My mother sent me a photograph of you—Baachan, my grandmother—when she returned from your funeral, which I did not attend. I had feigned the usual excuses: no money saved; can’t get away from my job just now; busy, very busy, too busy; sorry, really sorry. But lying flat on my back the night of your …

A weekly visual journal/cartoon about an easily-annoyed fourth generation American of Japanese descent. This week, “Phrenological foolishness (my character as indicated by the bumps on my skull)” Check back every weekend for subsequent entries. Click to enlarge

Doris Haruno Abey, a girl from a California farm, my mother, goes to Japan to study Japanese dance. She studies dance and is given the name Sahomi Tachibana. Sahomi at Oregon Buddhist Temple, 2016 She comes back to the United States and spends World War II in two internment camps, where she teaches Japanese dance. …

Marcos Bravo, coordinator of the Elena Kohatsu Library, at work. Courtesy: Japanese-Peruvian Association I'm 7 years old. My mother takes me to the Elena Kohatsu Library for the first time. I see hundreds of books, most of which I can't quite understand or appreciate. I focus on a corner filled with Japanese magazines. I can't …

While outsiders or newcomers may view Pasadena, the second oldest incorporated city in Los Angeles County, as a white-privileged neighborhood, longtime insiders like me have a slightly different perception. The writer, left, with other friends in the Altadena area at the Pasadena Obon. Circa 1972.   We remember dressing in yukata for the Obon at …

I still have half a dozen long videos to review. They're recordings from recently digitized old VHS tapes, capturing my family's Christmas celebrations in the 1980s and 1990s. Between the antics of the kids and the excitement of some slightly drunk uncles, the Akamine family's true Christmas spirit invariably reveals itself in two moments on …

My grandma, Pauline, was born in 1913 in Seattle, WA, and grew up on Vashon Island in the Puget Sound of Washington. The Japanese farming community on the island was a tight-knit group. They organized social events like dances, singing performances, and picnics. The Vashon Japanese effectively blended with the greater community. My grandmother thrived …

Police report submitted by Mary Masako Oshiro for her missing pen. Photo courtesy of author. In June 2025, I had the chance to present my research on the JACL and political lobbying at the Changing Perspectives on Japanese American History in Oakland, California. While there, I ran into my friend and colleague Andrew Way Leong, …

Dane Matsubara and Gardena drag racing enthusiast, Paul Katata, in front of the first generation Mondello-Matsubara Fiat Topolino, 2024. Courtesy of Oliver Wang. Dane Matsubara is the grandson of the late West Los Angeles drag racer, Sush Matsubara. Sush grew up in the Sawtelle neighborhood, working at local gas stations, before joining the wave of …

My family of eight emigrated to Brazil in 1932 (Showa 7). It was a time of global economic depression, and Japan's overpopulation made it difficult to find work. The government, determined to somehow overcome the recession, began encouraging people to emigrate to Brazil. They advertised that people could quickly become wealthy in Brazil, but Brazil …

By far, the most important Nikkei tradition in our family is Obon. My grandfather, Kenzo Hamamoto, passed away when I was two years old, and afterward, my mother, brother, and I flew to Hilo, Hawaii, every few years to take part in services of remembrance. One year, there was a private ceremony that the priest …

The year was 1946. Brazil breathed a sigh of relief after the end of the war. Women embroidered little flags, children ran wild on the dirt streets, and the radio occasionally repeated tiresome news about reconstruction. However, in that corner of the São Paulo countryside, in a small town called Bastos, in the state of …

Read Chapter 5 With his detailed recollections of his various experiences of uprooting, racial bigotry, exile to Japan, and repatriation to Canada, Roy often reflects on the significance of those experiences both for himself and for society at large.  Experiences of Racism Roy’s mindset is still strongly affected by his own experiences of the racial persecution …

Born Marianne Teruko Machida—known to everyone simply as Terri—lived a life woven together by beauty, intellect, creativity, and a quiet strength that sometimes roared when it needed to. She was a woman of deep heart and bright spirit: a devoted wife, a loving mother and grandmother, a gifted artist, a great laugher, a reader of …

A weekly visual journal/cartoon about an easily-annoyed fourth generation American of Japanese descent. This week, “Little Neal in Slumber Land - My Life in Daydreams - ” Check back every weekend for subsequent entries. Click to enlarge

Grandpa Masakazu Tanabe, my father-in-law, who remained healthy until 101, loved inviting people over and serving them a feast. He had five sons and three daughters, and the whole extended family would gather for the New Year. Including great-great-grandchildren and great-grandchildren, over 100 people would come, traveling from as far as Maringá in northern Paraná and …

The upcoming short film, Desolate Dreams, tells the story of a Japanese American family and their friendship with an African American journalist in the aftermath of the Pearl Harbor bombings in Dec. 1941. It highlights the often underrepresented solidarity between African American and Nikkei communities during World War II. Kiyoka “Kex” Rhodes This short film …

Writer Catherine Toth Fox, 50 is one of Hawai‘i’s blogging pioneers. Cuz she shares so much about herself on top her blogs I wen assume dis Kalihi girl must’ve been one supa-talkative child, but she says in third grade when her classmates at Cathedral School wuz asked for describe her, dey chose for label her …

My father, Hiroshi Okuda, was recognized in the Montreal Japanese-Canadian community as a leader, as an after-dinner speaker, as an “educated person.” In the mid-1930s, at a time when very few Japanese Canadians went to university, my father graduated with not one, but two undergraduate degrees from the University of British Columbia. Hiroshi Okuda's graduation …

Tom Matano with a first generational Mazda Miata. Courtesy of Mazda USA. Tsutomu “Tom” Matano first arrived in Los Angeles from Tokyo in 1971 as a 22-year-old, initially interested in studying language as a practical fallback plan. As he explained to me in 2024, his thought process was, “if I go overseas, pick up a …

Read Part 2 Finding people to interview for my feature piece proved more difficult than I thought. I had no ties to the Japanese Canadian community as a whole, I wasn’t a history or social sciences student, and, despite being neck-deep in the project, there was still that lingering feeling of “I don’t belong here.” …

There are people whose presence is not limited to the space they occupy or the time they live. People who, when they pass away, leave a lingering echo, a void that can't be filled, but also a luminous trail that guides, inspires, and comforts. Gerardo Maruy carrying the Pan American Games Torch. This was Don …

Although some had only forty-eight hours, Mother remembers we were given perhaps a week to prepare to leave Seattle for a temporary prison camp.1 After the bombing of Pearl Harbor by Japan on December 7, 1941, Executive Order 9066, signed on February 19, 1942, meant that all those of Japanese ancestry, regardless of citizenship, if …

Mr. Shimizu's story of buying horses was truly majestic and filled me with nostalgia for the good old days of Brazil. The names of the big ranchers (fazendeiros) and horse and cattle traders in the interior of São Paulo state, such as Coronel Candoca and Capitão Rio Lindo, along with the place names Botucatu, Birigui, …