June Fox, a digital filmmaking graduate in fall 2023, participated in a three-week intensive documentary program through UCCS called “Looking China.” Participants filmed, edited and submitted documentaries on different aspects of culture in Xiamen. 

During this trip, Fox didn’t only create a documentary, she created a lifelong friendship with her producer, who went by her English name Mia, and found acceptance of her trans identity among her fellow filmmaking students.  

Some members of the team came from outside of UCCS, including universities as far as California or Fiji. Producers, including Mia, were students from Xiamen University who partnered with members of Fox’s team focused on directing and filming. The students from Xiamen University were able to use their expertise in the area to help inform the documentaries and their focus. 

Fox’s documentary focused on the architecture of Jimei, a city close to Xiamen. The goal was to examine historical and modern architecture in an area that has been touched upon by many different cultural influences. 

Jimei residents were surprised by outside interest in their city’s architecture, coming from a perspective of a much older civilization. “The locals were like: ‘Oh, why are you doing that? The city’s not that old, it’s only 800 years old. You won’t find that much history here,’” Fox said. “For an American, that’s much older than what I’m used to.” 

The team were given five days to shoot their documentary and five days to edit it, but Fox prioritized getting to know Mia. “We’d walk a couple blocks, take some videos of some old architecture, find a person to interview if we could then stop by a cafe to get some coffee or some tea,” Fox said, adding that she appreciated Mia’s easy-going nature. 

Still, the filming process was not without its difficulties. “I don’t know any of that language [Mandarin] so my producer would interview people, and I would just tell her what I wanted to get out of it. I wouldn’t even know what they said in the footage and where to take the documentary [next] until she translated all of it,” Fox said. 

In the end, they were successful with their documentary, even if Fox didn’t know what was being said in the footage until they got to the editing bay. “Mia and I were the only group that … didn’t have any notes to change [the final documentary], so we got to celebrate that night,” Fox said. 

Fox shared that everyone on the trip was facing their own struggles, and she was no exception. “The guy from Fiji had never been on a plane before, let alone left his country. One of the UCCS students was dealing with a recent loss. For me, I had just come out as trans to my family, and it didn’t go very well,” Fox said. 

Despite meeting opposition at home, Fox found acceptance across the world. “Mia was very chill about it, she talked about a trans celebrity that she followed that was Chinese,” Fox said, echoing the sentiment that young people worldwide tend to be accepting even when older generations aren’t.  

“Mia and I went clothes shopping together and did makeup together and stuff. By the end of it, I’d come out to everyone as trans using karaoke that we got to do at the end. That was just a really fun and special experience,” Fox said.  

Even after the trip, Fox has stayed in contact with her peers from UCCS and Mia. “I’ve eaten dinner with the UCCS students at our professor’s [Jay Hubert, assistant professor of Communication] house since then to catch up and Mia, I still text her sometimes. We update each other [on] how we’re getting through life and keeping on,” Fox said.

June Fox (middle). Photo courtesy of Jay Hubert.