​创作者之言

This website would be incomplete without some expository remarks pertaining to the identity of the one who designed and constructed Hwayih Woen’s system architecture, videlicet: myself.  Even now as I sit down to pen this macabre self-introduction, a curious juxtaposition assaults my sensibilities.  On the one hand, my modus operandi is to allow my work to stand on its own.  The integrity of the systems I construct, should they actually hold weight, ought to withstand scrutiny independent of my own identity.  On the other hand, after years of scraping out creative work in the depths of obscurity, I’m beginning to notice a curious pattern: people are curious about my own personal story.  Given this emergent expectation, a standard third person resumé style “short bio” simply seemed incredibly disingenuous, particularly in the context of publishing this website.  Functionally speaking, I face a “scope” problem that nobody seems to know how to solve.  What could I say about myself that the most current iteration of my curriculum vitae couldn’t summarize into a bullet-point list? 

• I was born and raised in Southern California.

• I was homeschooled for the vast majority of my education.

• I’m multi-racial.

• I wrote a novel in high school, which can be found on Amazon

• I grew up as a monolingual English speaker.

• I did my undergraduate degree in Music Composition at Pepperdine University, and my Master’s degree in Ancient Chinese Philosophy at Peking University.

Conversely, every one of these bullet points could (and indeed, they do) fill up entire tomes, because they each contain a saga so peculiar to my experience, that the history contained within them constitutes the very substance of who I am today (and particularly so for the first three bullet-points on the list).  However, despite the voluminous nature of the content that I could—and indeed already have—produced, a very peculiar imperative constrains me, one that others bestowed upon me starting from the time I was a very young man.  I have often heard the phrase “I am a very private person” used as a slogan from both family and friends over the years.  On its own, such an isolated fact seems innocuous enough; however, upon further examination, the slogan metamorphosizes into a question that imprisons me—a question that asks: how does one “share one’s story” without violating the manic and ill-defined calls for “privacy” on the part of family and loved ones?  Human beings do not live in a vacuum; and consequently, to tell “one’s story” would inevitably be to tell the story of others, for it is our interactions with others that define the very plotlines of our individual lives.  Given this, the Hwayih Woen project, to a certain extent, represents—among other things—my inaugural attempt to solve this so-called problem of “scope” when it comes to the slogans of privacy.  Therefore, if my story is indeed something that interests you, I invite you, the reader, to accompany me on a journey through the forest of my creations, for it is in that labyrinth that you will eventually find the most defining imprints of who I am. 

For more information on my other work, please check out the downloads tab of this website, as well as my SubscribeStar page. 

Instructional Hwayih Woen videos on YouTube, Rumble, and BitChute will soon follow.

Welcome to the journey.

~J.Y. Cheung