July 19, 2017 International Examiner

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

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July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 1

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2 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE OPINION

Never Again is Now: We must stand up to injustice, promote change

By Anna Tamura Special to the IE The following was a speech for the Minidoka Pilgrimage Closing Ceremony on July 9, 2017. Disclaimer: The ideas and opinions expressed here are entirely my own and do not necessarily reflect those of the National Park Service.

As many of you know, I work for the National Park Service, but today, I am speaking to you not as an employee, but rather as a long-time member of the Minidoka Pilgrimage Committee and as a member of the Japanese American community.

I would like to thank the Pilgrimage Committee for inviting me to speak with you today. I would also like to thank my Uncle Richard Tamura for attending 14 pilgrimages, and 12 together with me. During these pilgrimages, he’s shared our family history with me, and I’d like to express my sincere gratitude to him.

Today, we are all connected in this moment—together in this place. Though momentary, we are all bonded to this place, choosing to pilgrimage for our individual reasons and connections to Minidoka. This year, 2017, we commemorate the 75th year since the signing of Executive Order 9066—a seminal presidential action that indelibly changed the course of history, a presidential action that transformed this arid high desert landscape into a prison for the Japanese American community.

For many of us, we have our Issei and Nisei Minidoka stories, and these stories, whether known or unknown, are a driving reason for why we are here today. These stories have many elements in common—family members being forcibly removed from their homes, temporary incarceration at Puyallup or Portland, imprisonment at Minidoka. Then there are the details of each family’s stories— perhaps a family member serving in the military, experiences of segregation at Tule Lake, a celebrated birth or mourned death.

For my Tamura family, like many others, there were few if any words much less stories spoken about their experiences during World War II. Perhaps only a few times during my entire childhood did I hear fleeting references of their time in camp. Of what was said, I can remember only three words—camp, Minidoka, and the Christiansens.

Over time, the stories expanded, but always the Christiansens were mentioned. The Christiansens were my family’s neighbors in

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rural Clackamas County in Oregon, where they operated a farm. In the spring of 1942, the Christiansens had agreed to store all my family’s household items, furnishings, vehicles, and the farm equipment, when my family was ordered to leave. After being incarcerated first at the Portland Livestock Exposition Center and then at Minidoka for three years, when they returned to Clackamas County, everything was exactly as they had left it; all of their possessions returned. The Christiansens turned out to be my family’s safety net, their trusted neighbors, allies who helped in a time of dire need, with potential significant risk to their own well-being. The Christiansens are integral characters in my family’s incarceration narrative because through their kindness, they had prevented a certain economic disaster for our family.

In thinking of those other two words— camp and Minidoka—those words are about this place. Minidoka is part of our community’s history, part of Idaho history, part of American history. Minidoka is a place of profound power—a symbol that conjures many emotions once you learn of the “concentration camp” that existed here.

During our four-day pilgrimage, we have learned so much from our elders, scholars, tour leaders, and friends about the unjust incarceration and imprisonment of our community in this place. ...

In this moment, in this place, we are all connected forging a common and lasting bond, a bond of remembrance and projection.

Remembrance of the people and the events that have brought us together in Minidoka, and a projection of our responsibility to ensure that Minidoka will live on in our children and our children’s children.

Taking that moment to feel the elements, cognitively experience yourself in this place, I can only imagine, was an act that most who were imprisoned here 75 years ago had done many times over. It was just over there, that the famous photograph of Fumi Onodera was taken. The photograph shows Fumi, a young Nisei woman, pointing to the names of her three brothers serving in the military while she and the rest of her family were incarcerated here, living in Block 10. It is on this soil, within these elements that such injustices were occurring to each and every person on a daily basis. While most of us here who did not experience the unjust incarceration will never fully understand what it was like during World War II, we know that all of us who have even 1/16 Japanese blood would have been imprisoned alongside our family members.

A tag hanging from barb wire at the 2017 Camp Minidoka Pilgrimage reads, “Never Again.” • Photo by Ryan Kozu

Well, as we know, the one constant in this world is change. Many would argue that we live in a different world from when the camp was closed. So much has changed, even in the past year, since Dale Watanabe provided his own powerful closing speech focusing on the rhetoric of the election, of building walls, xenophobia, and profiling based on religion, race, and national origin.

Tragically, the past year has provided us with numerous acts of prejudice and hate that will be added to the history books. We can also add that in the past year, the direction of our country has profoundly and shockingly changed. We’ve seen and experienced a resurgence of prejudice, bigotry, chauvinism, narrow-mindedness, and intolerance to people of color, to Muslims, to immigrants, to people who identify as LGBTQIA, and to women.

This hostility has taken form through many actions—in hate crimes, in verbal and physical assaults, in public displays and marches by hate groups, and in government rhetoric and action that hauntingly resemble the policies that created Minidoka during World War II. In response to these actions, the Nikkei community and our allies have responded with the statement “Never Again” and “Never Again is Now.” Your presence here is a way of supporting that message. Your pilgrimage to Minidoka illustrates that you understand the meaning of this place, and it is important to you. This year’s February 19th Day of Remembrance events received record attendance. This year’s pilgrimage is the largest to date, and I suspect it’s because we all have made the easy connections between what happened 75 years ago, to what is happening today, in 2017. We understand that Minidoka’s story, this place you are in today, is more relevant to our lives, to our country, to this time in history than even a year ago.

EDITOR IN CHIEF Travis Quezon

IE BOARD OF DIRECTORS Ron Chew, President Gary Iwamoto, Secretary Arlene Oki, At-Large Jordan Wong, At-Large Edgar Batayola, At-Large Lexie Rodriguez, At-Large Peggy Lynch, At-Large Nam Le, At-Large

ASSISTANT EDITOR Chetanya Robinson

COMMUNITY RELATIONS MANAGER Lexi Potter

COPY EDITOR Anna Carriveau

lexi@iexaminer.org

BUSINESS MANAGER Ellen Suzuki finance@iexaminer.org

DEVELOPMENT MANAGER Heidi Park CVA COORDINATOR Ngoc Dinh

editor@iexaminer.org

news@iexaminer.org

ARTS EDITOR Alan Chong Lau arts@iexaminer.org

CONTRIBUTORS Anna Tamura Devin Cabanilla Mitsue Cook Brenda Neth Jeanie Lindsay Cliff Cawthon Chris Juergens

Hazel Lozano Kamna Shastri Jenn Pang Chizu Omori Elvis Irizarry Roxanne Ray DISTRIBUTORS Joshua Kelso Makayla Dorn Maryross Olanday Rachtha Danh Antonia Dorn Kristen Navaluna Kat Punzalan Eli Savitt Christina Nguyen INTERNS Cathy You Kanami Yamashita Christine Smet

In the past six months, our country has also witnessed a marked increase in activism, marches and protests, and demonstrations of unity and equality for all. The Women’s March on January 21, the day after the presidential inauguration, was the largest collective march in world history, with 5 million people worldwide. It is these types of actions, personal and collective, that protest injustice, strive for a future when equality and freedom is possible, and act to make it happen.

Yet what can we do individually and collectively to ensure that Minidoka or what our community experienced never happens again? In small and large ways, we can resolve to channel our strengths, talents, and courage to stand up for justice and for others when they are in need. For me, this place, my families experience here, my mother’s sacrifices and education of me are what help me find my own courage. My mother spent her first three years of life at Minidoka, and then raised me as a single mother, valuing and seeking every opportunity to provide a good education for me. Born from her struggles are the many privileges I have today. The phrase “Okage Sama De” (I am what I am because of you) resonates with me, and I feel a deep and persistent duty to honor my Issei, Nisei, and community’s experience and trauma here at Minidoka through the active sharing of my accumulated knowledge. An important part of my personal discovery, valuing my heritage, and committing myself to justice occurred here, in this place—at Minidoka.

Today, as we breathe this air, hear the breeze and feel the heat of this place, we recognize that we are all, in some way, products of Minidoka. May we both individually and collectively recommit ourselves to standing up for Constitutional and civil rights and for those that are targeted because of their identity.

Each of you has power, brilliant ideas, talents, interests, and skills to draw from to stand up to injustice, to promote good, to promote change. It is the act of doing that will make the difference. Be it an act of kindness, of formally or informally educating others about Minidoka and the incarceration history, or organizing for communities in need.

My hope is that you will draw inspiration from Minidoka and your experience here to find ways to be like the Christiansens. To be brave helpers who rise to the occasion and stand up and support individuals and communities who are being victimized, just like our Nikkei community was, 75 years ago, here at Minidoka. You are all now a member of Minidoka’s legacy. Thank you.

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IE COMMUNITY VOICES

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 3

Port of Seattle Commission Who will you be voting for?

Port of Seattle commission candidates were invited to by the Candidate Forum for the API Candidates & Issues Forum—King County to answer a questionnaire of four questions. Of the 15 candidates for Position 1, Position 3, and Position 4, 11 responded. To view the candidates’ questionnaires, visit: iexaminer.org/2017/7/ port-candidates-2017.

4 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE NEWS

Port of Seattle candidate Bea Querido-Rico: We need to invest in the community

By Travis Quezon IE Editor In Chief

to laser focus on protecting and developing the jobs of the future by strengthening the support through innovation in areas where we As a candidate for Port of Seattle are strong: maritime, fishing, aerospace, and Commissioner, Position #1, Bea Querido-Rico software development, among others. is the only candidate in the race with direct IE: What would you say is the key issue Port of Seattle operations staff experience. As a newcomer to local politics, Querido-Rico is at the Port of Seattle, and how would you seeking to challenge the status quo in order bring about change to that? to enable more women and underrepresented Querido-Rico: The Port should pay more communities to have a voice in government. attention to disadvantaged communities.

Querido-Rico’s family immigrated to the Allocating budget or throwing money at United States from the Philippines in 1988 problems is not enough. In my campaign, I and she is the first person in her family to always say, “we need sensible leadership.” run for public office. She is a supply chain Sensible leadership means effective leadership and logistics engineer who got her start at the and the Port Commission needs to have a deeper understanding of the day to day lives Boeing Company. of communities like the Asian Pacific Islander The International Examiner caught up with communities.

Querido-Rico to talk about what she feels Sensible leadership is needed. The part voters need to know about the Port of Seattle where the Port is spending half a billion elections. dollars every year and there’s only a select International Examiner: What do people few groups that are benefitting from that, is need to understand about the Port of really concerning to me. I feel like the Port is Seattle? not understanding what it’s like to do business Bea Querido-Rico: Many people think with someone coming from immigrant the Port only manages the airport or han- communities. Don’t just create a workshop, dles all the cranes you see when you’re help communities be more resilient in business driving on I-5 ... but it’s beyond that. and make the process of doing business at the The Port of Seattle is an economic develop- Port more accessible and easier. ment agency that impacts so many aspects of Additionally, I think what really matters our daily lives. If you enjoy traveling and use is the International District. I’m going to the the airport or ship products for your business [“We Shall Not Be Moved” town hall] to you are a person I will serve. If you are look- protest or stand up against the displacement, ing for a job so that you can feed your family, and the implications of all the development if you appreciate the wildlife that soar through going on in the city. And that’s something I the Cascades and advocate for clean air and feel like the Port has been absent in. water, or if you are looking for affordableFurther, in my opinion, the Port has fresh produce from local farmers, then you are overblown the issue with the SODO arena the person I will serve. and has allocated public funds that are counter The bottom line is, the Port of Seattle’s to the mission of the Port as an economic impact on people, it’s much more relevant than development agency. The University of people think. They’re the economic driver for Washington Evans School of Public Policy King County, and they haven’t really been just released a study that further enforces the forthcoming with that mission. The Port needs viability of the SODO arena as an economic

need more brain power and less politics to develop an integrated gateway strategy. The Port tends to approach problems in a silo and as a Commissioner, I would collaborate with government and private partners to invest in an integrated and innovative transportation infrastructure that will result in more people being independent from their personal cars.

I am laser-focused on investing in a multimodal transportation infrasture addressing: speed, reliability, and independence Finally, I think it’s outrageous that Port of Seattle’s technology team is buried in the organization. As Port Commissioner, I would strongly recommend for the Executive Director to have a Chief Innovation Officer on the Executive Leadership Team. My priority is innovation and it starts at the top with senior management.

IE: You’ve been attending a lot of API community events and reaching out to community leaders. What’s an example of something that you’ve learned about the community in your outreach?

Port of Seattle Commissioner candidate Bea QueridoRico outside of MOHAI. • Photo by Travis Quezon

driver, yielding three times more tax revenue to the City General Fund. If elected on the Port Commission, I would work hard to make sure that we invest in protecting the heritage and culture of the impacted communities surrounding the proposed SODO arena, to include the International District and South Seattle cities. What our community needs is to be unified and sports teams do that. Investment in the return of the Sonics is what our community needs—it can’t be done only by the Port, it’s an all hands on deck issue.

Querido-Rico: As a member of the API community, I’m dedicated to advocating the needs of the community. In fact, I spearheaded the institutionalization of the Filipino Young Leaders Program (FYLPRO), founded by past Philippine Ambassador to the United States, Jose L. Cuisia, Jr. and led as President of the national nonprofit for two years, and currently serving as Board member. I established the Boeing Filipinos group as well as participated in the Executive Development Institute.

What I learned in the process of the election is that I noticed that candidates who care about API show up to events. For those candidates that truly care about API community issues my message is: it’s nice to see your support for the API community Other key issues—what’s really apparent during elections, but I do hope that they to the public is the growth of the airport. We follow through on promises stick around.

News Brief

Town Hall purpose to stand up against displacement and gentrification

By Chetanya Robinson IE Assistant Editor On Tuesday, July 18, community organizations and businesses in the Chinatown International District (CID) hosted a town-hall style forum to communicate to the City of Seattle their fears of displacement and gentrification.

The Town Hall coincides with the Council voting this month on a measure that would affect what kind of development will happen in the neighborhood: the Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA). The MHA measure would change the zoning of parts of the CID—with the exception of the National Historic District at the center of the neighborhood—to allow developers to build taller buildings. In exchange, these developers must set aside a percentage of their housing as “affordable,” or else pay into an affordable housing fund that the City will use to build its own affordable housing.

The possibility of new development in the CID, brought on by the MHA, is driving fears of displacement and gentrification. The CID is one of the poorest neighborhoods in the city, and historically home to immigrants

and refugees, including many with limited English. Some fear that, in a city where rents have recently surged to become the fifth most expensive in the country, the MHA rezoning will lead to housing becoming less affordable for CID residents.

In a statement, InterIm CDA noted that the rezone also coincides with worries about speculative real estate purchases—people outside Seattle buying up property as an investment without immediately using it.

According to Frank Irigon, who has worked as activist in the CID and the API community for decades, one of the goals of the event was to help educate people about the housing issues facing the neighborhood, including the Housing Affordability and Livability Agenda (HALA).

Irigon sees HALA as a giveaway for developers, and he fears it will not do enough to ensure that low-income residents of the CID can continue to afford living there. The MHA is designed to build housing for the low-income—defined as those making less than 60 percent of the area median income in Seattle. A single person making around $40,000 dollars a year or less would qualify as low-income, as would a family of four making around $58,000 dollars per year.

Irigon said that for the CID, displacement is a bigger concern than affordability, because most CID residents make far less than the area median income. In a ranking of the median household incomes of some 45 Seattle neighborhoods from data website Statistical Atlas (drawn from slightly outdated 2010 census data, it should be noted), the CID comes dead last in median household income, at around $25,000 dollars per year. For a family of four, this is just above the federal poverty line of $24,600 dollars. Seattle’s median income in 2017 is around $80,000 dollars per year.

Irigon fears that the same gentrification and displacement that struck the historically Black Central District, and the Yesler Terrace housing project, will ruin the CID. “They’re getting rid of all these ethnic enclaves,” Irigon said. “They’ve neglected the International District, and then all of a sudden they say, ‘Hey let’s beautify this place.’ They didn’t beautify it before when our people were living there.”

Organizers of the forum are also concerned with cultural displacement, Irigon said.

“Many of us consider Chinatown, even though we don’t live there, as our cultural and historical home. And with these high-

rises and hotels and these other businesses that aren’t culturally appropriate for that neighborhood, for our people, that’s what cultural displacement is all about.”

