Twitch streamer Kasey Ma and lawyer Vince Xu sat down with NextShark to talk about their experience as Asian American contestants on the Amazon Prime Video reality dating show “The One that Got Away.”
The new show centers on a social experiment that has six singles date random people from their past to see if one of their missed connections was the right person at the wrong time. For a month, the singles live without their phones, building genuine relationships with the others around them.
Chinese American Twitch streamer Kasey Ma, 30, has never been on a dating app before. She has been in a few monogamous relationships, with her last being almost eight years long. Ma learned how important it was to love herself first and to figure out who matches her lifestyle instead of molding her identity to meet someone else’s expectations. Ma shares with NextShark, “I don’t want to slow down for anyone anymore.”
“I felt so cool,” she continues. “Because this is what I’ve been trying to do, you know, is to be a good inspiration for Asian Americans, especially women, to take that leap of faith, and you don’t have to be a doctor, you don’t have to be a lawyer or someone in finance.”
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Because of her Hong Konger father’s encouragement to build a stable career, Ma studied economics at New York University. “But the route that I chose, obviously, is so different,” she says. “I was taught to pursue my dreams. You don’t have to be afraid to do that just because your parents told you that you couldn’t or it wasn’t advisable by your friends.”
Lawyer Vince Xu, another 30-year-old single on the reality show, was discovered on Bumble and invited to participate. He had previously been in a nine-year relationship with his high school sweetheart. Xu says he was thrilled to not only rekindle relationships with people he had not talked to in a long time but to also represent as a Chinese Taiwanese American man on an American dating show.
“I don’t think we’ve really seen an Asian American man on an American dating show share his story,” Xu says. “I think there’s a few that have been a part of other people’s stories. You see them be the suitors.”
“I think this might be one of the first times you are seeing an Asian American man being a lead and sharing his full story and dating multiple different types of women, not just Asian women, but from all different walks of life and different ethnicities,” he continues. “Having an Asian American man navigate and have his own journey, this will not only be entertaining but eye-opening for a lot of people to see what Asian love is.”
Xu notes that countless Asian American parents tend to show their love and care through their actions instead of their words. “Growing up, you don’t necessarily get the ‘I love you’s’ or the hugs or the kisses,” he explains. “Our parents showed affection differently. When my parents wanted to show they love me, they would cut fruit. They would make sure you are always full and that you are never hungry.”
“I think that boils down to how we perceive love and how we respond to love and all the way down to our decision making in who we want to spend the rest of our lives with,” he adds.
Ma and Xu’s time on the show has ended, and they both have yet to reveal their relationship statuses.
“The One That Got Away” premiered on June 24 on Amazon Prime Video.
Featured Image via Prime Video Press Release
