a mixed plate of Japanese American news and culture
Our annual New Year's editions include an extra helping of original feature stories, a Winter Book Review, a piece on Preserving Our Japantowns, as well as contributions from all our columnists. Our 2011 issue includes the first annual Nikkei of the Year award, which went to Olympian Apolo Anton Ono. Also inside, an interview with Korean American actor Tim Kang and an update on LA's Little Tokyo.
A BOY OF HEART MOUNTAIN: Based on and inspired by the experiences of Shigeru Yabu By Barbara Bazaldua, illustrated by Willie Ito (Camarillo, Calif.: Yabitoon Books, 2010, 145 pp., $19.95, paperback) Travel back to the Japanese American community of the 1940s and absorb the history of internment camps while reading what feels like a novel. [...]
THE BOY IN THE GARDEN By Allen Say (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Books for Children, 2010, 32 pp., $17.99, hardcover) Reviewed By Twila Tomita, Nichi Bei Weekly Contributor If you are a fan of Allen Say, you’ll be happy to know that he has a new book, “The Boy in the [...]
Any Japanese American would immediately understand what you meant if you said 442nd, E.O. 9066, or camp. But how many Japanese people living in Japan would know? Before November, not that many. However, in November, Tokyo Broadcasting System aired a drama in Japan called “99 Nen no Ai ~Japanese Americans~.” The drama was about the [...]
Without question, the dominating ethnic story of the 2010 elections was how Nicky Diaz and Latino voters handed billionaire Meg Whitman a stunning loss in the gubernatorial race. The less obvious but significantly interesting back story is about the continued rise of Asian Pacific Islanders (APIs) in politics. APIs represent the second largest ethnic voter [...]
MAD AT MOMMY By Komako Sakai (New York: Arthur A. Levine Books, 2010, 40 pp., $16.99, paperback) Do you remember feeling angry with your mother? This little picture book tells the story of a bunny who is angry with his mom. She doesn’t let him watch cartoons. She always tells him to hurry up, yet [...]
THE LUCKY BASEBALL: My Story in a Japanese-American Internment Camp By Suzanne Lieurance (Berkeley Heights, N.J.: Enslow Publishers, Inc., 2009, 160 pp., $14.95, paperback) Twelve-year-old Harry Yakamoto lives for baseball. Growing up in Cedar Grove, a small town in Central California with only a handful of Japanese Americans, his peers do not allow Harry and [...]
This year Oshogatsu is taking a slightly different turn at the Tatsumoto abode. Normally we engage in the frantic end-of-the-year housecleaning and last minute food preparation for both the eve and the day, then slide into the New Year with one simple task — finishing the traditional ozoni as the first meal of the New [...]
It might be hard these days to find someone who has never seen Tim Kang’s face. The Korean American actor has appeared on “Chappelle’s Show,” “The Office,” “Monk,” “Law & Order,” and in the 2008 “Rambo” film. He was in a pivotal, highly memorable episode of the “The Sopranos” and is perhaps best known for [...]
MAYUMI’S KITCHEN: MACROBIOTIC COOKING FOR THE BODY AND SOUL By Mayumi Nishimura (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 2010, 160 pp., $29.95, hardcover) Macrobiotic lifestyles have steadily become popular and mainstream over recent years thanks to Hollywood stars, who rave of their benefits. As Madonna’s personal macrobiotic chef for seven years, Mayumi Nishimura is an expert at creating [...]
ANSHU: DARK SORROW By Juliet S. Kono (Honolulu: Bamboo Ridge Press, 2010, 327 pp., $18.00, paperback) Being a historian, like other callings, carries its occupational diseases. To be sure, I do not face the same hazards as, say, a coal miner. Instead, my curse is that I am unable to take in historical novels or [...]
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