Irigon and other activists, including the late Bob Santos, fought to preserve and protect the CID after seeing gentrification, displacement and other pressures destroy historic Asian enclaves across the West Coast.

Irigon points out that the threat of displacement in the neighborhood is nothing new. He remembers when, in 1970, a fire at the Ozark Hotel in Westlake led to stricter building codes, which forced many building owners in the CID to close down their residential units, which devastated the housing stock in the neighborhood.

“What they couldn’t do 40-something years ago with the Ozark Fire Ordinance, they tried to do now with the Grand Bargain,” Irigon said.

Hosts of the forum include the CID Coalition, Friends of Little Saigon, Helping Link, Japanese American Citizens League— Seattle Chapter, Organization of Chinese Americans, Puget Sound Sage, South CORE, and other CID community organizations and businesses.

IE NEWS

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 5

Peter Steinbrueck: The Port of Seattle as a regional economic engine

By Mitsue Cook IE Contributor

needs to remain globally competitive.

The public policy and the investments must align.

August 1, 2017 is the Primary and Special Election. To have a sense of the Port of Seattle’s issues, Mitsue Cook interviewed Peter Steinbrueck, a consultant to the Port of Seattle and former City Councilman who is running for Port Commissioner, Position 4. He was a Loeb Fellow at the Harvard School of Design, who studied the environment, climate change and urban strategies in the United States.

Green the Port. Deep green.

More equitable living wage jobs for blue collar workers are important. More vocational training for youth is needed for the future of the Port.

Cruise lines and the Pacific fishing fleet are important job creators.

Improved relations with communities and local communities are important.

Cook: What about the Asia Pacific Community?

Mitsue Cook: What are important facts about Washington State and the Port?

Steinbrueck: More job training and equitable employment opportunities are • Commitment. The Port of Seattle needed. Not all kids are well suited for creates economic opportunity for all, college, and there are other pathways to stewards the environment responsibly, good jobs for them. partners with surrounding communities, Cook: What environmental conduct ourselves transparently, and conditions need to be improved? holds ourselves accountable. We will Steinbrueck: There is too much noise leave succeeding generations as tronger and air pollution due to air traffic. There Port. needs to be a regional airport, quieter jets Cook: What are key issues at the Port and cleaner jet fuels. of Seattle?

On October 12, the API Candidate Steinbrueck: Transparency and ethics Forum for Port Commissioners will be with full accountability are necessary. No held at 6:00 p.m. at the Nagomi Tea House more illegal pay raises. in the Chinatown International District. It will be sponsored by 24 API organizations.

Cook: What are other key issues?

The November General Election Steinbrueck: Good jobs, good gover- candidates for Port Commissioner will nance, and greening of the Port are some be discussing the Port’s issues and their the key issues. The state’s largest port positions.

Port of Seattle Commissioner, Position 4, candidate Peter Steinbreuck. • Courtesy Photo

Peter Steinbrueck: According to the State of Washington, Department of They establish policy and they hire its Commerce, “Washington is America’s executive director. They serve four-year top state for business in 2017.” The Port terms and establish Port policy. of Seattle is one of the fastest growing In 2017, the Port established a Century airports and busiest shipping ports.

Agenda with three points to drive the The Port creates jobs and economic op- economy in this region: portunities. It also means our connection • Vision. Over the next 25 years, we to the rest of the world by airports and by will add 100,000 jobs through economicships passing through. growth led by the Port of Seattle, for a total Washington is the most trade-dependent of 300,000 port-related jobs within the state in the United States with the Port region, while reducing our environmental driving the economy of the region. footprint.

Cook: What is the Port of Seattle and • Mission. The Port of Seattle is a pubwho are the commissioners? lic agency that creates jobs by advancing Steinbrueck: The Port of Seattle is trade and commerce promoting industrial governed by five commissioners, elected growth, and stimulating economic develat large by the voters of King County. opment.

Shadows of Light: Mental Health Awareness for API Communities Brenda Kay Neth IE Contributor On July 1, 2017, Governor Jay Inslee declared statewide that July would be “Mental Health Awareness Month for People of Color.”

The proclamation moves forward to address the need for culture-based mental health care within behavioral health agencies as well as other providers.

Michael Itti, executive director of Washington State Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs, believes the proclamation will not only create greater awareness, but more culturally appropriate mental health care as well.

“How we talk about mental health care is different in different communities.” Itti said.

Itti points to a 2011 research study with the National Alliance for Mental Illness (NAMI) which shows that of all cultural backgrounds, Asian Americans are the least likely to receive mental health care treatment. He also points out that one third of all Asian Americans have limited proficiency in English, increasing the obstacles to diagnosing and treating mental illness.

“Mental illness is a tough subject for everybody. We need culturally appropriate providers who can treat with a collective attitude,” Itti said.

Itti said that the responsibility for creating culturally-appropriate providers will lie heavily with the providers themselves. Itti stated that providers could develop cross-training for counselors through the help of those within the API communities. Itti also stressed the

need for holistic health care embracing both the physical and mental sides of overall health.

On a long-term basis, Itti hopes there can be legislative measures that will mandate “linguistically appropriate” providers. Intermediate goals are to create training for those working with immigrant and refugee families and clients. For now, simply creating open discussions and awareness about safe resources is key.

Yoon Joo Han, Director of Behavioral Health at Asian Counseling and Referral Services (ACRS), echoed Itti’s opinion.

ACRS serves 2,000 API clients living with chronic mental illness. She said it is necessary to have cultural awareness in order to understand and serve the API communities effectively. For example, there may actually be no words in some languages to describe Western diagnoses, such as bipolar disorder or depression. Sensitive case managers work within these frameworks.

Religious beliefs may deter recovery through Western methods. Again, case managers can encourage clients to take their medications to the temple to be blessed by their priest or develop safe rituals for healing.

toward more inclusion of Pacific Islander communities, such as Micronesia. “How was your day?” leads the discussions on mental health awareness and mental health care during the conference for college-age API students throughout the day.

her API students are suicidal, they don’t want parents to know, because they don’t want to get yelled at. Tran said that growing up, her emotional needs were ignored in favor of academic success. “As a child it is your duty to get good grades. There is no time for Hadi was careful to emphasize that he whining,” she said.

Tran is the lead staff member working within cannot speak for all API communities. He helped found the now annual Summit on behalf Mount Rainier High School with Forefront, a of his friend Jesse, who lost his life to suicide non-profit organization in partnership with two years ago. Jesse’s departure, according the University of Washington School of Social to Hadi, was directly impacted by two core Work, which provides suicide-prevention belief systems Hadi believes are a common awareness in schools and colleges. This will thread within many API communities. Those be the second year with Forefront for Mount beliefs are to be obedient and “save face” in Rainier High School, and Tran said she’s working on parent training curriculum for the order to protect your family.

“You are taught to suppress, not express. new school year.

When you suppress long enough, something Tran offers the following advice: “Let your has to give,” he said. Hadi also said that children know you are there for them. Have profound sorrow and shame over one’s open discussions with them in the household. vulnerabilities within API cultures can lead to You are there to support and help as needed.” a diagnosis of depression.

She went on to say that unless the student “The scarcity of culturally-appropriate has a defined plan for suicide, she is not mental health care contributes to API’s required to contact their parents. Despite this, being the least likely minority group, next she makes every effort to work with the student to American Indian/Alaskan natives, to seek in opening up to parents. She emphasized that help—and the most likely to drop out of API students need to learn how to advocate “Mental illness is a biological, treatment.” Hadi said. for themselves and open up discussions with psychological, and social issue,” Han said.

Phuong Tran, a high school counselor at their parents. In turn, parents need to move “With the right services, you can lead a good Mount Rainier High School, said the “tough beyond intergenerational frameworks of fear life.” love” approach she experienced growing up and listen to their children.

Brandon Hadi, co-founder of the API with Vietnamese immigrant parents is also “Just because they get a B doesn’t mean Mental Health and Wellness Summit, something many of her API students face. their child won’t go to college,” she said. She which was held at UW last year described Tran said students are afraid to talk to their added that parents, too, need support and barriers to mental health care within some parents because they’re afraid their parents guidance to grow beyond past traumas and API communities and a need for more will get angry or punish them for not focusing awareness. The Summit, now in its second entirely on good grades. She said that when cultural norms. year, is expanding its outreach and working

6 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE NEWS

Community seeks to honor Alan Sugiyama legacy with commemorative plaque

By Kamna Shastri IE Contributor

for the people whose lives were touched by such leadership. “Recognition in remembering our community leaders is important to the people they represented; it is acknowledgement that we exist and that we have a say in our future.”

The fruit-laden trees of the Danny Woo Community Garden, the colorful play equipment at Donnie Chin International Children’s Park. Walking through the Chinatown International District neighborhood, you can see reminder after reminder of inspiring leaders who have dedicated their lives to advocating for the community.

The late Alan Sugiyama, who served as the first Asian American on the Seattle School Board and advocated for children, community, and education, passed away earlier this year after battling cancer for Alan Sugiyama. • IE Archival Photo two years. Sugiyama founded and served as executive director of the Center for Career Alternatives for 30 years, helping guide by Seattle’s Department of Transportation. hundreds of disadvantaged young people The group requesting the change must make sure there is a City Council sponsor who through job training programs. can represent the proposed change. Seattle Now, a group of Sugiyama’s close City Council President Bruce Harrell has friends and family are working to place a agreed to sponsor the street naming. Next, commemorative plaque in the neighborhood the Seattle Police and Fire departments to remember the activist and school board need to confirm that emergency response member. The plaque would christen the times won’t be affected by the change and intersection at South Oregon street and 15th that the new name would not cause undue Avenue as “Alan Sugiyama Way.” confusion. In addition, the group must show The idea came to Sugiyama’s good friend proof of outreach to communities affected by Larry Matsuda and a group of others during a the change. Lastly, the group must raise the get-together this past Memorial Day. School funds for any materials. districts often name their own schools after Matsuda said that the Alan Sugiyama important people, but there were no schools Memorial Committee raised $2,600 in cash that could be named after Sugiyama. The and pledges within three days. The core group intersection sign and plaque seemed like a is still working on collecting signatures from good way to honor Sugiyama by marking a the community. point in space that Sugiyama passed every day for 20 years.

Sugiyama’s legacy has room to grow.

There is still much work to be done in the neighborhood, and in the Seattle school district, for young students of color.

Community leader Ron Chew wrote in an email that the street naming is a wonderful gesture and he would like to see Sugiyama’s work continue through programing and direct action.

An artist’s rendition of an “Al Sugiyama Way” sign.

“I would love to see the spirit of their lives reflected in active ongoing programs supported with government funds. Over time, people will forget who Donnie Chin and Al Sugiyama are unless we find ways to sustain the causes to which they devoted their lives,” wrote Chew.

people. She would sometimes sit under his table as a child, peeking out from beneath and watching her father’s clients. Now Sugiyama also works for the school district. She said she didn’t quite think about a street naming memorial, or anything of the sort, until her Larry Matsuda also reflected on the father’s friend Larry Matsuda suggested the importance of remembering the legacies idea. Then she started to see what something of our leaders. He conjured the image of as simple as a street name could do. a hero, and one that need not be flying in “It’s going to be special for other people the sky like Superman, but those heroes who don’t know him to be like ‘Oh who was who help individuals and communities rise that?’” she said. “They’ll be able to Google with forward momentum. Remembering such leaders is especially necessary, him and see the accomplishments he did.”

Matsuda thinks, given our current national The physical presence of a name, especially leadership that “model[s] dishonesty and in public spaces, is one way to keep the bigotry.” legacies of community leaders alive. Willon “Alan exemplified many outstanding Lew, one of Sugiyama’s close friends, said in an email: “Future generations learn from qualities such as ethical leadership, their legacies and seeing a landmark named willingness to help people in need, and after a community leader raises the question dedication to social justice,” Matsuda said.

Leaders and Legacy “We need heroes to look up to be a strong WHY which generates dialogue.”

Naming a sign or place after a person society, so that lessons are learned and not Growing up with her father, Alysa Lew also noted that remembering requires the fulfillment of specific criteria set Sugiyama imbibed his passion for helping community leaders is an important gesture forgotten.”

Seattle Preschool Program in second year, reaches 1,000 children Brenda Kay Neth IE Contributor In 2014, Seattle passed the Seattle Preschool Program Levy of $58 million over four years, allowing the implementation of a four-year pilot program, to pursue its goal of providing high-quality preschool for 2,000 children. Now in entering its third year, the program will have 37 sites, 13 providers, and will enroll approximately 1,000 children. The program recently received high praise from Mayor Ed Murray, despite growing pains over meeting higher costs for providers. Enrollment for its third year began mid-March, and there is already a wait list. Families of four making under $73,800 have free tuition for their eligible three- and four-year olds. Higher-income families will pay a sliding scale fee.

Leilani Dela Cruz, Operations Manager of Early Learning for SPP, stressed that the pilot program is “equity” based, focused on reaching a diverse population through many different locations and providers to bring kindergarten success to all children.

Day care centers, preschools, community centers, as well as the public schools are just some of the locations SPP is targeting.

Research shows all children benefit from attendance at mixed income classrooms, Dela Cruz said.

SPP is also implementing a pilot program in Family Child Care homes. “We want to go where the children are.” Dela Cruz stated. This culture-appropriate approach,

according to Dela Cruz, is unique to Seattle’s plan. She said no other city is currently showing this type of innovation.

Dela Cruz said many immigrant families prefer to have their children schooled by a neighbor in their own home who speaks their native language.

Through the SPP, these family child care homes will be supported to participate in the Washington State Early Achievers Program.

How does the SPP bring higher quality to preschool? Susan Lee, director of Operations at the REWA Early Learning Center at Beacon Hill, said the SPP offers scholarship money to help with continuing education for its teachers, as well as consistent coaching and feedback about how teachers are doing. SPP also provides for special education assistance within the classrooms of children who need it.

This fall will be the Beacon Hill center’s second year with SPP and there are two SPP classrooms. Lee said an additional classroom will be added.

What if you have a three-year-old waiting for an SPP slot? Lee said that this upcoming year, parents can have their toddler “grandfathered in.” She said if the three-year-old already attends a center where SPP is provided, parents can simply request continuity of care for their child at the same center.

For Lee, a concern is that there are still not enough hours in the day for child care

assistance. Frantic parents, though grateful for the Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. care with SPP, still face paying for additional child care after 3:00 p.m. Lee said her center does offer before and after school care, but for a fee. She commented that working parents would benefit with eight-hour preschool every weekday, and hopes additional SPP funding can provide this in the future. She also indicated that there has been a disparity in salaries between teachers and directors. At one point, Lee said she encouraged one of her administrators to go back to the classroom where she could earn more money.

At present, Lee said her bilingual center serves a total of 102 children, teaching Chinese, Vietnamese, English, as well as a number of different Chinese dialects.

She said this is especially important to note, since 90 percent of her teaching staff are immigrants and can communicate a child’s difficulties more effectively to parents, other staff, and administration.

If a child does need special education support, the process will happen faster than within a single-language classroom.

Lee said she is excited to be a provider for two new SPP sites that will open in 2019. She said that the Low Income Housing Institute (LIHI) plans to create a preschool within their low -income complex in Lake City, providing four classrooms serving 80 preschoolers.

SPP is financing the project. Also on the horizon is an expansion into preschool at

the REWA site on Martin Luther King.

At present, infant to two-year-old care is provided, but she said by 2019, three preschool classrooms will be open. SPP has given $500,000 toward its completion.

Hueiling Chan, Director of the bilingual preschool for the Chinese Information and Services Center, said that the collaborative spirit of the pilot program allows centers to share and learn from one another, instead of competing. This fall, Chan will oversee a new SPP site at the Yesler community center. Chan said that Yesler is one of four community centers that is offering the SPP opportunity, made possible through the City of Seattle and its Parks and Recreation Department. The Yesler classroom will offer both Mandarin and English.

Gloria Hodge, Director of the Hoa Mai Preschool, a bilingual Vietnamese immersion center, said the school celebrated its one-year anniversary in December, and that it couldn’t have happened without the help of the SPP. “Partnering with the Seattle Preschool Program has provided so many benefits for our teachers and children through observation, coaching, data collection and assessment,” she said. “It has helped us grow and become more effective as Early Learning Professionals. It is important for the Seattle Community to know the impact it has made through the Family and Education Levy.”

