So I felt like a little kid, though,

who had made the grown-ups laugh, but wasn't really sure about how that happened.

I just knew that I had caught a fish.

So I decided to take those pictures and post them on the internet anyway.

I was just banking on the fact that

Wisconsin eyes would just see that and see that I was living the dream, you know, catching salmon in Alaska, you know, like a vacation.

But of course, I wasn't on vacation.

I was at my new home and Rona was releasing her chokehold on the world and now I had to plan in-person events back in Wisconsin.

So I'd been living in this double loophole, one for my laureateship and now one for my marriage.

I'd figured out how I would be in Wisconsin for the busy seasons, in a fall and the spring to be available for appearances and such and be here in Alaska in the winter and the summer.

So it wasn't exactly a bait and switch, but it also wasn't our deal.

So my husband suggested that to get our mind off of all of these sliding plans and we take a road trip down to Seward.

And it is a beautiful drive.

It's about two hours with the mountains on one side and the bay on the other.

And we're going down to go snagging.

The weather was still horrible.

I'm still in a hoodie.

I was just down for the road trip.

So for snagging for the uninitiated is imprecise fishing.

Imagine a one inch lead ball with three or four hooks welded into it.

And instead of hooking the fish in the mouth, you cast out this ball and you snag the fish anywhere in its body.

So I'm now in chest waders for this trip and I'm standing waist deep at the edge of the ocean.

And there's mountains on this way, so I cast this way a little bit.

And there are eagles on this side, and I cast the way for a little bit.

Seals are popping up here and there.

Beautiful, quiet.

And then a salmon yanks your line, and this sucker is trying to make a run for it.

So now you have to reel faster and pull back harder so you can make sure that you're trying to keep the fish a little bit above water level so it doesn't swim and get away.

And I am doing all of this, walking backwards about 50 yards.

Why?

Because I didn't know about tides.

I didn't notice that the ocean had crept in on me and land was much further away than when I had started.

I lost a couple of fish with this method,

but I snatched four salmon out of the water that day.

I probably caught 12 salmon over the course of that summer, and next summer I'd caught maybe two dozen salmon.

So my the woman that had come to take my to come to approach me that day took my number maybe to keep an eye on me or maybe she saw herself in me.

It turns out that she is a former salmon derby winner here and it turns out that she's a pretty solid human being.

We've actually become pretty good friends.

So we both count down the months to salmon season and we both fish with lipstick.

Now, ironically, we don't fish together very often, mostly just checking in on each other on our progress.

I will grab a pole and go down to the creek a couple of times a week.

Most times I come back without a fish, but every time I come back with a different clearing.

You couldn't have told me that I would have enjoyed fishing, but I found it to be this active meditation.

I'm moving, but I'm not.

When I'm in Wisconsin, I realize I'm on the go all the time, 24-7.

I got to.

And when I'm here,

I'm at rest.

I need that too.

So I still am not a fan of all of the ubiquitous moose decor.

My sandals and sundresses are still in storage back in Milwaukee.

But I promise you, I have two Alaskan traditions down pat: fishing

and love.

Thank you.

Give it up for Dasha, y'all.

Dasha Kelly Hamilton has authored award-winning poetry, essays, and fiction, and her work as an arts envoy for the U.S.

Embassy has brought her to Botswana, Mauritius, and Beirut.

She's an alum of HBO's Deaf Poetry Jam and Poet Laureate Emerita for both the city of Milwaukee and the state of Wisconsin.

Her show, Making Cake, is touring now.

And yes, you will still find her standing in waders fishing in Alaska every summer she came.

To see videos of her in action, go to themoth.org.

After our break, a woman who grew up in Anchorage returns after decades to put the pieces back together.

When the Moth Radio Hour continues.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by PRX.

This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX.

I'm Sarah Austin-Janesse.

In this episode, we're hearing stories from our main stage show in Anchorage, Alaska, which was supported by the Anchorage Concert Association and Alaska Public Media.

Here's our host, Jacoby Cochrane.

And before we bring our final storyteller up here tonight, I want everybody to just sort of look to your left and to your right.

You're the reason that this show has been going so damn well thus far.

Because not only have these storytellers come up here and shared a little bit of themselves, but you've listened with such an incredible amount of energy and passion and support.

And so make some noise for yourself and all the people sitting around you.

When I asked our final storyteller tonight, what was something you didn't see coming?

