Drag ON Talent teaches Southeast Asian youth a transformative craft

Khooblah_Khon and other mentors helped their drag apprentices wear hip pads to mold "an hourglass figure," they said. As everyone was "huffin' and puffin'," Khooblah offered the youngsters some advice: "I told you — being in drag is painful!"

Koobmong Kong, better known by the drag persona, Khooblah_Khon, is an online drag queen specialist. They were one of three mentors of Drag ON Talent, a six-month program that met biweekly and was funded by a St. Paul Cultural Star Grant. Oblivia Nukem Jun and Jasmine D. Cassadine were the other professional drag queens involved. The pilot program had four mentees, who declined to be interviewed because of safety concerns.

Transforming Generations (TG), a nonprofit founded in 2016, led the workshop from January to June. The organization provides "support services to victims and survivors of gender-based violence in Hmong and Southeast Asian communities," according to its website.

In addition to acknowledging such traumas, TG aims through Drag ON Talent to "give space for LGBTQ folks to live beyond the narrative of tragedy," said Seng Xiong, TG's queer justice coordinator. "We can create beautiful things with imagination."

The title of the program, Drag ON Talent, is intentional — the capitalized preposition, in particular.

It encourages "drag artists and LGBTQ+ folks to carry ON (as in keep moving through) amidst uncertain circumstances ... and be courageous as dragons (Drag ON — get it?) in the Hmong culture," Xay Yang, the nonprofit's executive director, wrote in an email. In the ethnic folklore, the dragon is villainized in the way that queer people are, she said. Program participants, then, have the opportunity to change perceptions toward the creature.

The initiative matched drag queen and drag king hopefuls ages 16 to 25 with some professionals. They met at Carleton Artist Lofts, which a community artist, Ka Oskar Ly, helped them find. Drag ON Talent branched off from Drag Tale Times, where a performer reads from children's literature. The nonprofit has been doing the series for several years with the Indigenous Roots Cultural Arts Center.

Xiong explained the etymology of "drag." In the United States, the term dates "back to the 1800s, when people would gender-bend and play around with this idea of what it means to be a man or a woman," Xiong said.

The long dresses worn by men "would drag across the floor," they said.

The art requires training — one example is the craft of receiving tips. "You don't just grab the money and run away." Khooblah said. Once audience members hand the drag performer a dollar bill, "You accept it — and give them that moment."

Two of the mentees transformed into drag kings, who assumed a "masculine presence" with a "dominating force," Xiong said. The rest of the group, including the three mentors, decided on the more well-known persona of drag queen.

"It was pleasant to see the array of gender expressions," Xiong said.

Both Xiong and Khooblah mentioned the importance of Asian American drag queens on the popular TV show "RuPaul's Drag Race," including Nymphia Wind, who is Taiwanese American, and Raja Gemini, who is Indonesian American. Both contestants showed that "it's not a scary or bad thing to show who we are," Khooblah said.

In the introductory meetings of Drag ON Talent, the mentees kept nodding as one drag instructor after the next lectured, giving the impression they got it, Khooblah recalls. But, while rehearsing, the students began to sweat and complain as they layered on stockings.

Khooblah stepped in to pump resilience into the fledglings. "I love to see them in pain," they said. "That means they're doing it right."

At the nonprofit's Pride Fest on Harriet Island, which had an attendance of 420, mentors checked in with their students before each went onstage. Khooblah had an unusual piece of advice: "If you're nervous, say 'Flowers and rabbits. Flowers and rabbits. Flowers and rabbits.' It's kind of weird, but it works."

Performers lip-synched to a variety of music, from rock to contemporary Hmong songs. Khooblah sang their own version of "Never Enough" from "The Greatest Showman." The performers' regalia included a chest-covering amulet, crystal tears, boots and heels, a belted harness with chains hanging from the waist, a bridal costume and flowing veil, and sleeves with fringes dancing like fires.

The greatest challenge of the mentorship program was time.

"We had to pack in years' worth of education in a couple of months," Xiong said. Despite that, the group of drag teachers and students "carried, delivered, served for folks to eat — and eat well." Such words of empowerment spring from Black- and Latin-led ballrooms in Harlem.

Through performance, Xiong said, "They fed us."

Minnesota is approaching the 50th anniversary of Hmong refugee resettlement as a result of the Vietnam and Secret wars.

The Southeast Asian diaspora is continuously defining and redefining itself. To perform drag gives the chance, Xiong said, to finally "experience stability and get us to places of thriving, building generational wealth, security and camaraderie." Drag ON Talent shows that cultural identity is expansive.

Xiong and Khooblah remember their first times witnessing drag queens. At the Hmong New Year in 2001, Xiong was a "small kid who knew early on that I was queer," they said. "I saw two really tall, muscled-up queens who were in full Hmong attire — skirts, cultural aprons, hats and cloths that hugged their bodies. They were so glamorous: I recognized myself."

At a Minneapolis club more than 10 years ago, Khooblah saw a drag queen performing and witnessed freedom incarnate. "I've always loved makeup," they thought. "Maybe I should try something with it."

Never blessed with a mentor, Khooblah sensed an opportunity in Drag ON Talent. As the novices took turns performing center stage, Khooblah compared it to "witnessing the birth" of each one — a metamorphosis.

With summer concluding and the mentorship program over, Khooblah feels a "sweet sadness" but remains optimistic. Their wish is for the mentees to continue drag, keep interrogating self-identity and eventually fly "on their own wings."

"I feel like a mother," Khooblah said, "very motherly. Taking her kid off to college."