Stacey Barchenger

sbarchenger@tennessean.com





Dad, we need to get rid of the prime rib coupons, the tourists come in for the $10.99 prime rib, drink ice water and never tip.

It's a loss-leader, he said. No one is going to pay full price to buy steak from Chinese people. We have to compete on price.

You sell steak because people wouldn't pay full price for Chinese food. You hired a white manager to front as the owner. And we still sell it with a coupon.

Immigrants can't sell anything at full price in America, my father said.

My name is Eddie Huang. I was born in America, my ancestors were from China and my parents were born in Taiwan.

I sell Taiwanese gua bao​ for full f------ price.

And that's how the never-bashful restaurateur and television personality opened the National Immigrant Integration Conference on Sunday, his words promising that the audience of about 1,000 at the Omni Nashville Hotel would get Huang as unfiltered as ever as he denounced treatment of immigrants and minorities as "the other."

READ MORE:Immigration conference held in Nashville as 'model gateway city'

Huang, whose father owned a steakhouse in Orlando where Huang grew up, said he parroted his father's drive to work three times as hard as peers to be successful. He told the story of an immigrant family trying to make it as entrepreneurs and still not being seen as equals.

But he found his identity in Baohaus, serving bao - the steamed, filled buns - at his restaurants in New York City and Los Angeles that he says are the mixtape of his love of hip hop and his family's culture. Huang's identity is told in his memoir, "Fresh Off The Boat," which was turned into a television series on ABC. He has a second book out this year and his show, "Huang's World" on Viceland.

That success comes despite hurdles, he said, proudly proclaiming to be a "yellow-blooded whole American, entitled to equal rights because nowhere in our creation story is whiteness tied to the definition of an American."

The first speakers at the conference Sunday expressed concerns that the definition could change: President-elect Donald Trump, who said during his campaign that a wall would be built between the U.S. and Mexico and suggested there should be mass deportation and a ban on Muslims.

The integration conference was billed as the largest gathering of immigration and refugee rights leaders since the divisive election.

"Millions of immigrants and refugees across America and those who have yet to arrive are counting on us," said Stephanie Teatro, co-executive director of the Tennessee Immigrant and Refugee Rights Coalition. "In this moment, we must be fearless and visionary, we must be there for one another as we work through this deep fear and uncertainty, the feelings of despair and (being) overwhelmed and the heaviness this moment."

The Tennessee coalition co-hosted the conference with the National Partnership for New Americans.

"The American dream is bigger than an election," said Eva Millona, co-chair of the partnership. "We need to stand together and recommit to our values."

RELATED:Mayor Barry reassures minorities, women, LGBT Nashvillians after Trump election

Trump's election was a wakeup call for people to stop posting on social media but take action to build compassion and recognition of immigrants as equals, Huang said.

"We are only foreign until we're family," Huang said. "And narratives are the bridge to familiarity. I believe there are truths we share that no one, no time nor place could ever extinguish from our existence. On some plane, in some space, we share these truths, and share these stories (that) no coupon could discount. I know this, because I've seen it in a bao.

"As immigrants, we must tell our stories if we want to be understood at full market value."

Reach Stacey Barchenger at 615-726-8968 or on Twitter @sbarchenger.



