Thank you, Chloe Ting: What I Learned from Completing Five Fitness Challenges Being an Asian American female, I often felt othered in my own body because of my race and gender. It was hard enough to accept my Asian facial features, and a greater challenge still to accept my Asian female body that checked off every stereotype: no curves, small boobs, childlike, rectangular figure. In other words, an easy target for bullying, harassment and fetishism. Not only did I feel very conscious of my un-Kardashian-like form, I couldn’t run for very long, couldn’t lift myself off the ground into a full crunch, and I hated seeing my thin arms exposed in pictures. My lowest points are probably when my own mother comments and judges my looks and my body, as is common of Asian immigrant mothers. How I dreamed of having nice muscles to knock out the bullies, one-up the street harassers, and hip toss purse-snatchers in superhero fashion!