Celebration of Leadership and Achievement This year’s Celebration of Leadership and Achievement Dinner: Ganbare! Generationsof Success honored multi-generational family businesses who emulate the CulturalCenter’s mission of sharing the history,heritage and culture of the Japanese American experience in Hawai‘i.
Celebration of Leadership and Achievement Dinner honorees with Cultural Center President/Executive Director Lenny Yajima Andrew (right) and Chairman of the Board Susan Yamada (left). The gala event took place on October 3 at the Mānoa Grand Ballroom at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i and recognized five businesses that started from scratch and have grown to establish themselves as household names in the Islands. These companies have weathered economic downturns, embraced changing times, and kept their hearts and minds focused on their passion to serve.
A crowd of more than 500 people joined the Cultural Center as it recognized Diamond Bakery, KTA Super Stores, Marians Catering/Dots Restaurant, M. Miura Store, and Tasaka Guri Guri.
In addition to a memorable evening, the Cultural Center raised an estimated $104,000 thanks to generous table and silent auction sponsors. Congratulations to this year’s honorees and dōmo arigatō to all who helped to make this a successful celebration! Scenes in my Memory Opening Reception Friends, family and supporters of artist Sumako Cohn gathered on August 1 at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i Community
Gallery for the opening reception of Scenes in my Memory.The exhibit features a charming collection of paper doll collages based on Cohn's memories growing up in Japan.
This summer the Cultural Center has held several interesting public programs featuring both local and visiting scholars and authors.
In April, Priscilla Wegars of the University of Idaho's Asian American Comparative Collection presented her research on the Kooskia Internment Camp, with a focus on the 17 men from Hawai'i who ended up there. Kooskia was a voluntary work camp where internees from the various Justice Department administered camps could opt to come in order to receive market rate wages for working on a highway project.
Also in April, a full house crowd came out to hear Paul Howard Takemoto give a poignant talk on his book Nisei Memories: My Parents Talk about the War Years, based on oral history interviews with his father, a Kauai'i born Nisei 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team veteran, and his mother, a California native caught up in the mass incarceration of all West Coast Japanese Americans during the war.
Another large crowd assembled in May for a panel and book signing featuring the book Asian Settler Colonialism: From Local Governance to the Habits of Everyday Life in Hawai'i. The presentations, question and answer session, and long informal group discussions that followed raised many issues about the role of Asian settlers in Hawai'i. This event was supported in part by a grant from the Hawai'i People's Fund and the generosity of the Japanese American Citizens League and the American Friends Service Committee.
Dialogues of Abstraction Opening Reception
On February 7, 2009, the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i Community
Gallery held an opening reception for its Dialogues
of Abstraction exhibit.This is the
first time the work of these two acclaimed Japanese-American painters, Mary
Mitsuda and James Kuroda, have been brought together, creating a critical
dialogue on the creation, development, and production of abstract painting.
NEW YEAR’S ‘OHANA FESTIVAL
The Japanese Cultural Center of
Hawai‘i rang in 2009, the Year of the Ox, with the New Year’s ‘Ohana Festival — featuring a showcase of food and
entertainment, Japanese cultural displays and demonstrations, and keiki games
and crafts that reflected the Cultural Center’s motto: Honoring our heritage. Embracing our diversity. Sharing our future.
The Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i expresses its
heartfelt gratitude to the generous sponsors, volunteers and community
organizations whose generosity and support made the New Year’s ‘Ohana Festival a grand success, attracting about 10,000
people throughout the day. Photos courtesy Brian Y. Sato and G2G Media
