USA TODAY International Edition
Lin- watching has fans partying
NEW YORK — You’ve never heard a roar for Jeremy Lin until you’ve heard it in Mandarin.
The question was this: With Lin- mania making its national network television debut Sunday, where to go to watch the game and get a feel for how the Asian Americans of New York were taking to all of this? The man from the Taiwan consulate knew just where to send me.
“Go to the Applebee’s in Flushing. Ask for Mr. Fu.” Well, why not? Downtown Flushing, just down the road from Laguardia Airport, is an Asian enclave, with most of the store signs bilingual. Sunday, with the Knicks hosting the Dallas Mavericks, Applebee’s was Lin Central Station.
Fred Fu was wearing a Lin jersey and handing out the neighborhood Chinese- language newspaper: a 12- page special section with 25 photos of Lin. Fu is the president of the Flushing Development Center and, apparently, the chief organizer of Lin TV parties. He makes sure the chicken wings are ordered and all 16 televisions are turned to the game and then holds court at a big table by the front door as the Lin- watching AsianAmerican community of Flushing rolls past. Funny guy, that Fred. “All the babies’ names in Asia are going to be Lin,” he says. “Check China the past 10 days. If your name is Lin, it’ll be easier to get a girlfriend.”
The younger folks are sitting at the bar or on high stools at tables, speaking English. The older generation is parked around regular tables, speaking . . . something I can’t understand.
Lin hits a jump shot.
They’re all speaking the same language now, roaring over their chips and salsa.
I drop by a young table first. George Wang, Justin Wong, Kevin Santarina, Matt Peng.
Wang: “I’ve followed the NBA all my life. I’m not going to lie; it’s definitely inspiring.”
Peng: “It’s a sense of hope, especially in an economic downturn. He basically is his own stimulus package. We’ve all seen the statistics. Jersey sales are up, Knicks prices are up. Imyself have six jerseys.”
Wang: “I’ve never seen so many Asians at a basketball game in my life. Except in China.” So Lin is making new fans? Wong: “I’ve been to one Wizards game before. I think.”
Peng mentions a friend who told him of seeing a row of Asian- American girls at a game last week at Madison Square Garden, clearly clueless about basketball but gushing all night about how cute the new Knicks point guard is.
Wang’s immediate concern is Lin’s turnovers: “He can captivate us all, but if he can’t take care of the basketball, we ain’t going to win basketball games.”
Down the way are two young ladies, cheering after a Lin pass. Their basketball knowledge:
Angela Li: “Most of the time, I think I can understand.”
Priscilla Fung understands something that a lot of people missed about Lin: “I don’t believe in two weeks he got so good.”
As I approach the older people’s table, the Knicks’ lead is vanishing, and so are the chicken wings.
Alex Peng is a broadcaster who came to the USA nearly four decades ago. He says he has broken down the Lin epic into five H words: Harvard, hope, humility, happiness and heading forward. “The Jeremy Lin story,” he says, “is that he makes, every single day, a lot of people happy.”
Paul Chiang, past 50, takes a seat, proudly showing his new Lin shirt. He says it is the first he has ever bought. Someone comes by with a camcorder, and Chiang holds up a poster he made — “Lin 17 show” — that looks like a New York license plate.
When Lin steals a pass and slides in for a dunk, the audience cheers. Including Yang Fan, who once was a Taiwan legislator.
“Japan, Korea, Singapore, everyone is going crazy for him,” he says.
Fu nods toward Fan. “I’m single and he’s been married 50 years. Lin brings us together.”
Eventually, the crowd counts down the clock. The Knicks win, the fans in the Garden come to their feet and so do those in the restaurant. Lin’s totals: 28 points, 14 assists, five steals, seven turnovers.
On the way out, I say thanks to Fu and come across Chiang in his new shirt.
“So happy,” he says. “So happy.”