She said, two days ago, I ran into the wall at the hotel and I got the black and blue on my face to show it.

Everybody make some noise for tonight's final storyteller, Monica Wu.

It was September 7th, 1989.

A phone call woke me up at 2 a.m.

at my New Jersey apartment.

My mother was screaming on the other end,

Joe, Jeannie, Sasella, Sasella,

Joe, Jeannie,

kill, kill.

It was only after a few minutes that I understood that my older brother Joe

and his two-year-old daughter Jeannie

were shot in their own home in Anchorage, Alaska here.

I had not been back to Anchorage for 15 years.

I had no choice but to go home and help my family.

During the long flight to Anchorage, I couldn't stop thinking about my brother and our past together.

He loved to eat, cuss, and tell jokes.

He wanted to be a comedian.

He adored a younger brother, Victor, who was 20 years his junior.

And he loved to gamble.

I was totally different.

I was top student.

I was serious.

I wanted to win the Nobel Prize.

My brother could get very cruel and tease me.

Oh, you ugly bookworm,

you never be able to find a husband.

I wish

my brother could show me some love.

Our family were Chinese pioneers to move from Hong Kong to Anchorage in 1968

when oil was first discovered at Prudhoe Bay.

My father bought a hole-in-the-wall restaurant called the Chinese Kitchen on Spinard Road.

Almond chicken, ek fooyang?

Our business ran very well except when Joe disappeared on his gambling binges and didn't show up for work.

My father and Joe fought constantly.

One day, I saw Joe going after my father with a kitchen cleaver.

I thought he was going to kill my father.

One very busy Saturday evening, Joe disappeared again.

And I noticed this light coming out of my parents' bedroom.

Joe was rummaging through the dresser drawer.

On the bed were money and jewelry.

I yelled at him,

you stealing again, you disgrace.

He lunged at me, hit me hard straight between the eyes, and then he stopped.

His nostrils flared like Chinese food dogs.

His eyes were a mixture of hurt and rage.

Then I heard dad shouting from behind me, leave or we'll call the police.

Dad was pointing a gun at Joe.

Mom stood beside him crying.

Joe cursed back, fuck you all.

I'm leaving.

You're not my family.

He stormed up.

That was the last time I saw my brother alive.

That night,

I wish I didn't have an older brother.

As soon as I could enter university, I left Anchorage and avoided coming home.

Fifteen years later, I was back on Alaskan Airline and headed to Anchorage Airport.

The minute I disembarked, I rushed straight to the Providence Hospital.

When I entered the ICU room full of strangers,

someone whispered,

Aunt,

a nurse placed a tiny bundle in my arms.

I had never met my niece Jeannie,

only recognized her from pictures.

Around her head was a big thick bandage.

I averted my gaze from the bullet hole on her forehead.

I held Jeannie tightly, felt her breathing so faintly.

And then Jeannie died in my arms.

I felt so unworthy of my niece

who waited so long to say goodbye to an aunt she had never met.

I felt so ashamed of leaving Alaska.

My whole family was falling apart.

My parents wept day and night.

I was not ready for the business of death.

And I was overwhelmed by social workers, marticians, and journalists chasing the year's most sensational story.

And I was in touch with the Anchorage Police, especially Detective Ken.

I tried to hunt down gambling haunts where Joe frequented on Spenard and on 4th Avenue.

Soon after, the police developed a short list of suspects,

but seemed to focus on one man.

His name was Ming.

He was a Taiwanese national.

The police showed me his picture and wondered if my family knew him.

We did not.

The funeral was standing room only.

It seemed like all of Anchorage's Chinese community was there.

The funeral service was chaotic, free-spirited, and beautiful,

just like my brother.

I was so surprised how many friends Joe had

and was so touched by the stories of his acts of kindness, especially working at the soup kitchen.

A middle-aged man came over

and told me his story.

He was homeless

and frequented the soup kitchen where Joe worked.

One day, Joe took his hand, placed it on his big belly

and said,

here man, rub my Buddha belly.

It will bring you good luck.

Don't you worry.

and gave the man $50.

For the first time,

I learned to appreciate a side of my brother that I didn't know.

I wish I could have showed him more love.

My younger brother and I approached the open casket.

Jeannie laid on top of her father's chest.

She was dressed in pink satin with a white sash.

Joe's lifeless arm held

his daughter's tiny body.

I had not seen my brother for 15 years.

I wanted to see him alive.

I wanted to see his eyes open,

not glues shut.