IE NEWS

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 7

CID Coalition meets with community for development feedback

By Jeanie Lindsay IE Contributor Discussions about a possible new corporate hotel, affordable housing, and community-generated goals in the Chinatown International District (CID) swirled at a July 9 meeting. The CID Coalition, also known as Humbows Not Hotels, brought together residents and friends of the district to share updates on local property development plans and gather feedback from the community.

Frank Irigon, a longtime Asian American civil rights advocate, also known as Uncle Frank, briefly spoke about his work on behalf of the International District community as a student at the University of Washington. He described efforts to protest the construction of the Kingdome as a way of fighting against displacement, similar to goals shared by the CID Coalition. He praised the group of volunteer activists for their efforts to work both with and for the community.

Members of the CID Coalition took turns to provide updates and moderate group discussion about issues impacting the district. A significant portion focused on updates from an International Special Review District (ISRD) board meeting in May, which included discussion regarding a proposal to build a new Marriott Hotel on 8th Ave S and S Lane St. At that meeting, many public commenters shared their dismay at the hotel’s location and design.

Some added that it failed to represent the culture of the district, and the lot should instead be used for community-oriented economic development.

Christina Nguyen, a volunteer with the coalition, shared some of that feedback with the group at Sunday’s meeting.

“This is basically a slap in the face for our community,” Nguyen said, after

Several people showed up to discuss the future of the International District on July 9, including Seattle mayoral candidate and state senator Bob Hasegawa • Photo by Jeanie Lindsay

sharing notes from the meeting. “We are more than colors in a window design.”

She continued to say that the overall concept for the hotel is “completely out of scope” with the people who live in the Chinatown International District.

The coalition also shared concerns about the proposed 14-story tall building’s shadow across neighboring structures, increased foot traffic in a sensitive area, and an overall sense that the project represents gentrification in the neighborhood. The hotel would replace a block that includes a Tai Kwon Do school and a former hookah lounge, and operate in close proximity to Legacy House, the only assisted living facility for Asian elders in Seattle. Bids for the lot had exceeded the capacity for nonprofits in the area, who had previously

hoped to purchase and use the property to expand medical and social services for the community.

However, plans for the hotel are still in their early stages. The ISRD board must approve the developer’s permit before any construction may begin, and members of the CID Coalition have been lobbying the committee to deny that permit.

The coalition also shared their concerns around Seattle’s Mandatory Housing Affordability (MHA) requirements.

If the city council approves an upzone in the district, the MHA laws would go into effect, and require developers to build affordable housing or pay a fee in lieu of those units. Current proposals for the Chinatown International District would mandate builders devote at

least 7% of their buildings to affordable housing units or pay the fee. But some members of the coalition say the legislation lacks clear avenues for accountability, while failing to provide enough affordable housing units quickly enough to meet current needs.

Tam Nguyen, a business owner and advocate with Friends of Little Saigon, says he doesn’t necessarily care about the percentage. Instead, he says he’d rather support any legislation that clearly accomplishes three goals. Those include commercial affordability for small business owners in the area, bringing and retaining Asian and Pacific Islanders within the district, and higher levels of cultural competency among staff brought in from outside the neighborhood.

“They need to speak our language, they need to understand our culture, and they need to understand our walk of life,” Nguyen said, while discussing the impact of people who work within the community. “If they cannot understand that, they should not be here.”

Volunteers also asked those who attended the meeting to share their concerns or ideas for the district’s future. Coalition members asked what should be done about affordable housing, affordable commercial space, community owned land, and stabilization assistance. Some groups recommended a community-based stabilization or antidisplacement fund, created and used by the API community and businesses.

Many groups also said they would like to see increased cultural opportunities. A table full of Cantonese speakers said cultural isolation for the aging community is difficult, especially when many young people don’t speak the language. Other commenters said they would like something like a community-developed landmark project, or a regularly scheduled night market.

Residents, task force surprised at Navigation Center July 12 opening

By Cliff Cawthon IE Contributor The Navigation Center—a new, lowbarrier, 24-hour shelter for the homeless— opened on July 12 at the Pearl Warren Building at 606 12th Ave S, near the Little Saigon neighborhood. The Navigation Center is intended to help 75 people at a time transition into permanent housing. It was intended to be one more tool for the City to use in addressing the homelessness crisis, but the project has been opposed by community advocates in the Chinatown International District and Little Saigon, who feel the City didn’t do enough outreach to the neighborhood to address their concerns about possible impacts the shelter might have.

The July opening was especially alarming for some after the City agreed to pause the project in March following community demand. According to a statement from Friends of Little Saigon in March, this pause was meant to last “until a detailed plan is vetted and approved by the community.”

According to community advocates and members of the Navigation Center Community Task-Force (NCCTF), the City

did not receive the group’s detailed response plan when it announced the Navigation Center’s opening, and then proceeded with the July 12 opening. The response plan was intended as a way to address community concerns about the Navigation Center, which the task force had also collected.

In a statement, the Mayor’s office explained why the City is going forward with opening the Navigation Center this month.

“The City is regularly meeting with the Friends of Little Saigon and the Navigation Center Community Task Force. ... At the same time, the Navigation Center is moving ahead to open on July 12th as there are people living outside in desperate need of the services it provides.”

In a statement published in the International Examiner, the NCCTF criticized the July 12 opening, saying “this puts into question their willingness to work with the community.”

Those sentiments viscerally manifested as community members expressed distress, confusion, and frustration at public meetings organized by the NCCTF and Friends of Little Saigon, to discuss the mitigation plans submitted by the City. “They talk about the Navigation [Center] in Chinatown, in our

Asian neighborhoods, and we have a lot of crime already,” said Peter Kuang, owner of the Green Leaf Vietnamese restaurants, which has locations in the CID and other neighborhoods.

Kuang and others were concerned that the Navigation Centers would attract more crime and harassment from panhandlers and homeless people, and disproportionately put elders and patrons in danger: “If we set up the [Center] ... older folks, [who] speak different languages, if there’s a problem they will have to figure out how to call [emergency services].”

Dr. Minh Xiao, a neighborhood chiropractor went further in criticizing the City’s approach. “We’re kind of shocked, we think that the City didn’t inform us about this Navigation Center,” Xiao said.

“Mayor Ed Murray helped [the CID] to cleanup Chinatown and they’ve done a really good job in the last year.” Dr. Xiao, however, mentioned that residents who were in-the-know had submitted a petition with “something like 1,300 signatures,” but according to Dr. Xiao, the petitioner had yet to receive a response.

Despite strong feelings against the center, Xiao and others took the needs of

the homeless and those dealing with drug dependency into consideration. Yet they were skeptical as to why the center would be located in a dense area. According to the Seattle Chinatown-International District 2020 Healthy Community Action Plan, more residents with children are moving into the neighborhood and Xiao believes that “this neighborhood will not be safe.”

Quynh Pham, from the Friends of Little Saigon and the chair of the NCCTF, agreed that many community members lacked information. According to Pham, community meetings in the past have been canceled where people “wanted to express their frustration.”

The NCCTF responded to the City’s plan on June 30. The four parts of the plan deal with public safety and operation issues; neighborhood health impacts and social services; economic and community investments to the surrounding community; and neighborhood partnerships to support the Center and receive feedback. The plan has also added limited entry and exit hours for the Navigation Center, as well as Seattle Police Department offices to respond to safety concerns.

8 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE NEWS

World champion power lifters Alma Kimura and Grant Higa break records, overcome barriers

By Chris Juergens IE Contributor Medalists at the June 2017 World Power Lifting Meet in Belarus, Seattle-area residents Alma Kimura (gold medal 2017; three-time world champion) and Grant Higa (silver medal 2017) look like an unlikely combination visually and professionally.

Grant is 46 years old, 5’8”, competes in the 265-pound-and-up division and is a personal trainer at Seattle’s Vulcan. Alma is 62, 4’10”, competes in the 138–158-pound division, and is a trial attorney. Dig deeper, however, and the reasons for success at powerlifting, life experiences, aspirations and values of the two Asian Americans originally from Hawai‘i are strikingly similar.

Alma and Grant identify similar keys to their success both as powerlifters and as professionals. Competition preparation takes months and is detail intensive. There are three different lifts—the dead lift, squats, and bench press. In the lead up to a match, lifters devote one three-hour work-out a week to each lift. Every week’s workout is different in terms of weight lifted and number of reps at a given weight. All workout results are meticulously recorded.

The goal is to work one’s body up to its maximum ability right at the time of the meet.

As both Alma and Grant explained, the minutia and focus involved in powerlifting corresponds with the skills they employ in their respective workplaces. As a trial attorney, Alma prepares far in advance to arrange witnesses and gather appropriate evidence. Cases often hinge on minute details and she cannot afford to leave any rock unturned. As a personal trainer, Grant likewise employs his detail-oriented mindset to prepare tailored workouts to

Alma Kimura and Grant Higa win gold and silver medals at the World Powerlifting Meet in Minsk, Belarus on June 15, 2017. • Courtesy Photo

each client. While Grant trains for about three hours three days a week, his clients are interested in a range of workouts types and lengths. As such, he seamlessly adapts his detail-oriented skills to different contexts and demands.

In addition, powerlifting, trial work, and personal training all involve performing for an audience. In powerlifting, hundreds to thousands of fans are often in the audience watching a competitor as they attempt to lift as much weight as possible. The experience is relatable to an attorney performing in a trial or a trainer presenting a tailored workout to dozens of clients a week.

The beauty of a sport like powerlifting, however, is that regardless of your background, “it is just you and the bar. The question is whether you can lift a given

weight or not,” says Grant. Alma noted that the number of highly successful powerlifters in the United States who are people or color is quite high.

Grant and Alma’s pride in their heritage and Hawai‘i upbringing shape their aspirations for others in their communities.

Grant says a major motivator for him is to be a role model to other Asian Americans, residents of Hawai‘i, and low-income young people who aspire to be weightlifters. With little money to spare, Grant started lifting in college at a no frills, rusty gym on the Big Island of Hawai‘i. Grant got up at 4:15 a.m. to fit a lift in to his busy schedule of work and study. “Weight is weight” says Grant, and it does not matter if you do not have access to a nice facility, you can make a work-out on your own if you are determined.

Alma similarly wants to inspire other Asian American women to become weightlifters. She proudly related how there are three Asian American women in their 20s at her gym to whom she serves as a mentor. Like Grant, she also takes pride in having been raised in Hawai‘i and calls herself a “Waipahu girl.” Waipahu is the working-class suburb of Hawai‘i where Alma grew up. The granddaughter of Japanese sugar workers from Japan, her ascent to being a Georgetown-educated attorney and world powerlifting champion is an example she hopes others can follow.

While extremely successful, competitive, and proud, both Alma and Grant show humility and are devoted to their families. Alma said multiple times during her interview that she was very happy Grant was being profiled with her. “I don’t think people outside the power lifting world realize how much of a big deal Grant is in our power-lifting community,” she said. Alma also spent considerable time discussing her son, who is in his mid-20s. She related how the two of them used weightlifting to spend time together. A family-oriented person like Alma, Grant proudly said he always fits his workouts in at times that do not interrupt his responsibilities as a father.

Grant spoke of his eldest 13-year-old daughter’s accomplishments as a select softball player and his younger nine-yearold daughter’s ability to climb eight feet of rope just using her arms.

While proud of their accomplishments this year in Belarus, both are in powerlifting for the long-haul. Grant is eying a gold medal at next year’s meet in Calgary and Alma will continue to defend her worldchampionships.

ARTS

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 9

Madame Butterfly panel discussion addresses representation

By Hazel Lozano IE Contributor The lights came down at SIFF Uptown during the July 9 community panel discussion titled, “Asian Arts Leaders Respond to Madame Butterfly,” as the audience watched Angel Alviar-Langley, a local hip-hop dancer and teacher. She opened the event with a performance of two musical pieces: a poem read by Kehlani, and “Ache,” by FKA Twigs, both produced and performed by women of color. She stated her desire to be true to her experience as a woman of color “in this space,” and being intersected as a street dancer invited to this event in front of this audience.

The event was intended not just as a response to Madame Butterfly, but to also address the representation, or lack of, for Asian Americans in general, from yellow face to white-washing to appropriation.

In addition to Alviar-Langley, the panelists included Matthew Ozawa, Kathy Hsieh, Jenny Ku, Roger Tang, Karl Reyes, Frank Abe, and LeiLani Nishime Alviar-Langley admitted that she wasn’t familiar with Madame Butterfly until she watched a Youtube video of a production the night before the panel. “I’m young,” she said. But Alviar-Langley, who organized last year’s What’s Poppin Ladiez conference, brought it back to what she often encounters as a Filipino-American artist and teacher of a historically-Black art form: “I’m making money off of this culture that wasn’t originally mine; what am I gonna do to give back?” She asked the room, “What are you doing to sit back? What are you doing to spotlight those cultures that you want to spotlight and how are you doing it in a way that isn’t harmful?”

Karl Reyes, a character tenor who is part of the Seattle Opera chorus, said that once he got to work with opera companies, they saw his potential and what he could do, thereby opening more doors. He also found, while playing Goro in Butterfly, the challenge of playing a character that, to his Filipino grandma, was a reminder of the horrors of Japanese soldier warfare in World War II. “What space are you taking?” asked Jenny Ku, a burlesque performer and activist, and pointed out in response to Karl that “we often have to wear the tools of our oppressors to gain entry into those rooms.”

Ku, (known on stage as Shanghai Pearl), expressed an alienation from the story, calling Madame Butterfly a “for-whitepeople-by-white-people story.” AlviarLangley stated that she would need to see “disclaimers” or some messaging around the production as a cautionary tale, in order for her to feel drawn into the story.

LeiLani Nishime felt that it was “less the opera and the story and more about the repetition of it.” Nishime, a professor at UW in the Department of Communications, said, “We must make it alien to ourselves.”

“White people should give up the idea that this story is theirs and theirs alone,” Roger Tang said. He then described the public response when David Henry Hwang decided to re-adapt Flower Drum Song, the 1958 Rodgers & Hammerstein musical adaptation of the 1957 novel by ChineseAmerican C.Y. Lee: “Why didn’t he leave it alone and get his own story?”

Kathy Hsieh, a longtime theatre artist and producer in Seattle, described a common conversation with those who want to keep classics like Madame Butterfly or The

Panelists pictured left to right: Matthew Ozawa, Kathy Hsieh, Jenny Ku, Roger Tang, Angel Alviar-Langley, Karl Reyes, Frank Abe, and LeiLani Nishime. • Photo courtesy of Kyoko Matsumoto

Mikado because of their love of the culture and music: “Why can’t we just enjoy something that has been classically ours?

“How much do you really appreciate a culture if you’re willing to traumatize the culture that that is representative of?

“I don’t understand how that could be traumatizing to people.”

Hsieh, who grew up and went to college in Seattle, said that growing up without any role models or accurate representation created an invisibility. “We’re basically rendered powerless because not only do I not see myself and feel like I have role models, but other people I grow up with don’t know how to deal with me.” She described being treated as alien when working on touring productions in high school, and being beaten by an elderly white bus rider because Hsieh tried to help her on the way to ballet class in college.“Go back to your country,” she was told.

“Whether it’s a positive or a negative stereotype, they create a lot of trauma,” Hsieh concluded. This reporter heard an audible groan from an older white male audience member across the aisle.

Hsieh emphasized the need for new stories to be told, and how women specifically can replace historically problematic storylines—in collaboration with Seattle Opera and her theatre company SIS Productions, Hsieh will be curating three short plays by and featuring AsianAmerican women, and a conversation on reclaiming Asian female representation, in an event called “Reversing the Madame Butterfly Effect: Asian American Women Reinvent Themselves Onstage,” on July 28 at Cornish Playhouse Studio Theatre.

Matthew Ozawa is still grappling with a conflicted lifelong love of opera, which historically is white-centric and marginalizes people of color (Pearl Fishers, Turandot), and how he grew up never seeing himself in Madame Butterfly: “As a director, I keep asking, ‘How are these pieces being interpreted by, and who are they being interpreted by?’”

