From the OP:
“Barry was usually of a happy disposition, although sometimes children teased him and called him kuping pangsit [having ears shaped like fried dumplings]. He just laughed.”
Forty years later, he about cried when Maureen Dowd did that.
Ah, LOL, I had forgotten about that.
I think from now on, I will refer to Barry as:
Kuping-Pangsit-in-Chief.