I wanted to hear his laughter or even his cusses.

I wanted to rub his Buddha belly.

Victor and I paid our respect the Chinese way.

We knelt in front of a casket, bow our head three times deeply.

I needed some mirror, so I went to the back.

Standing beside me was an Asian man.

He was the man in the police picture.

He was the prime suspect, Ming.

My legs started shaking.

I thought immediately of Sajju,

the Chinese gang tradition of exterminating

the victim's entire family.

Then Detective Ken stepped in.

between Ming and me.

When I was finally able to take a breath, I was so

ashamed

of my brother's dysfunctional life

and blamed him for his daughter's death.

I went back east to my corporate career.

I did not follow the developments in Anchorage at all.

My family told me

that Ming was finally convicted

and was sentenced to 198 years in prison for two counts of first-degree murder.

The motive

was a gambling debt that Joe owed Ming

for $1,450.

For many years,

I did not mention Joe and Jeannie and was hoping that detachment would dull my pain and my shame.

Then one day, recently,

My younger brother Victor called.

He wanted to visit Anchorage,

but had forgotten where the cemetery was.

I remember that years ago I had shipped a box back from Anchorage.

I opened the box up,

took out the obituary, and the funeral registry.

Reading through the registry,

I was reminded

of how the entire Anchorage community of all races and cultures rallied behind my brother.

I wanted to know more.

I got the case file from the Anchorage Trial Courts.

I read through the crime scene descriptions over and over again.

I traced my thumbs on the fingerprints of men captured in the court records

and wondered

what exactly happened that night.

I'll never know the details,

but I do know

in my heart

that my brother

until his very last breath, did

everything

he could

to save his daughter.

There's one more item in the box from Alaska.

It is a native Alaskan bracelet

made with Warris ivory.

Each link has the carving

of an Arctic animal, animal,

walrus, whale, eagle.

The bracelet was a gift from Joe to me for my 16th birthday.

In the Japanese art tradition of Kinsuki,

broken pieces of pottery are put back together

with lacquer and powdered gold.

A beautiful new piece of art is created

with its own unique legacy.

All these years,

I refused to mend my brother's shattered life

with love and compassion.

I shoved away the pieces with scorn.

Tonight,

wearing wearing my brother's bracelet,

I reclaim my past

and I forgive my shame for leaving Alaska to save myself.

Tonight,

by embracing my brother's scars and wounds,

I ask for his forgiveness

and I forgive him.

Thank you.

Make some more noise for Monica, y'all.

Monica Wu has held senior executive roles at global corporations for four decades, where she says she's worked with fascinating and flawed individuals.

She's a published author and a proud Moth mainstage storyteller.

By sharing her stories, she hopes to convince all people that life is not about survival of the fittest, but about evolution into better versions of ourselves.

You can see photos of Monica and her family at them.org.

Here's Jacoby Cochran to close us out.

It has truly been one of the pleasures of my life to spend just a few hours with all of you, to take in your energy and your embrace.

I hope each of you make it home safe tonight.

Send me a text when you get home, all right?

Y'all have a going and we'll see you next year.

To hear other stories from Alaska and from our archives, and for information on live events and the Moth podcast, and to pitch us your own story, go to themoth.org.

That's it for this episode of The Moth Radio Hour.

We hope you'll join us next time.

This live Anchorage Show was hosted by Jacoby Cochran.

Jacoby is the award-winning host of City Cash Chicago, Chicago's favorite daily news podcast, and you can also catch him discussing news, sports, and culture on Chicago's NPR and PBS stations.

This episode of The Moth Radio Hour was produced by me, Jay Allison, and Sarah Austin Janess, who also hosted and directed the stories in the show, along with Kate Tellers.

Co-producer is Vicki Merrick, associate producer Emily Couch.

The rest of the Moth's leadership team includes Sarah Haberman, Jennifer Hickson, Meg Bowles, Marina Cluche, Leigh Ann Gulley, Suzanne Rust, Brandon Grant, Sarah Jane Johnson, and Aldi Caza.

Moth's stories are true as remembered and affirmed by the storytellers.

Our theme music is by the drift.

Other music in this hour from Regina Carter, Galt McDermott, and Phil Cook.

Thanks again to the Anchorage Concert Association and Alaska Public Media.

We receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, and presented by PRX.

For more about our podcast, for information on how to pitch us your own story, and we hope you will, and everything else, go to our website themoth.org.