Ozawa realized his “otherness” when he wasn’t cast in the Werther chorus as a boy, and admits that he only started speaking out for his Asian identity two years ago, as he took on the challenge of directing Madame

Butterfly for Arizona Opera, and recognized several layers of conflict in interpreting and casting the story in a “traditional way,” as they requested. A fourth-generation Japanese American, Ozawa exclaimed, “You don’t know anything about a culture by going to a tea ceremony!”

Rather than colorblind casting, Ozawa said he’s more interested in color-conscious casting. His production of Madame Butterfly, at the Arizona Opera, retained a lot of the traditional aspects of the opera, as dictated by the company, but Ozawa shifted the storytelling and staging more dramatically in the second act, particularly removing the “Asian ritualism” around Butterfly’s decision to commit suicide: “People were seeing something they weren’t quite used to.”

Ozawa said the audience loved it, but was surprised to hear that the biggest complaint from audiences was his reinterpretation of Kate Pinkerton: “Many people were angry that she wasn’t nicer and more angelic.”

While these statements of the AsianAmerican experience are very familiar to some attendees and readers, the Seattle Opera acknowledges that it’s a new conversation for them with their audiences: “We have a challenge with a target audience for efforts such as this. On the one hand, some members of our opera community are not familiar with social justice issues or with the hurt that marginalized people have experienced. For some of them, these conversations about race and equity are new, and they can be challenging and controversial. On the other hand, there are people of color in Seattle for whom Seattle Opera’s efforts surrounding Madame Butterfly simply do not go far enough. We try to do our outreach on social media and in the press acknowledging where different people are coming from.

We know that we have not done a good job in the past of honoring the POC members of our community, and we have to work hard to prove we are worthy of peoples’ trust.”

Seattle Opera is putting on Puccini’s Madame Butterfly for the eighth time in its history (according to the Seattle Opera website). The last production was in 2012, and in the intervening years the AsianAmerican community has actively voiced criticism of its misrepresentation in media, most notably during the Seattle Gilbert and

Sullivan Society’s 2014 production of The Mikado.

Seattle Opera joined Seattle’s Race and Social Justice Initiative in 2014, and through trainings, the staff recognized the need to open a conversation about the problematic narrative in Madame Butterfly. General Director Aidan Lang began planning for this season three-to-four years ago, and according to Gabrielle Nomura Gainor (Seattle Opera’s Media Relations Manager), “To cancel now would have meant breaking many contracts that would have had significant negative financial impacts on vendors, musicians, artists, and more.”

While recognizing that change couldn’t happen overnight, Gainor stated that she and Seattle Opera “acknowledge that the choice to do Butterfly is hurtful to some people. We’re grateful for members of the API community who have generously shared extremely painful stories with us to help us in our work toward racial equity. It’s our responsibility as a historically white and European organization to look at ourselves and examine how we can improve, and we will continue to do that.”

In April, Seattle Opera’s Barbara Lynne Jamison, Director of Education and Community Engagement, invited this panel of Asian-American artists to respond to the work. Seattle Opera recorded the panel discussion and plans to share a transcript with board and staff members who could not be there, including General Director Aidan Lang.

Moderator and veteran KIRO journalist Frank Abe opened the panel by stating that the production was going ahead, so questions were not going to be related to the production cancellation but rather to issues of representation. At no time did the panelists specifically endorse the production or state their endorsement of how or why it’s being produced. Ozawa commended the Opera for having a conversation that he didn’t see even happening at many opera companies across the United States. “For me, this is a huge deal.”

As for the audience, Gainor said they had hoped to get a mix of opera subscribers and community members, particularly those of the Asian Pacific-Islander (API) communities; this reporter noted a fairly strong representation of API attendees (though not more than white attendees), and a fair number of board members and staff in attendance. Gainor also noted that there were more APIs in this audience than a typical Seattle Opera performance.

During the audience Q&A session, a Seattle Opera subscriber expressed a deep appreciation for the panelists sharing their very personal stories “over and over and over again.” She then asked what “disclaimers” (as Alviar-Langley described) would be offered to the audiences, since the panel audience was full of self-selected attendees. Lynne-Jamison replied that the Opera is offering “American Dream” after Butterfly closes. The info for this piece, and the Opera’s additional programming is visible on a separate page from the Seattle Opera page for Madame Butterfly: https:// www.seattleopera.org/classes-camps-clubs/ for-adults/community-events/ One audience member asked what the conversation was in Japan (about the stereotypes in the opera), to which Jessica Murphy Moo responded that Yasko Sato, a Japanese soprano making her debut in this BUTTERFLY: Continued on page 10 . . .

10 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

ARTS

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

A Heart Soaring In The Sunset—The Shimmering World of Yayoi Kusama

By Kazuko Nakane IE Contributor

Panelists (from left to right) Jenny Ku, Angel Alviar-Langley, Kathy Hsieh, Matthew Ozawa, Roger Tang. • Photo by Jacob F. Lucas

. . . BUTTERFLY: Continued from page 9

production, said though audiences often commented on how a lot of the character motivations and actions didn’t accurately reflect Japanese culture, there was no controversy in Japan surrounding the characters in the opera. At this point, Frank Abe stepped in to point out that there is a very different context between JapaneseAmerican experience and Japanese experience.

A self-described white middle-aged subscriber told of having spent 11 years in Japan married to “a Japanese,” and how “drummed in” Japanese culture was in her life, and how conflicted she is while recognizing her white privilege, that “it’s a weird opera but I do love it.” Nishime responded to this by affirming her love of pop culture, even problematic pieces like Breakfast at Tiffany’s, and commended the power of ambivalence, and in confronting it: “Why is it that we love pieces that in many ways are conflicting with our belief system? In what ways do other parts of that movie allow me to be okay with some of the racism in it? What’s the give and take there? How is it that we actually engage with popular culture?”

Nishime encouraged the audience to sit in that discomfort: “Allowing yourself to feel that full range of emotions, as you’re seeing that opera, I think it can be really powerful and really transformative.”

This reporter heard another groan from the older white male across the aisle, this time accompanied with a “Why,” under his breath.

Lynne-Jamison mentioned next steps for Seattle Opera, in addition to the July 28 Kathy Hsieh-curated event:

“In late August, we will convene with members of the staff and board and staff to share what we’ve learned from listening to our community. With the help of racial equity consultants, we will begin to distill our learning into actionable steps to help us affirm our commitment to being a diverse, inclusive, and equitable company.”

In September 2017, Seattle Opera will present An American Dream, an opera about the incarceration of Japanese and Japanese Americans during World War II. The panelists also shared their upcoming projects: • Jenny Ku regularly performs in Seattle: https://www.facebook.com/TheShanghaiPearlBurlesque/ • Roger Tang will be writing in the upcoming 14/48 Quickies Theatre Festival, on July 28-29: https://v6.click4tix.com/ event-details.php?e=430938 • Angel Alviar-Langley organized the 2nd annual What’s Poppin, Ladiez? conference, July 28-30. More info is available at https:// www.facebook.com/whatspoppinladiez/ • LeiLani Nishime is organizer of the Seattle Asian American Film Festival, which runs in February and will also be showing free outdoor films at Hing Hay Park in August: http://seattleaaff.org/2017/ • Matthew Ozawa will be directing the two-act world premiere of An American Soldier, an opera by David Henry Hwang and Huang Ruo at Opera Theatre of St. Louis in summer of 2018: https:// www.opera-stl.org/season-and-events/ productions/an-american-soldier-2018

Frank Abe, Karl Reyes, Dr. LeiLani Nishime, Jenny Ku, Angel Alviar-Langley, piece of Kathy Hsieh. • Photo

by Jacob F. Lucas

Polka dot majesty, that’s one way to describe Yayoi Kusama. She is an indefatigable bewitched queen of the global art world. Still active at 88 years old, since her youth, she has created myth and miracle out of herself to build a singular artistic career. She began to paint in Matsumoto, Japan in the 1950s, and came to Seattle in 1957 where she had her first U.S. show at Zoe Dusanne Gallery. Local artists in the gallery such as Paul Horiuchi and George Tsutakawa urged her to go to New York if she wanted to make it internationally. In New York she gradually became a prominent avant-garde performance artist. She was a young woman and a minority in the city at a time (from the end of 1950s to 1970s) when male artists dominated almost all emerging new art movements.

Her originality has evolved from her ability to cope with her at times severe mental condition. With her keen awareness of the emerging new art movements and connectivity with fellow artists, she could turn her handicaps into a fierce creative energy that transformed obstacles into artistic solutions. In a literal sense, there is no other way to express it, she is truly one of a kind. Prominent individuals noticed her uniqueness and talents, and opened doors for her. She received numerous awards, and her recognition was validated by a highly prestigious award, The Order of Culture by the Government of Japan in 2016.

In a recent video interview displayed in Yayoi Kusama: Infinity Mirrors (at Seattle Art Museum from July 2 to September 10), Kasuma, radiantly dressed in a red wig and dress, confronts the viewer with a penetrating gaze and talks about her hope for young people to harness all their energy to fight like her for love and peace in the world. At the entrance, many happy, bright colored, large paintings hang on the wall to welcome all visitors. “Love Myself (2010)” radiates a joyous pink and blue resembling Matisse but harbors a kick of contemporary uneasiness. One sees an endless number of eyes swarming like a school of small fish on these canvases.

The recognition of her work came with her shows in New York and Washington, D.C. galleries consisting of a series of “Net” paintings filled with small dots on huge canvases, some as large as ten meters in width. For this, she painted nonstop for 50 to 60 hours. She wrote in her autobiography that this was her way to forget about hunger in a chillingly cold New York studio. Others explain it as a condition propelled by the compulsive nature of her mental condition.

A smaller oil painting, “Plate 29 (1961)” in the show demonstrates her dexterity as the diverse shape of each dot beautifully captures the inner landscape of a troubled mind. She was about 10 years old when she first began to see the hallucination of these dots.

From the early 1960s on, buoyed by her will to conquer the New York art scene, she began soft sculpture. She sewed an endless number of stuffed forms out of fabric by hand, and attached them on furniture. She filled these creatures of growth on a boat in the gallery in 1963-64, covered whole walls with

Image of Yayoi Kasuma taken from a video shown at the Hirshhorn Museum’s 2017 exhibit. • Photo by Ron Cogswell

photo reproductions of them, and called it “Aggregation: Thousand Boats Show.”

Here in this exhibition, there is a solitary silver-painted boat with a rich wealth of abundant growth on its surface featuring grapes and leaves that almost seem to symbolize the harvest of life. The artist herself and most publications discuss those protruding forms as a multiplication of the phallic form, which in Japanese folk life translates as “the god of fertility.” Although she steered clear of politics, the image of a provoking sexuality came from her “happening” events, which she orchestrated in public performances with nude, young participants at prominent places like the Brooklyn Bridge from late 1960s to early 1970s. One of the soft sculptures on the wall, “Plate 44, Ennui (1976)” looks as if it were filled with diverse shapes of a silver larvae.

Elegant yet abundant squirming forms hint at the eerie persuasion of her dark novels and poetry published after she moved back to Japan in 1973, and permanently settled in at a psychiatric hospital in Tokyo in 1977.

Her success story is not simply based on sensationalism or popularity alone. For this particular traveling exhibition, the shows have sold out before the opening dates, and images of visitors in her virtual reality installations have been circulating everywhere. In one interview, Kusama makes it abundantly clear that the writings and artistic creativity are one single journey for her.

And, indeed, her singularity of purposeful pursuit breaks open the limitations many of us face in our normal lives. Her journey has been one of heavenly highs and torturous lows but somewhere in-between she has achieved a phenomenal freedom.

Even though the initial tickets for the show are sold out, Seattle Art Museum will issue a limited number of tickets for the day of the show only although it’s recommended you line up early for the best shot at them. They will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis. Hours have been added for this show to accommodate as many visitors as possible. SAM will be open on Mondays until 5pm. On Fridays, the museum will be open until 9pm. The museum will also be open on Labor Day, September 4. For up-to-the-minute details about tickets, go to this link: http://kusama.site.seattleartmuseum.org/plan-your-visit/#tix.

The show was organized by Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington DC (Feb.23-May 14, 2017) and after Seattle Art Museum, the show will travel to the Broad, Los Angeles (Oct. 21-Jan. 10, 2018), Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (March 3-May 27, 2018), and High Museum of Art, Atlanta (Nov. 2018-Feb. 2019).

There will be related activities lead by local artists, including Junko Yamamoto on Sundays, and related films will be shown on July 12th. Please check for details at seattleartmuseum.org.

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INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 11

Tai Tung Restaurant owner Harry Chan will put up original neon sign

By Ron Chew IE Contributor In the past several years, new largescale construction projects have begun to alter the look and feel of the International District, prompting fears about the steady disappearance of favored neighborhood haunts and a renewed desire to preserve pieces of the historic landscape.

Harry Chan, owner of the iconic Tai Tung Restaurant at 655 South King Street, is doing his small part to retrieve the past.

The restaurant, established in 1935 by Chan’s grandfather Quan Lee, is the oldest Chinese restaurant in Chinatown.

Chan is fabricating and reinstalling the old original neon sign on the outside of the business. It will be emblazoned with the Tai Tung name and the words “chop suey.”

Chan pointed out that chop suey is classic standard fare at many early Chinese American restaurants. “Even the ‘lo fan’ know what chop suey is,” he said. “It’s healthy. A lot of our customers want this.

Some people who are vegetarians like it, too.”

The International Special Review District Board issued a certificate of approval for the sign on June 30.

“At night, it will look real beautiful,” Chan said. “You can see it from both directions of King Street. I want to keep some of what we still have in Chinatown. I want to make the restaurant look old again.”

Tai Tung is the last Chinatown restaurant that features a front dining counter with a

Tai Tung’s Harry Chan. • Photo by Lexi Potter

row of bar stools to accommodate single diners.

Chan, a daily fixture at the restaurant, is an eternally youthful looking man with a beaming smile and glasses. He rolls up his sleeves and wears a white apron over his street clothes, darting back and forth between the front of house and the kitchen, greeting customers by first name.

“Back in the old days, it was real busy and this counter was filled from morning until night-time with customers,” Chan said. “It’s not like today. There were a lot of Filipino laborers and single men who worked in the canneries. The old-timers— that generation—all they did was eat and work and sleep. They would come down here in the morning for coffee and hang

around talking and eating breakfast. They would come back down later to gamble and visit the clubs. There was not much to do back in those days.”

Chan puts in long days, typically beginning work at 10:30 a.m. and staying until closing time in the late evening. He’s been at the restaurant since 1968. At the age of 20, he started by helping in the kitchen, chopping vegetables and washing dishes.

“That’s almost 50 years!” he exclaims.

“I want to keep doing this as long as I can, as long as I am healthy. Some days, I’m so tired, but I enjoy it. I feel real comfortable in this area. This is my territory. A lot of my customers—it’s just like they’re my friends. If I go on vacation, they come in here and ask where I am. Sometimes they go into the kitchen looking for me. They say, “Hey, where’s Harry?”

In addition to the new sign on the outside of the restaurant, Chan wants to feature historic photographs from the neighborhood to add to the ambience of the vanished era the restaurant continues to evoke. Original touches include the front counter—downsized during an earlier remodel of the interior—the painted floor and heavy front door.

Quietly showcased along the walls of the dining room are nine black-and-white Chinatown images by Seattle photographer Dean Wong.

“People will be able to see the pictures while they’re dining,” Chan said. “This will be good for the area, good for our customers. That way, people won’t forget.”

12 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

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Reading With Your Kids And A Journey Into The Mind of a Poet

Welcome to our ongoing summer version of our Pacific Reader book review supplement. In this issue we give it up for the kids and look into the mind of a local poet. Minh Lê’s debut picture book for kids entitled Let Me Finish! as illustrated by Isabel Roxas hit the bull’s eye in 2016 when it was selected as “Best Book of 2016” by NPR, BetsyBird, School Library Journal, and The Nerdy Book Club. Our writer caught up with the author and illustrator to ask them some timely questions about the process of working on a children’s book together. In addition, we have reviews of a couple other picture books for children. Summer is a great time to read with your kids so why not get started now?

