After being diagnosed with Neuromyelitis optica, Christine Ha began to lose her vision and is now blind. She knows what it feels like to be an "other", and has the stories (from funny to embarrassing) to back it up. In this talk, Christine explores her journey with otherness, and three methods anyone can use for effectively harnessing its power: connecting with those like you, connecting with those unlike you, and self-compassion. Christine Ha is the first-ever blind contestant and season 3 winner of the competitive amateur cooking television show, “MasterChef” U.S., on FOX with Gordon Ramsay. She defeated over 30,000 home cooks across America to secure the coveted MasterChef title, a $250,000 cash prize, and a cookbook deal.
Christine also has a Master of Fine Arts from University of Houston’s nationally acclaimed Creative Writing Program. During her time there, she served as Fiction Editor for Gulf Coast: A Journal of Literature and Fine Arts. She is currently working on her memoir and second cookbook.
Christine’s first cookbook, Recipes From My Home Kitchen: Asian and American Comfort Food (Rodale, 2013), was a New York Times best-seller. She has been featured on NPR, the BBC, and CNN International, and travels around the globe to give keynote addresses and TEDx talks. Christine has also served as a culinary envoy on behalf of the American Embassy as part of cultural diplomacy programs in Jordan, Serbia, Bosnia/Herzegovina, and Croatia. She was a co-host on the Canadian cooking show, “Four Senses” on AMI, and a judge on “MasterChef” Vietnam on VTV3.
Christine received the 2014 Helen Keller Personal Achievement Award from the American Foundation for the Blind, a recognition formerly bestowed upon Ray Charles, Patty Duke, and Stevie Wonder among others. Christine currently resides in Houston, Texas, with her husband and two dogs. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at www.ted.com/tedx