"I grew up speaking Teochew and Vietnamese. Somewhere along the way, English replaced most of it. Now, watching my parents get older — I realize the window is closing."
Steven La is a 2nd-generation Teochew-Vietnamese immigrant living in the US. He built Ember because the tool he needed didn't exist: somewhere to capture the words his parents still know, the phrases that don't translate, the stories that live only in their voices.
Not a dictionary. Not a textbook. A living archive — built by the people who still carry the language, for the people who want it back.
Millions of people across hundreds of languages are living this exact experience. The language slipping away isn't abstract. It's specific. It's the word your grandmother uses for a thing that has no English name. It's the story your father tells in a voice that doesn't translate.
Ember is the tool that should have existed. It does now. Don't let your family's language end with you.
"Every word I know in Teochew is a word that doesn't disappear. That's the whole idea."