Seattle poet Jane Wong’s debut book entitled Overpour met with good comments all around when it was released by Action Books. If you have ever read poetry from a book and then heard the actual poet read the same poem in person, have you noticed how different the experience can be. We profile Jane Wong and ask her all about the experience of preparing for a reading of her own poetry and other literary matters.

Enjoy your summer and keep those books open!

—Alan Chong Lau, IE Arts Editor

Author Minh Lê and illustrator Isabel Roxas open up about children’s books

By Jenn Pang IE Contributor Spoiler alert! In picture book Let Me Finish! by Minh Lê, illustrated by Isabel Roxas, the spry, red spectacled narrator is chased through vivid environments, only to be interrupted by well-intentioned animals. In one of the best executions of the “meta-book,” Let Me Finish! lets kids and adults in on the joke together, as the narrator starts climbing over pages in order to read in peace. In addition, Let Me Finish! beautifully demonstrates the blessings and curses of having a supportive community. IE corresponded with writer Minh Lê and illustrator Isabel Roxas about their take on modern classics for children, their parents’ reactions to Minh Lê their creative work, and advice for those who want to pursue creative endeavors. cousins and I would spend hours wreaking International Examiner: Which havoc in my father’s engineering offices children’s book character embodies acting out dangerous quests and fierce battles … with T-squares and pencils for how you were as a child? weapons. Those poor engineers, we really Minh Lê: Probably Harold from Harold mussed up their workspaces over the and the Purple Crayon. I was similarly shy weekend. and cautiously curious, and like Harold I IE: There are many animals and liked to see a world of possibility in a blank page. However, unlike the bald Harold, I creatures that come out of different woke up every morning with a full head of environments to disturb the narrator in your book Let Me Finish! Did you have thick gravity-defying black hair. siblings or pets or imaginary friends Isabel Roxas: As a child I loved to growing up? Which interrupted you eat and make up stories (that is still true most and under what guise? today), so two characters come to mind— Lê: Actually, Let Me Finish! is not the caterpillar of The Very Hungry Caterpillar and the rabbit in This is Not a so much inspired by my childhood, but Box. I was a picky eater, but once I liked by social media. The way we consume something, I would eat massive amounts entertainment these days is so social ... of it. I have so many photos of myself as a big part of the experience is how we a toddler with my face smushed into a share and discuss it with others. So when mango. I also loved imaginary play, just you’re really excited about something like the rabbit in This is Not a Box. My new, even if you’re not being chased by

a purple rhino, it often feels like a race to get through it before someone reveals the ending to you.

Roxas: I had siblings, cousins and the neighborhood kids who interrupted me all the time with the temptation to play outside, climb some hill of spare parts or play shopkeeper. But I had a special place where I could read uninterrupted— it was the [young reader’s area of my grade school library]. We had to remove our shoes to get into that section and Isabel Roxas keep very quiet. There was something very sacred about that space with its own money, but she gets very excited when she sees my work featured in newspapers and rituals and rules.

IE: Asian parents don’t often envision magazines.

IE: What kind of advice do you have their children having creative jobs when they grow up. What experience for people who want to write/illustrate made it clear that this was what you books for kids? wanted to do? How do your parents feel Lê: Write a story, not a lesson. Don’t about your chosen profession? get me wrong, a great story can also teach Lê: I’m incredibly lucky because my a lesson, but if you treat the story as just a parents have always been very supportive vehicle for a lesson in morality, kids will and gave me the time and space to find see right through that. my own (often meandering) path. They Roxas: Be persistent. Be resilient. are still my biggest supporters. In fact, my Be playful. Be true. Be thoughtful. Be mom, who is an accountant, keeps a copy curious. Draw (or write, or both) as often of the book in her office during tax season as possible. so her clients can read it while she finishes IE: What do you consider as modern their paperwork. classic children’s books that should be Roxas: The opening of a children’s the new go-to baby gifts? specialty bookstore called Young Minds Lê: I could go on forever, but some of solidified it for me. One day, when I was in the store browsing, I saw people my favorites are: Max and the Tag-along painting a giant flying dragon on the Moon by Floyd Cooper, The Adventures of wall—it turns out that they were a just- Beekle by Dan Santat (who I am working formed organization of children’s book with for my second book), First the Egg illustrators! I was just a young teen then, by Laura Vaccaro Seeger but they let me sit-in on their meetings Roxas: Beegu by Alexis Deacon; Mad and I was on my way! I think my mother at Mommy by Komako Sakai, and It’s is still concerned that I don’t make enough Useful to have a Duck by ISOL.

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July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 13

14 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

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INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

Jane Wong: Poetry itself is a ritual that allows for resilience

By Susan Rich IE Contributor

year’s fortune: “O do not weep, she says/ for ages past I was/and I endure.”

Recently, I had the distinct pleasure of hearing Jane Wong read her poems in the intimate setting of the WordsWest Literary Series salon held at C & P Coffee Company in West Seattle. On this particular night, Jane shared the stage with nationally known poet, Terrance Hayes, and the café was standing room only. Even so, her ability to reach her audience even in a packed space and her generosity of spirit impressed me.

After I’d read (and reread) her new book Overpour and listened to her live reading, I caught up with Jane to ask about both the new book and her writing life.

Rich: Your poem, “Ceremony” is divided into eight sections with themes of accidents, death, desire, and selfprotection moving through them (as well as other concerns). Could you talk about how this poem came about?

Susan Rich: How do you prepare for a reading? What factors do you consider in choosing your poems, planning (or not) your introduction to each poem?

Jane Wong: While I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this, I actually don’t prepare!

At least, not in terms of planning out what I will 100 percent read. I am secretly a pretty anxious person and I find that preparing for a reading makes me way too nervous!

I simply bring new and old poems with me and allow myself to be inspired by the audience—by the atmosphere around me.

I think to myself: which poems would feel good in the air here? What risks do I want to take (with reading new work, which I almost always do)? I like that each reading feels different in its intimacy to me. There is no “rehearsed set.” I love telling short stories before or after poems. I want the audience to get to know me. I want readings to feel a little bit like sitting at a dinner table— sharing stories of ridiculous moments from my family. That makes me less nervous.

Poet Jane Wong. • Courtesy Photo

there is an unusual format of a “living anthology” where readers react to each others work and choose poems that create echoes off the other poet’s offering. How did sharing the stage with Terrance Hayes and participating in this unusual format allow you to hear your poems differently—if at all?

Wong: This poem originally began with an epigraph from Sylvia Plath: “what ceremony of words can patch the havoc?”

“Ceremony” asks that very question— what are the rituals we cling to when there is so much terror in the world? How can we protect ourselves? This is a poem from a truly terrifying time in my life. A time when I needed to remind myself that I exist. The actual writing of this poem did that work. Poetry itself is a ceremony, a ritual that allows for resilience.

Rich: What are you working on And oftentimes, when I go to powerful now? Do you think in terms more of readings, I get an inside glimpse into that books or singular poems or something poet’s world. In this way, I save my stories else? for those in-person moments.

Wong: I am excited about the next challenge in my writing life. If anything, Rich: Ideally, what experience do you want your audience to take away after a I love being challenged. I’m working on creative nonfiction right now and live reading? will be spending July at Hedgebrook, Wong: I hope that you want to run a residency, working on essays. I plan home and write. I hope that you want to to write a series of interconnected come up and talk to me! I hope that people essays on my upbringing in a Chinese feel comfortable enough to say hello.

American take-out restaurant, located Rich: You have mentioned H.D. as an in a New Jersey strip-mall. One essay influence on your work. Can you talk engages unlicensed dentists in NYC’s more about how she is important to you Chinatown; my mother and I would and what you hope you’ve learned from spend a great deal of time in Chinatown trying to find a dentist to give her fake her?

Wong: I started reading H.D. during teeth. These excursions were always on my time at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop; Sundays—the one day the restaurant the incredible poet Hannah Sanghee closed. I hope to gather these essays into Park introduced me to her. At first, I a collection—highlighting the stories was struck by her early work—poems of working-class Chinese immigrants, from Sea Garden. I loved the intensity particularly women.

Wong: WordsWest was a wonderfully inventive format, especially since I don’t overly prepare for readings. I loved how this format facilitated deep listening and collaboration. The reading felt like a conversation. A gift. Terrance read a few poems about his father, which felt like an invitation to take an emotional risk. I didn’t even have “The Good Work” (the only poem I’ve written in my father’s voice) with me and had to look it up online, since it appeared in The Journal. My father’s not Rich: Which is a favorite poem to read in my life and this is not an easy poem to read. It’s an older one too—a poem I almost to an audience? And what makes it so? forgot about. It was as if I was writing it all Wong: I love reading “Twenty-Four,” over again; I definitely had tears in my eyes. of “Oread”—its use of synesthesia and a persona poem in my mother’s voice, Rich: As an audience member at the expansive simplicity: “hurl your green because it reveals her vulnerability. I wrote reading, I felt welcomed into your work; over us/cover us with your pools of fir.” about this poem on the Poetry Society of you explained poems that were in the This was a poet who was more powerful America’s “In Their Own Words” series. voice of your mother, your father—things than its “Imagist” tag (I am not a fan of This was the first poem I wrote in my mother’s voice. I like reading this to an a reader could not know if just picking up Pound). Then I read Trilogy and was audience because it has stakes—it tells her your new, beautiful Overpour. Could you knocked over by its breath and breadth. I story of migration. Of the risk she made to talk about that choice—to leave notes and have always been struck by H.D.’s voice. come to this country. And every single day, epigraphs out of the book but to fill in the She demands to be listened too, while remaining vulnerable through beguiling/ people make this risk. I hope that listeners more personal information in person? curious assertions. On my birthday each understand the realness of migration, of its Wong: I think of reading a book and year, I turn to a random passage in my emotional impact too. going to a performance as two different, copy of the collected H.D. and that’s Rich: You recently read with but complimentary, events/reckonings. my “fortune” for the year. I began this Terrance Hayes at the WordsWest As a reader, I love developing questions— tradition with my friend Hannah. This Literary Series in West Seattle where asking questions of the poet, of the poem.

Rich: To young poets, to poets of color who are struggling right now and think no one cares what they have to say—what do you say?

Wong: I’d read them “won’t you celebrate with me” from Lucille Clifton, which helps me: “what did I see to be except myself?/i made it up/here on this bridge between/starshine and clay,/my one hand holding tight/my other hand.”

And then I’d tell them to send me their poems, immediately. Because I want to read them, to care for them. And for those who don’t believe in you—use that as fuel to write, write, write.

PACIFIC READER

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 15

Effects of the Vietnam War, new book finds no easy answers

By Chizu Omori IE Contributor In Paisley Rekdal’s book The Broken Country: On Trauma, A Crime, and the Continuing Legacy of Vietnam, the broken country referred to is presumably Vietnam, the country the United States fought for many years. The war’s origins started in 1955 when the French were driven out, and ended in 1975 with America’s withdrawal. But this book’s story makes it clear that in many ways, America is also a somewhat broken country due to that war.

The impetus for the book was a knife attack in Salt Lake City. It seemed like a random act of violence. A refugee from Vietnam set about stabbing persons in a parking lot in Utah, yelling “You people killed my people.” Looking around him, he targeted white men, and severely wounded two. This crime sets Paisley Rekdal on an investigation, on delving into what motivated the perpetrator, why he expressed his angers and needs in such a horrific way. It sends her on a journey of tracing the refugees from that war who had come to the United States, settling in various parts of the country. She recounts the deeply destabilizing effects that war generally has on people, and how refugee groups adapt, as best they can, to life in societies so different from their own.

Her writing style; is so engaging that you immediately understand that Rekdal is no mere academic, but a writer who wants to engage the reader in an emotional way. This is a highly personal story, for Rekdal makes it a journey of discovery, of her biracial (Chinese/white) background, of a Chinese American uncle who served in the Vietnam war. By including herself in this way, she makes this an engaging, deeply thoughtful meditation on how a war affects entire populations, long after the last shot has been fired. Her conclusions resonate for many if not most Americans, for we are indeed a nation of immigrants, and refugees from all over the world.

Human beings are adaptable beings but we are also social creatures who grow up within communities and carry the values, mores, and family traditions of that community. And when they move to another country for whatever reasons, culture clash is something they have to deal with. Studies have shown, Rekdal says, that traumas experienced are often transferred to children and other family members even though the particular traumatic experiences are never discussed or articulated. We can all understand this. Seeing it manifest in situations where a person acts out his grievances in the way this man did

is understandable, but terrible in its results. “Innocent” victims bear the brunt of events that happened years ago, thousands of miles away, and we are all enmeshed in distant events that live on in the lives of many.

Rekdal has lived in Vietnam and in the United States. She spoke with many who came from Vietnam, refugees and immigrants who were escaping terrible situations and hoping to find a better

life here. They do establish themselves and create lives that give them some security and stability, but many are haunted by what had happened to them and their families.

And we Americans were responsible for a great deal of that suffering, though individually we may have been against the war. So, how do we deal with today’s realities? Can mental health services realistically cope with such deep hurts?

As a society, could we have helped them more? Undoubtedly, but it is doubtful that we will fully acknowledge our responsibility for all the damage that we have caused. So we’re left with picking up the pieces and hope that time will help ameliorate people’s pain.

Rekdal compares a monster sculpture in Hanoi, consisting of crashed American airplane parts war refuse: humbees, jeeps, tanks, and a large photo of a female figure on a beach pulling an airplane part with a rope, with the Maya Lin Vietnam memorial in Washington D.C. Both are tributes to the war. One is graphic, the other is abstract. And for her, both stir memories of that conflict, in visceral, dramatic ways, symbolizing the vast waste and the various costs of the war. She ends on this uncertain note, on art, but without any real conclusions about the meaning of it all. She knows that there are no easy answers.

Dan Santat’s Are We There Yet? is a fantastic romp

By Jenn Pang IE Contributor

Mike Wu’s smash hit Ellie returns

By Jenn Pang IE Contributor In Mike Wu’s follow up to his smash hit children’s book Ellie, the helpful and enthusiastic elephant spruces up the zoo in another friend-filled tale. In Ellie in Concert, Ellie finds that her giraffe friend Lucy can’t sleep because of all of the noise that the other animals are making. Ever looking for ways to improve the zoo, Ellie takes on this challenge and elicits the help of the other animals.

honed as an animator at Pixar, shows a mastery of straightforward storytelling and illustration. This gentle story also serves as a good primer on tenacity for young children.

Kids will love the vibrant animals and the depiction of music. As a bonus, there are three original songs written for this book by Andy Jimenez. Their scores can be found on the inside covers as well as the inside of the book jacket; audiofiles can be found on Mike Wu’s website (theartofmikewu.com).

It would be a fun game to see if the readers can identify which sounds are supposed to represent each animal’s contribution.

Wu merges the softness of watercolors, the fluidity of music, and the vivid animal Ellie in Concert will always be relevant— characters in a seamless way. His deft hand, highly suggested for young children, ages 3-5.

Are We There Yet? Is a fantastic romp through a boring car trip that only Dan Santat could deliver.

Santat is a prolific illustrator and his debut as both writer and illustrator, The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend, won the 2015 Caldecott Medal. Once again in Are We There Yet?, Santat demonstrates the beauty and wonder that is contained in our imagination.

The main character is a boy who taking a long car trip to his grandmother’s birthday party. The narrator prompts the reader to imagine fantastic scenarios: pirates, astronauts, dinosaurs make appearances, with full transformations of the kids starting to read and/or who are family in the car. A great book for reluctant to sit down, ages 4-6. Note: fidgety children, this book is read uses the word “butt” once. upside-down for the middle part.

The rather mundane advice is accompanied by an ever-changing, colorful world. As a background detail, the family appears to be interracial; creating a nice, subliminal representation for hapa kids.

Highly suggested, and worthy of being another modern classic like Beekle.

Are We There Yet? is an amazing adventure for families to take together. Highly suggested for

16 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

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Before we debate border walls and H1-B visas, we should read Lucky Boy

By Nalini Iyer IE Contributor A professional Indian American couple in Berkeley, CA, yearning for a child, and a young undocumented Mexican teen single mother seeking safety and security for herself and her son, are the main characters in Lucky Boy, a poignant novel by Shanthi Sekharan. At a time when the United States is engaged in explosive and oftentimes xenophobic conversations about immigration, Sekharan’s novel speaks to its human dimensions.

Kavya and Rishi Reddy, born and raised in the United States, meet in college, get married and settle down in Berkeley in the heart of the tech industry in California. He is an engineer who works at Weebies, an ecommerce site that dominated the market on all things babies and parenting, and she is an aspiring chef who runs the kitchen for a sorority. However, they are unable to conceive a child and Kavya becomes increasingly despondent over her infertility, and the couple looks into adoption.

Solimar Castro Valdez, a teenager from a small village Santa Clara Popal-

co in Mexico, dreams of going north to California, seeking economic security.

All the youth in her village, including her relatives, have followed this path.

Her father arranges for a coyote to transport her, and in the midst of her journey, Solimar realizes that the coyote betrays her. She escapes, meets a charismatic young man named Checo, and joins his group as they make their way across the border.

The journey is perilous and Sekharan describes the hardships in detail. Hunger, fear, weather and violence thwart them but Checo, Soli, and friends have an irrepressible energy and desire to make it to the U.S. Checo and Soli fall in love but tragedy befalls them as Checo dies and Soli is raped several times. Soli makes it to Berkeley to her cousin’s home and finds a job as a housekeeper to a liberal white couple. She also learns she is pregnant.

Sekharan captures the difficulties of an undocumented life, the hypocrisy of white liberals, the brutality of the state, and the support network of the community through Soli’s story. When Soli is arrested and transported to an immigration detention center, her son, Nacho, ends up

in the custody of the state and becomes Kavya and Rishi’s foster son, Iggy.

Sekharan’s narrative becomes the story of two women who fiercely love the same child. Is Nacho better off with the Reddys and experiencing all the advantages of a middle-class life, or does he belong to his brave mother who will

go to any lengths to regain her son? The reader does not have easy answers to this question, and the narrative does not fully resolve the question either.

The novel is one of very few by South Asian Americans that interrogates U.S. immigration policy from the perspective of two different sets of people whose class identity and ability to thrive in the United States are vastly different from one another. Their place in America is determined by whether they are documented or undocumented. The novel shatters the model minority stereotype of South Asian Americans and honestly delves into the realities of the undocumented person’s life. It also recognizes that documented and undocumented people represent two sides of an immigration policy that is deeply flawed; while these two groups may not see each other as interlinked, this novel, by intertwining Soli and Kavya’s stories, compels us to recognize that they are. Before we debate border walls, H1-B visas, and who deserves to live in the United States and who does not, we should read Lucky Boy and see the humanity of those impacted by these debates.

Mother speaks to the universal challenge of caring for elders

By Elizabeth Hanson IE Contributor “Was there ever a right time for one’s mother to disappear from the face of the earth?” So asks the 50-something Mitsuki, protagonist in Minae Mizumura’s fine novel, Inheritance from Mother.

Through sixty-six short but engaging chapters (originally published in weekly installments in the Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper), we follow Mitsuki as she deals with her mother’s final illness and death. Though set in present-day Tokyo, the narrative speaks to adult children in every corner of the planet who have been responsible for an aging parent—the decisions on what kind and how much treatment to offer, how to pay for the care, how to share responsibility with siblings, how to negotiate with doctors, nurses, and nursing homes, and how to maintain some semblance of sanity amid the emotional confusion and stress.

The author is not squeamish about including details of end-of-life care.

Mitsuki reflects, “... at some point life had forced her to learn words utterly devoid of poetry and romance. ‘Dysphagia,’ ‘nasogastric tube,’ ‘gastronomy’: until recently she hadn’t known any of these words, but now they rolled off her tongue.”

Mitsuki has no children and has established a career as a translator of French, but even so, she struggles with the traditional Japanese expectation that a woman will, above all, be a selfless caregiver, forsaking her own needs for those of children, a husband, a husband’s parents, or her own mother and father.

Although Mitsuki does her best to be a kind and dutiful daughter, deep down she resents her mother’s lifelong selfishness and cannot bring herself to express any love.

Mitsuki and her sister are guiltily eager for their mother to die, hoping with each health crisis that this will be the end: “Mitsuki pictured women in cities and rural areas across Japan, their faces shadowed with fatigue, longing in secret for their mother’s death.

Such women wanted freedom not just from their mother but also from the trauma of seeing the cruelty of old age up close—the trauma of having one’s own future self thrust under one’s nose.”

A second story line follows Mitsuki’s grief and anger as she discovers that her husband, Tetsuo, is living with a younger woman paramour while he finishes a sabbatical leave in Vietnam.

Emotionally drained from caring for her mother, Mitsuki chooses to put aside the issue of her broken marriage.

With this subplot the author offers a satisfying strand of suspense as we wonder how and when Mitsuki will confront her husband.

Many chapters are devoted to detailed back-stories of Mitsuki’s relatives or memories of her own childhood. These family-saga passages can be tedious and repetitious but are redeemed by the details they offer of life in twentiethcentury and currentday Japan. Mitsuki’s constant self-reflection and sorrowful outlook on life also become tiring, but the pace picks up in the second half of the book when she escapes, for much-needed R and R, to a resort hotel after her mother’s death.

Here the author borrows from Agatha Christie, setting up a mystery involving the collection of guests, with the requisite whodunit discovery.

The author’s clever descriptions and flashes of humor brighten the book.

An elderly couple is like “a wellaged pair of matched rice bowls for husband and wife.” Mitsuki’s mother “read voraciously, the way a goat eats paper.” And when Mitsuki arrives at the resort hotel, she sees an elderly woman guest and thinks, “She’d had enough of old ladies, thank you. The moment she thought this, the old lady came tottering toward her.”

Translator Juliet Winters Carpenter, two-time winner of the Japan-United States Friendship Commission Prize for Translation of Japanese Literature, is a virtuoso. I flipped to the title page after reading the first chapter to verify that the original novel was not written in English, so smooth and vibrant is Ms. Carpenter’s prose, so natural her renderings of dialog and colloquialisms.

Serialized “newspaper novels” have a long tradition in Japan. In challenging herself to write one, Minae Mizumura instructed herself to “Keep it entertaining, by all means.”

She has succeeded (and justified Ms. Carpenter’s translation efforts).

Inheritance from Mother speaks to the universal challenge of caring for elders and the plight of a middleaged woman facing life alone, with an ending that nonetheless offers a message of renewal and hope.

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July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 17

Changing Season: A father and daughter contemplate their legacy and future

By Paul Mori IE Contributor

everything from objects placed aside, but not discarded, such as tools and farm equipment, to things in the land itself, including the spacing of legacy grape rows and the locations of layers of soft earth bordered by immovable hardpan. A mended shovel handle tells of past family conflict, and its honed blade has found its shape after years of practiced work. An old “singletree,” once used to attach work animals to plows and equipment introduces a story of the change from his father’s time to the modern mechanical driven farm world.

Like the returning cycles of the farming season, David Mas Masumoto (Epitaph for a Peach, Harvest Son, Wisdom of the Last Farmer) continues his written saga about farming with a story about past legacies, future dreams, and transition in Changing Seasons: A Father, A Daughter, A Family Farm. For Masumoto, it is the season to begin the process of passing on his organic farm to his daughter, Nikiko, who decidedly will have new challenges and who defines a new kind of farmer: a queer mixed-race feminist woman.

Masumoto’s essay “Epitaph for a Peach” changed the course of his life when it was published in 1987 in the Los Angeles Times, and its message reverberated into larger waves of The same appealing voice in earlier changes and attitudes about organic books remains in Changing Seasons, farming and the near extinction of as does the soul of his legacy farm. heirloom varieties.

But with 40 seasons behind him and But it was more than the message retirement far closer, Mas Masumoto that resonated with readers—it was contemplates his past, his changing also the honesty of his writing style personal world, and how the farming that wielded so much power to change business is changing and will continue an industry dominated by large factory to change. farms and their industrial-produced Part of his gift is seeing meaning in fruit. Unpretentious, simple, amusing, the simple, and then transforming that and grounded in a disarming reality, into words without disturbing their his writing found an audience as did inherent simplicity. Masumoto sees his heirloom peaches found buyers. stories and their history imprinted in

before she takes over completely, she sees her father do them with natural ease, not always realizing his struggles. However, her personal substance and strengths soon become apparent, and it is equally clear that they existed long before. Not being a traditional farmer, either in practice or in who she is, Nikiko is a modern trailblazer.

There is comfort in the repeating cycle of years or planting seasons.

Patterns, habits, and skills honed in repetition are a stabilizing force, and the illusion that change doesn’t exist can be intoxicating. Nevertheless, change happens, and Changing Seasons addresses the evolution in the lifecycles of the farm and their caretakers when that illusion can no longer be sustained. Advancing age, sickness, and other forces beyond the farm all can challenge even the most prepared.

Although nostalgia is certainly part of the book’s allure, so is its honest reality.

The harsh reality of farming and the never distant risk of absolute failure is a sobering part of Changing Seasons. A single rainstorm can be catastrophic, if it occurs during the three-week window while grapes rest on paper in the drying sun awaiting the transformation into raisins. The chance of failure due to so Both David Mas Masumoto and many things beyond control makes it Nikiko Masumoto know the value unimaginable why anyone would take of legacy, innovation, and evolution, on such gambles. and they have generously shared their Nikiko’s voice inhabits the narratives combined wisdom in an elegantly often in alternating chapters, and documented passing of the torch. In that youthful voice and her fresh essence, Changing Seasons shows perspective perfectly weaves into the that following one’s own path, as well fabric with her father’s, as does her as investing in things that grow and polished writing style. In learning nurturing them to maturity, applies as tasks that she will have to master much to farms as it does to families.

Memoir tells of a deep love, coming-of-age on 1959 Japanese navel base

By Paul Mori IE Contributor One can only imagine the depth of beauty of a singular woman that would inspire a man in his seventies to write a memoir of a few months in 1959 Japan when he was a boy of only 19 years and serving with the U.S. Navy. Neither the years, nor life itself, could strip away the layers of her beauty, even though the only surviving proof that she ever lived is the letters she so passionately wrote.

The author’s rediscovery of those letters in 2012 began the process of his bringing to life again those precious months when two very different people on different paths found a common passion for art and culture that made all those differences inconsequential for too a short window of time.

Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Paul Brinkley-Rogers has created something more than a memoir in Please Enjoy your Happiness—it is a love letter tribute to Kaji Yokiko, whom he could not fully appreciate in his youth, and only now, after years of seeing what life offers, realizes how remarkable she was.

Stumbling into the White Rose, a hostess night club frequented by sailors near the Navy base in Yokosuka, Japan, he first met her. Paul Rogers was English by birth and in his sensibilities, but joined the U.S. Navy, and at 19, was shy, quiet, and nearly without words when he encountered women. Thus it was up to Kaji Yokiko to pick him out of the crowd of sailors,

because he carried a book of poems by Dylan Thomas like a security blanket.

In many ways, Yukiko was everything he was not. Along her path to the White Rose and at age 31, she had accumulated a wealth of knowledge about life and things, which included how to talk to and entertain men. She was a modern geisha of the highest order, whose artistic and conversational skills were the tools of her trade that kept men satisfied at a safe distance, rather than with the physical pleasures of the flesh.

Well versed in literature and poetry, in popular, jazz, and classical music, and in art films, she shared the best of Eastern culture with Paul inside and outside of the club. Through the course of sharing, the buried secrets of her very dark past are slowly revealed.

Their bond was far deeper than friendship, but less than lovers, and their chaste relationship was fueled by letters.

Her letters were meticulously crafted with typewriter and dictionary, and have a depth beyond the surface awkwardness of her English.

While being in port in Japan and out to sea multiple times on the appropriately named aircraft carrier Shangri-La, Paul’s fondness for her grew, but eventually, the day came for his permanent departure.

After one happy last meeting, followed by one last letter, it was over until Paul Rogers began this book.

Enjoy your Happiness is highly personal and deeply intimate, making it appealing to some, but excessive for others. Yukiko’s existing letters supply the structural posts and the author provides a context around them. He chooses a first person narrative, by mostly talking directly to Yukiko in letter writing form in the present and in the past, and his youthful innocence and his mature wisdom and flawed elder self stand side-by-side. The letter writing style may seem archaic and difficult to adjust to in this time of instant communication, but it brings an intimacy that only letters can.

The gushing descriptions of Yukiko at the book’s start can bring a sense that these musing are the imaginations of an aging man that only grew more unreal with the years, but a disturbingly violent incident depicted in the second chapter awakens a harsh reality and sets the narrative on a new course, thus ending all such skepticism.

Yukiko’s forward-looking vision of Paul becoming more than his innocent self at 19 and into a writer, as well as her own realization of how her dark past matured her more than the dozen years that

separated them, adds even more credibility and complexity. Just as real is her barely contained passion for a deeper kind of love with this youngster.

The author does more bring life into his personal story, and another pleasure of this book is how he splendidly conjures up the time and place that was 1959 Japan. The watering holes and their inhabitants near a naval base in the greater Tokyo area where the two meet were soon to disappear, but in 1959 no one yet knew that. It is a special time, where both innocence and jadedness mix freely, as memories of WWII are fresh, and Vietnam and the trends of the 1960s are nowhere to be seen, even at the near horizon.

This is a coming–ofage story for Paul Rogers, and as 1959 ends, so does innocence. In the end, the admonition of Enjoy Your Happiness carries just as an important meaning for the author, as it does for those who are privileged enough to peer into the window of his happy past, where a rare and pure kind of love found life in the hearts of an unlikely couple and in the most unlikely of places.

18 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

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Gently to Nagasaki confronts the tragedy of evil and the choices people make

By Paul Mori IE Contributor

truth and accountability, and Kogawa courageously ventures straight into her raw and abrasive past that reinjures, and One would be hard pressed to find a nar- persists even when her own imperfections rative more fiercely potent and elegantly self inflict. sung than what is found in Joy Kogawa’s She writes: “My story is from the belly dark personal account, Gently to Nagasaki. of the dark. I am forbidden to tell it and But then again, there are few authors like commanded to tell it. I am told that to Joy Kogawa. speak is to slay and not to speak is to One of Canada’s most revered authors, slay. What is needed is right action.” And she has received the Order of Canada 1986 action she takes. award, as well as honors from the governThere is real danger to books like this. ment of British Columbia and the Order of the Rising Sun from the Emperor of Japan Books that venture deep into darkness for the legacy in her books about the Japa- can easily enfold and smother the reader, nese Canadian experience. Her 1981 book or worse yet, be an exercise of selfObasan is now a classic and a “must read” indulgence that serve only the writer. in Canadian literature classes.

Gently is neither, for Kogawa is too In Gently to Nagasaki, Kogawa confronts skilled a writer and too humane and wise the persistence of the tragedy of evil, both in a person. the large events such as the bombing of NaKogawa’s prose delivers. Her choice gasaki and the Rape of Nanking, and in the of words has the immediacy of the voice personal ones she has suffered in her own of youth, but their meaning carries life. Born in 1935, she suffered through the such aged layers of reflection. Make no dual injury of the brutal internment of Japa- mistake, there is real pain and suffering nese Canadians in World War II (in many here, and Kogawa spares no one of ways even more severe than the Japanese American incarceration), and later with the feeling these with her. Rather than using public revelation of her cherished father, an words to soften these, she uses them to enlarge the complexity of persons and Anglican minister, of being a pedophile. imbue the value of her wisdom that she Gently to Nagasaki opens up the deep- has earned through many tears and years est recesses of her personal life and re- of living. veals painful events that few people would Chapters are short, easing the weight admit, much less talk about in wounding detail. This literary journey is a quest for of their content, and the topics and stories

the movement to imprison Japanese Canadians during WWII, as well as a childhood acquaintance whom she had not seen since that time, and who was a direct victim of her father’s abuse.

Kogawa, too, is confronted by accusers because of association with her pedophile father. For her, there is no truth uncovered until the journey through confrontation happens and no reconciliation until mutual understanding occurs.

And in talking about large scale events such as the bombing of Nagasaki in 1945, she focuses on persons rather the events themselves. She tells stories about Father George Zabelka, the priest who prayed and blessed the American flight crew before departure to destiny on that August day, as well as Takashi Nagai, a Japanese nuclear physicist who was caught below that same day in the firestorm that was the are varied and diverse, even in their atomic bomb. themes. Here she confronts the problem Ultimately, this is a book about lives, of evil. Can good people commit serious evil acts, and still be good? Can there be and that is what saves this narrative faith and trust, and can these stay alive from a fatal drop into darkness. It is in the midst of endless evil? In spite of about choices that people make, their the spectrum, the persistent reader will subsequent ramifications, and the eventually discover the singular vision of potential of seeing a different truth in the later years of life. Gently to the book.

Nagasaki shows that nothing is simple Kogawa is unrelenting in her quest for in answering life’s most difficult justice. She meets with two grandchildren questions, and even without clear and advocates of Howard Green, the Canadian politician who spearheaded answers, the effort is well worth it.

Art history book reveals the underappreciated genius of Hokusai, creator of the iconic Great Wave image

By Paul Mori IE Contributor There is not a more iconic image of Japan than Hokusai’s “Great Wave.”

Appearing on everything from coffee mugs to socks, it is parodied as often as the Mona Lisa and it defines the way the world thinks about Japanese art.

Even though many know Hokusai because of the “Great Wave,” few know the many layers of his genius and the wide breadth of his artistic endeavors. Sarah E. Thompson seeks to change this by offering a glimpse of Hokusai’s extraordinary output in Hokusai, published by the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

This book was originally intended to accompany an exhibition at the MFA, and the art selected for the exhibition and book was drawn from the museum’s extensive collection, which includes 150 paintings, 1,200 woodblock prints, and 360 illustrated books. The book focuses on 50 central works and each is exceptional and unique.

For those who only know Hokusai’s most famous landscape wood block prints, the selection of art will be a revelation.

Naturally, there are ample prints, but also

paintings, toys, lanterns, sketch bookThompson’s book wisely avoids these like illustrations, and manga. Exemplary problems with a smart design and clean are the printed sheets that included parts format, and which is both strong in word intended to be cut out by the purchaser and and generous in reproductions. There is pasted on a board-like diorama or static pop-up book. Both uncut sheets and their fully constructed versions are shown.

Even more fascinating is the artist’s stylistic range that invites comparisons to the range found in Picasso’s or Leonardo da Vinci’s art. In a sense, this is not a complete surprise, given the spectrum of jobs he had, and Hokusai’s voracious borrowing from other artists. Truly he was a creative genius with many faces, and turning the pages of this book surprises and satisfies the eye and mind.

Hokusai is not coffee table book, exhibition catalog, or a textbook, but a rather a stand-alone compilation with the best qualities from all of these. In spite of its modest dimensions and relatively short length, Hokusai is remarkably satisfying.

Exhibition catalogs are too often notoriously unwieldly, dense in text, and short in showing the art itself. Most end up untouched and hold little interest to others. Coffee table books are seductive in their glossy beauty, but rarely engage beyond a visual indulgence or two.

Also, when art is referenced in the text, examples are thoughtfully provided.

The included essays are succinct, readable, and insightful on Hokusai’s life and the underlying artistry in the art itself. In one instance, the geometric patterns and structural forms in Hokusai’s art are explained elegantly in the text and illustrated with printed plates from Hokusai’s own guide to painting.

In another, the connection between calligraphy and his painting style is illustrated.

Accompanying the uncropped images, corresponding enlarged detail reproductions often fill pages edge to edge on double pages, making complete use of the book’s 8 X 10 inch format. These not only show the precision and genius of Hokusai’s artistry, but also they mimic the experience of viewing the art in person, as one would step in close to view details.

Clearly, this seemingly modest book is successful in its purpose in presenting the artist’s depth and it exceeds expectations.

And much like the art of Hokusai, Sarah plenty of amazing art to view, and it is all E. Thompson’s Hokusai is lovingly well presented. The feel of the original designed and beautifully executed, and it wood block art is maintained in the invites many repeated visits. matte finish in a lovely Italian printing.

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INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 19

The little-known woman who helped lay the foundation for women’s rights in Japan

By Paul Mori IE Contributor

Beate Sirota Gordon changed the course for every Japanese woman after World War II, but almost no one knows her contribution or even her name. In spite of doing this at age 22, her critical role in establishing the foundations of women’s rights in the Japanese constitution remained uncredited and unknown for forty years, and she wanted it that way.

Japanese Constitution; and finally, her post-war career as a cultural ambassador by introducing the arts of Japan and Asia to the west from her base in New York City.

Spanning three continents, the story on how this came to be is remarkable in itself. Born in Vienna to Ukrainian Jewish parents who moved to Japan in the 1930’s because her father Leo’s musical career, Beate spent most of her formative young years among the Japanese. When it became time for college in the late 1930, the Sorbonne in Paris was ruled out because of the growing specter of Nazism in Europe, and Mills College in the San Francisco area became her choice, and America her haven when WWII broke out.

Authors Nassine Azimi and Michel Wasserman change this by telling the Before Pearl Harbor, Beate’s fluency untold story of this remarkable woman in Japanese had not been much more in the Last Boat to Yokohama: The Life than a novelty in America, but after, it and Legacy of Beate Sirota Gordon. became the rarest of commodities beFollowing the cessation of the war cause the ultimate distrust of Japanese in 1945, Japan was a broken country Americans and their incarceration. from years of war and the saturating Soon this refugee was enlisted in the influence of the military on every as- war effort, and after the war and wantpect of society, including everything ing to be reunited with her parents in from primary education to industry. Japan, the only means was to take a Yet the opportunity to reinvent the military job, and she became a clerk country was at hand. From ground in General MacArthur’s GHQ in Jalevel, a new constitution was to be pan. From there, her fate with destiny crafted, and Beate Sirota Gordon was could finally be realized, being in the the right person, at the right place, at right place at the right time. the right time.

Rather than being a book with a single voice, Last Boat to Yokohama is really a loosely tied together series

In addition to chapters by the authors, there is a recovered draft of Beate’s mother’s fascinating and unique account of living under house arrest in Japan during the war, a 2012 interview with Beate Sirota Gordon shortly before her passing, and an afterword by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, as well as other tributes.

of essays and source writings, whose connections sometimes are stretched to their limits. The authors group them in three general topical categories—her parents’ story of coming from Vienna and ending up in Japan for 17 years, including the critical and devastating war years; Beate Sirota Gordon’s contributions to the

This is a short book, but enough to tell the basics of Beate Sirota Gordon’s story and whet the appetite for readers to find out more by reading her autobiography, The Only Woman in the Room. With these two goals—the authors succeed. However, with their dependence on first-hand accounts, the authors preserve the value of raw history, but at the expense of a more coherent, single narrative and a satisfying whole. In spite of the book’s fascinating story, it is an imperfect book in execution, but certainly a commendable tribute to a remarkable woman worthy of praise.

Haruki Murakami’s short stories explore absence

By Rumi Tsuchihashi IE Contributor With the seven-story collection Men Without Women, the wildly popular Japanese author Haruki Murakami returns from a three-year absence to take his fans on a brief but unforgettable exploration of: absence. In each tale, there is a common thread of a woman leaving and creating a chasm that a man struggles to make sense of, if he makes sense of the void at all. Told as a series of vignettes featuring vanishing lovers, identity crises, or middle-aged infidelity—with almost hauntingly spare language even for Murakami— each story is freshly poignant.

The opening story takes place in rainy Tokyo (as do most of the stories in this book). A fifty-something widow with a newly minted D.U.I. reluctantly hands over his driving duties to a young female driver. As she gradually wins his trust with her steady gear shifting and lack of superfluous chitchat, Kafuku, an actor by profession, begins to open up about his latest off-stage act: befriending his late wife’s lover. Kafuku had known about the infidelity yet remained coolly dismissive until her sudden passing, which awakens in him a dangerous obsession to find out why she strayed.

Another character in his fifties, plastic surgeon Dr. Tokai is a lifelong bachelor who plays squash and has a knack for selecting good Pinot Noir. His love life, a threemarried-womenat-a-time high wire act deftly coordinated by his loyal male secretary, halts abruptly when he fails at not “loving somebody too much.” The doctor shares this news with the narrator—a writer who is presumably Murakami’s alter ego—and laments that he “couldn’t turn back.” Foreshadowing the descent into darkness and the tragedy that follows, he also confides that he’s become consumed by a question, “ Who in the world am I?” After catching his wife in bed with his best friend and leaving her without

a word the very next day, Kino opens a neighborhood bar in his namesake.

He absentmindedly goes through the motions of daily life, with the exception of a frenzied but emotionless one night stand with a female customer who turns out to be covered in cigarette burns, and the sighting of other strange omens he couldn’t ignore.

At the urging of a mysterious regular customer whose name he never learns, Kino leaves Tokyo and shuts in at a nondescript seaside hotel. In a pulsequickening scene, the now vulnerable Kino, feeling “as if you could see right through to my internal organs, like a freshly caught squid”, is visited by a terrifying and maddeningly persistent late night knocking—with no outside source.

Writing stories about absence is, perhaps, necessarily an ambiguous task. Murakami fills each of the seven stories with sometimes odd but evocative details: the clink of ice in a single malt whiskey; a unicorn statue on a daily driving route; a pair of JBL speakers; sing-along Beatles songs like “Yesterday”; and a sizable dent in the fender of a blue Mazda. These details form an outline around a vast white space of emotion and memories, in which a spouse, a friend, an ordinary life, and a sense of self-knowing once lived, but is now absent from and won’t return to.

“Only Men Without Women can comprehend how painful, how heartbreaking, it is to become one,” extols the narrator in the title story. To become one is to be “waiting for someone you don’t know somewhere between knowledge and ignorance. Tears falling on the dry road as you check the pressure of your tires.” And yet, as unknowable as Men Without Women purportedly are to those of us who are not, Murakami succeeds in endearing us to these fictional lost men, compelling us to keep them company long after the story is over, if only in our minds.

20 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

IE ARTS

South Asian art exhibit shows a diaspora of dreams and visions

By Elvis Irazarry IE Contributor

of the pro-democracy protests that took place in Cairo during the seminal Arab Spring movement. The whip and the images conveyed are symbols of present-day enslavement, human repression and absolute power.

A grand exhibition has now graced us in a time where politics, identity, and xenophobia seem to be all we, as humans, think about on a regular, daily basis. Lucid Dreams and Distant Visions: South Asian Art in the Diaspora—currently on view at the Asia Society in New York City—goes further to define and elaborate meaning to these issues and to most importantly, how the effect is manifesting itself for South Asians and their communities in the United States and beyond.

Around nineteen artists, all living in the United States, come together in a concerted effort to present the various complexities of being South Asian in the Western world, and how the issues of gender, race, migration and memory come into play as prerequisites for utmost creative and artistic expression.

The exhibition is presented with an elaborate array of artworks which directs its attention not of culture and retrospect but of America as well; as Boon Hui Tan, Vice President of Global Arts and Cultural Programs at Asia Society and Museum Director states: “through a number of mediums, including photography, sculpture and video, the artists featured … challenge prevailing stereotypes and assumptions of South Asian identities in the United States today.” In lieu of India’s 70th anniversary of independence from British colonial rule, this show couldn’t have come at a better time.

The first work that comes to my attention is The Present is a Ruin Without the People (2016) by the Pakistani artist Ruby Chishti—an elaborate sculptural installation famously done with various media (recycled textiles, metal scrapes and thread just to name a few) and presented as a kind of organic, morph-like image of desolation and despair. What obviously appears to be a country-side mountain with windows and landscapes is really muted decay and abandonment due to the annals of war and strife. Most striking of all is the distinct ambient soundtrack which permeates throughout the work—as it were weaving

Chitra Ganesh (b. 1975 in Brooklyn, NY. Lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.) Devika Rani, 2012 • Courtesy of the artist

in and out like a spirit looking for its ancestral roots.

Adjacent to it is a work entitled Emperor with No Country (2016), by Toronto-based artist Jaret Vadera, presenting subjects of Buddhist theology and science fiction in a format where facts are relayed in a document-like manner. In what appears to be either a laboratory coat or nuclear protection gear (see image), Vadera creates a map full of vivid details of boundaries, allegiances and nationalities, which he then refers them to as useless—because the map is placed on the coat of an supposed emperor—a vivid example of brutal colonialism and imperialism.

The exhibit is quite well executed: each gallery has own distinct selection of paintings, sculpture, drawings, video/audio installations and photography, each representing its own ideals, ambitions and aspirations with historically detailed vision and forethought.

New York-based artist Jaishri Abichandani, presents her work as multidisciplinary with a feminist twist, A mixed-media piece entitled We Were Making History 3 (2013) incorporates various materials such as fabric, jewels, studs, wire, for example, and creates a kind of leather whip which sculpts into faces and figures, all representative

Another artist whose work I also found quite striking is the Calcutta/New York based artist Rina Banerjee whose work, entitled Mother gathered Three or no more dirty black stones, tossed them to sky that could break what had hardened her ground and without frown or flirt of flower father like grease or butter slipped aside to free her from forty and some more grown men who held her as housewife like plant life with three or more daughters, (2017) gives the viewer her take on sociopolitical issues of migration, post colonialism, gender and race. Utilizing found objects to create an otherworldly yet traditionally based format, the image of a large female figure and its smaller companions are done in the style of traditional Indian painting, while delicate fabrics interweave amongst images that swirl and stream within and outside the two wooden panels—thus making it engaging and contemplative to look at.

Baltimore-based artist Mequitta Ahula’s work Performing Painting: A Real Allegory of Her Studio (2015) used herself as a means to depict and deconstruct the history of figurative painting as it relates to the body along time and space. What I found quite interesting are the influences of Courbet and Cezanne in the painted figures (see image) and the brush technique that are reminiscent of Seurat and Signac: short, choppy strokes in various muted colors. The work comes alive as spaces interchanged with geometric shapes, patterns and images; creating a story within a story.

Kabul 2,3,4 (2002–2007) by New Yorkbased artist Mariam Ghani, is an elaborate display of three video screens, placed vertically and depicting the artist’s tour of the city of Kabul in three different years travelling the same route from beginning to end. The intent is to show the progress (or digress?) of Afghanistan’s post-war reconstruction in its visual entirety—and it shows well. Images within each frame

(people, buildings, shops, cars) appear quite the same, yet the viewer will soon find little nuances in the colors and shapes of things as the eyes catches them – like hope amongst all the rubble and ruin, however ambiguous it may appear or seem to be.

Another video installation, Don’t Hurry, Don’t Worry (2010), is a contemplative work based on the artist’s family and their time together—images that call on “notions of intimacy, loss and the passage of time.” In the 45 or so minutes, the viewer gazes at different intervals: one of the past, the other of the present. Whether it is a family gathering over dinner, tending to an ailing grandparent or chatting with each other about “the good old days,” the visuals become somber and melancholic or happy and nostalgic—reading into what each of the persons shown are trying to convey.

Since these footages were captured within a six year period, its documentary style conveys an intimate surrounding—as if you were there in their presence as well.

Lastly, making my way over to the last work of the exhibition and located in a separate gallery, the work Crossing Boundaries (2015) by Pakistani artist Anile Quayyum Agha, was surely a sight to behold. In this installation, the artist used light and shadow to cast images of geometric patterns and symbols inherent in Islamic mosques, but more than that, the work speak of “the often alienating and transient position of the immigrant” as well as the fact that women in Pakistan are still excluded from traditional areas of worship. A black, laser-cut steel cube (reminiscent of the Holy Kaaba in Mecca) is placed in the middle of the white painted space— a single white bulb radiates the various images mentioned, thus creating an atmospheric event within the four walls and placing the viewer in an almost contemplative and meditative state quite impressive.

Overall, Lucid Dreams and Distant Visions: South Asian Art in the Diaspora is a most lively and provocative show not to be missed—do plan to see it soon if you can.

The exhibition will be on view at the Asia Society Museum (725 Park Avenue in New York) till August 6.

A ‘video poem’ capturing the experience of Japanese incarceration

By Chizu Omori IE Contributor “When Rabbit Left the Moon,” a 14-minute film by filmmaker, Emiko Omori, will be featured at the Wing Luke Museum on Thursday, August 3 in the Tateuchi Story Theatre. It will be screened as a continuous loop from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

This film began as an experiment, Omori said in an interview. Words to describe the camp experience, the experience of having been incarcerated for the duration of World War II, seemed inadequate to her-either too many or not enough. So, the idea of creating a wordless film, a “video poem” as she calls it, came to her as an attempt to express long buried feelings without words. “Many of the images and much of the music come from my longer work,

Rabbit In the Moon, a documentary which came out in 1999. Omori also said that she wanted to include the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as an added reminder of America’s attitude toward Japan and the Japanese.

Finished early this year, the piece was presented as an installation at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco the week of the 75th anniversary of the signing of Executive Order 9066, by President Franklin Roosevelt, that paved the way to the incarceration of 120,000 Americans of Japanese descent. The installation was shown continuously for a week, held in a small room with sofas to make for an intimate screening and viewers were encouraged to jot down their comments on cards.

A panel discussion was also held in conjunction with the installation, attended by

an overflowing crowd, an indication of the public state of mind in current times. Some of the comments on the cards were: “Heartbreaking yet visually beautiful. Thank you for reminding us not to go down this road again.” “Thank you for teaching us about this crime against humanity. God bless you.” “Heart broken open. Growing up on the east coast in 1950s-1960s no mention of this history.” “Such quiet dignity against such total indignity. Horrible then, and detention camps for immigrants and potentially new ethnic groups frightening real now.”

This film has been shown at Films of Remembrance in San Francisco, Occidental College in Los Angeles, New York Museum of Modern Art, Cal State University Dominguez Hills, and the Euphrat Museum of Art at De Anza College.

A still from When Rabbit Left the Moon

IE ARTS

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 21

Clowning artist brings personal story of 2011 Japan tsunami to Fish Saw

By Roxanne Ray IE Contributor

in the 2011 tsunami,” Mikawa said. “We lived in my one-bedroom apartment on King Street for two years.”

Sachie Mikawa is back in town, ready to show her newly-created show Fish Saw.

During this time, Mikawa pondered ways of helping her mother adapt to this tragedy.

“She’d lost many people she knew and was close to, but the death of a four-year-old girl, who was the daughter of my mom’s cousin, affected her the most,” Mikawa said. “Mom was going through the survivor’s guilt and it was very hard to see her deal with it everyday.”

Mikawa, a clowning artist who hails from Japan and has lived in Seattle for over 15 years, took a break from the States in 2013, and spent some time down under in Australia.

There, she played the role of the sidekick Egg to her partner Trent Baumann’s character The Birdmann, as part of his production company Downunderground.

While in Australia, Mikawa expanded her clowning work to include original music composition for Baumann’s vaudeville and clowning work. “What I most enjoyed in the past four years was traveling around the world,” Mikawa said. “We did shows in Edinburgh, where we were nominated for The Most Original Comedy.”

From there, she and Baumann circled the globe. “We did shows in a medieval town in Italy, in the desert of Alice Springs, and on an amazing beach in Surfers Paradise, Australia, and the beautiful Salamanca Market in Tasmania, to name a few,” she said. “We really enjoyed the Canadian circuit as well.”

Now she’s returning to present her latest work, Fish Saw, created with director and co-writer George Lewis. “It’s a very special show for me and George,” Mikawa said. “It’s the third original work we’ve made together in ten years. And it’s a very personal piece for me, as it is based on true stories of my mom’s family.”

Mikawa’s decision to create work based on her mother stemmed from her experience of the 2011 tsunami in Sendai, Japan. “My mom moved in with me when she lost everything

But Mikawa began to have an idea.

“Around that time I started having this image in my head where the dead girl and my mom, as a very young person, were meeting underwater,” she said. “The dead girl from the future would tell my mom, as a young girl, that everything is okay.”

The new idea grew slowly. “I kept that image in my head for a couple years along with a few more images and words, lines,” she said.

“Fish Saw started from there.”

Working with George Lewis, Mikawa explored the complexity of these images.

“George and I wanted to create something based on magical realism, and thought of animation that I could interact with onstage,” she said.

Mikawa reports that Fish Saw went through three phases of development, which each involved travel—since Lewis is based in Buenos Aires, but was also spending time in Seattle, all while Mikawa was based in Australia and touring extensively to perform, as well as to visit her mother.

The first phase involved getting thoughts out on paper. “We met six days a week and did writing everyday,” Mikawa said. “And

lots of talking, about what happened to my family during and after the tsunami and about my mom’s family history, going back five or six generations.”

The second phase involved creating animations with artists Sandra Lîa Jurcovich and Andrea Torti. But the show wasn’t quite finished. “I went back to Buenos Aires after that and worked another month, which was a great blessing because the show changed a lot after I went back there for the second time,” Mikawa said. “Things that weren’t as clear before I left suddenly revealed themselves to us. Toward the end of the process, I added sound and music to the animation and the rest of the show.”

Despite Mikawa’s original desire to heal her mother through this show, she reports that her mother has not seen Fish Saw. “She has seen the posters and newspaper covers with me on them and articles that I had sent, but because of her dementia, each time she sees them, it’s a complete surprise to her,” Mikawa said.

She reports that her connection with her mother is somewhat in limbo. “The biggest thing that happened to my family after the 2011 Tsunami was that my mom stopped living,” she said. “She had always been hardworking and recovered after each tragedy, but not this time. She stopped working, cooking.

She used to own a restaurant, so this was a big deal. She is now living with dementia.”

Despite her mother’s condition and her penchant for world travel, Mikawa finds that national boundaries interfere with her caretaking. “When she moved in with me in Seattle,” Mikawa said, “she said she wanted to have the option of living in the United States, so I became naturalized in order to apply for

her green card. But after waiting for two years for the green card in a foreign land, she really missed Japan and decided to go home.”

This decision created the initial divide.

“Since Japan doesn’t allow dual citizenship, I could only visit for up to 90 days even though I was born and raised there,” Mikawa said. “And my mom had overstayed in the U.S. while waiting for the green card, so she can’t come back to the U.S. So that’s pretty screwed up for both of us.”

Although this situation is part of what keeps Mikawa on the move, she focuses on the positive aspects of her travels. “I had a couple festivals in New Zealand where Fish Saw was to debut,” she said. “But then a couple weeks before the festival, I found out my mom was very ill, so I flew back to Japan for a month and a half to take care of her.”

The timing was coincidental. “I ended up being there for the sixth anniversary of the 2011 Tsunami, but in the Japanese calendar, it’s considered the seventh, which is very important when counting death anniversaries, so it was special,” she said. “Seeing mom in the state she was in then, and spending time with her in that particular time, really affected what eventually became the final version of the show.”

Although she has no current plans to move back to Seattle permanently, Mikawa is looking forward to her visit. “I’m so excited to bring the show to Seattle,” she said. “A lot of friends helped me make this show via Kickstarter, and I finally get to share it with them.”

Fish Saw will run on July 29-30 at Theatre Off Jackson, 409 Seventh Avenue South, Seattle. For more information, see http://www. fishsaw.com.

Announcements Chin family and International District Emergency Center vigil to remember Donnie Chin On Sunday, July 23, the Chin family and International District Emergency Center (IDEC) will host a vigil to remember the life and death of Donnie Chin.

Chin, considered by many to be a community hero, founded IDEC while still in junior high school. Recognizing that the police and fire departments were slow to respond to calls in the neighborhood, if they came at all, Chin and his friend Dean Wong decided to take matters into their own hands. They learned first aid and martial arts, bought emergency medical equipment, and started responding to calls themselves.

IDEC grew over the years, but Donnie Chin was always its cornerstone. In a historically neglected neighborhood, Chin brought a sense of safety and stability. People were accustomed to seeing him run by with a cargo vest and first aid kit. Chin saved numerous lives over his decades of service, and was usually the first person residents and business owners called when they needed help.

Donnie Chin was killed suddenly in the early hours of the morning on July 23, 2015 by gunfire between two rival

gangs. His death came as a shock to the community, triggering grief and anger over the City’s neglect.

Immediately following Chin’s murder, the Seattle Police Department (SPD) announced that it would make the investigation a top priority. SPD officials also expressed confidence that they would be able to identify and apprehend those responsible.

Yet two years after Chin’s murder, the case remains unsolved. The longer the investigation remains open, the more the community fears that justice for Donnie will never become a reality.

Cathay Post scholarship dinner The Cathay Post will be holding its Annual Installation/Scholarship Dinner on August 20 at Ocean Star Restaurant from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. They are accepting new members. If you are a veteran or a supporter, please feel free to contact Terry Nicholas (206 355 4422) or Lloyd Hara (206 283 9681) for more information.

Cost of the dinner is $20 per person.

Public forum for Tommy Le, high schooler killed by police

Tommy, a 20-year-old high school senior, was shot on June 13, 2017 by Sunday’s vigil will provide an opportunity for community members to gather King County deputies responding to a and remember Chin, to mourn, and to air disturbance in Burien. He was hours their frustrations. Speakers will include away from graduating through the Donnie’s sister Connie Chin, his best Career Link High School Completion Program, having picked up his cap and friend Dean Wong, and IDEC leaders. gown earlier that afternoon.

Since Donnie was not fond of candles, Known by his classmates and teachers organizers are encouraging participants as a “goofy” and “bubbly” kid, Tommy had to bring glow sticks or electronic cancome a long way from when he first entered dles instead. For participants who do the alternative high school after dropping bring wax candles, organizers request out of Evergreen High School. Having that these be carried inside jars, mugs, or earned enough credits to graduate on a final cups to minimize wax drip and fire risk. exam the morning of his death, Tommy had Members of the press are welcome to plans to attend South Seattle Community attend the event, but are kindly asked to College, according to his father Sunny Le. be considerate of other participants who Tommy Le’s family, along with are grieving. officials from King County, will be

hosting a public forum on Wednesday, July 19 from 5:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at Asian Counseling and Referral Service (ACRS), 3639 Martin Luther King Jr Way S, Seattle, WA 98144. The purpose of the forum is to discuss police intervention in this case.

The forum will begin with statements from members of the Le family, after which the floor will be opened to community members for questions, with priorities given to Vietnamese American youth.

In attendance from King County will be Councilmembers Joe McDermott, Dave Upthegrove, Larry Gossett, Executive Dow Constantine, Sheriff John Urquhart, State Representatives Mia Gregerson, Bob Hasegawa, Michael Itti from the Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs and the Office of Law Enforcement Oversight Director Deborah Jacobs.

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22 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

Arts & Culture Asia Pacific Cultural Center 4851 So. Tacoma Way Tacoma, WA 98409 Ph: 253-383-3900 Fx: 253-292-1551 faalua@comcast.net www.asiapacificculturalcenter.org Bridging communities and generations through arts, culture, education and business.

Friends of Asian Art Association (FA3) P.O. Box 15404 Seattle, WA 98115 206-522-5438 friendsofasianart2@gmail.com www.friendsofasianart.org To advance understanding, appreciation and support for Asian arts and cultures, the Friends of Asian Art Association provides and supports programs, activities and materials that reflect the arts and cultures of countries that make up the broad and diverse spectrum of Asia.

RAJANA Society Seattle, WA 206-979-3206 sameth@rajanasociety.org

RAJANA Society is an Arts & Civics project focusing on civic engagement and bridging cultural divides with the Cambodian Diaspora.

Civil Rights & Advocacy Organization of Chinese Americans Asian Pacific American Advocates Greater Seattle Chapter P.O. Box 14141 Seattle, WA 98114 www.ocaseattle.org

OCA—Greater Seattle Chapter was formed in 1995 and since that time it has been serving the Greater Seattle Chinese and Asian Pacific American community as well as other communities in the Pacific Northwest.

It is recognized in the local community for its advocacy of civil and voting rights as well as its sponsorship of community activities and events.

Education Denise Louie Education Center 206-767-8223 info@deniselouie.org www.deniselouie.org

COMMUNITY RESOURCE DIRECTORY

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

Homelessness Services

Professional & Leadership Development

YouthCare 2500 NE 54th Street Seattle, WA 98105 206-694-4500 info@youthcare.org www.youthcare.org

Working to prevent and end youth homelessness with services including meals, shelter, housing, job training, education, and more.

Homeownership Services HomeSight 5117 Rainier Ave S Seattle, WA 98118 ph: 206-723-4355 fx: 206-760-4210 www.homesightwa.org NMLS#49289 HomeSight creates homeownership opportunities through first mortgage lending, down payment assistance, real estate development, homebuyer education, and counseling.

Housing Services InterIm Community Development Association 310 Maynard Ave S, Seattle, WA 98104 Ph: 206-624-1802 Services: 601 S King St, Ph: 206-623-5132 Interimicda.org Multilingual community building: affordable housing, housing counseling, homelessness prevention, advocacy, teen leadership, and the Danny Woo Community Garden.

Executive Development Institute 310 – 120th Ave NE. Suite A102 Bellevue, WA Ph: 425-467-9365 edi@ediorg.org • www.ediorg.org EDI offers culturally relevant leadership development programs.

WE MAKE LEADERS Fostering future leaders through education, networking and community NAAAP Seattle services for Asian American Queen Anne Station professionals and entreP.O. Box 19888 preneurs.

Seattle, WA 98109 Facebook: NAAAP-Seattle info@naaapseattle.org Twitter: twitter.com/naaapwww.naaapseattle.org seattle

Senior Services

The Kin On Team is ready to serve YOU! www.kinon.org

Kawabe Memorial House 221 18th Ave S Seattle, WA 98144 ph: 206-322-4550 connie.devaney@gmail.com We provide affordable, safe, culturally sensitive housing and support services to people aged 62 and older.

Seattle Chinatown/International District Preservation and Development Authority ph: 206-624-8929 fx: 206-467-6376 info@scidpda.org Housing, property management and community development.

Immigration Services

Speak better. Write better. Live better. Improve your English language skills with a professional language consultant at a price you can afford. Learn to write effective business and government correspondence.

Improve your reading, conversation, academic writing, and IT skills.

Washington New Americans Program OneAmerica 1225 S. Weller St., Suite 430 Seattle, WA 98144 Are you a lawful permanent resident? The Washington New Americans program can help you complete your application for U.S. citizenship. Low-cost and free services available – please call our hotline or visit www.wanewamericans.org.

Phone: 1-877-926-3924 Email: wna@weareoneamerica.org Website: www.wanewamericans.org

Southeast Seattle Senior Center 4655 S. Holly St., Seattle, WA 98118 ph: 206-722-0317 fax: 206-722-2768 kateh@seniorservices.org www.sessc.org Daytime activities center providing activities social services, trips, and community for seniors and South Seattle neighbors. We have weaving, Tai Chi, indoor beach-ball, yoga, dance, senior-oriented computer classes, trips to the casino, and serve scratch cooked lunch. Open Monday through Friday, 8:30-4. Our thrift store next door is open Mon-Fri 10-2, Sat 10-4. This sweet center has services and fun for the health and well-being of boomers and beyond. Check us out on Facebook or our website.

Social & Health Services Asian Counseling & Referral Service 3639 Martin Luther King Jr. Way S Seattle, WA 98144 ph: 206-695-7600 fx: 206-695-7606 events@acrs.org www.acrs.org ACRS offers multilingual, behavioral health and social services to Asian Pacific Americans and other low-income people in King County.

APICAT 601 S King St. Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-682-1668 www.apicat.org Addressing tobacco, marijuana prevention and control and other health disparities in a culturally and linguistically appropriate manner.

Commission on Asian Pacific American Affairs GA Bldg., 210 11th Ave SW, Suite 301A Olympia, WA 98504 ph: (360) 725-5667 www.facebook.com/wacapaa capaa@capaa.wa.gov www.capaa.wa.gov Statewide liaison between government and APA communities. Monitors and informs the public about legislative issues.

Cathay Post #186 of The American Legion Supporting veterans for over 70 years Accepting new members—contact us today to learn more! (206) 355-4422 P.O. Box 3281 Seattle, WA 98144-3281 cathaypost@hotmail.com

Offering home visiting services for children birth to 3 and full & part-day multicultural preschool education for ages 3 to 5 in the International District, Beacon Hill and Rainier Beach.

Grammar Captive 409B Maynard Ave. South Seattle, WA 98104 206-291-8468 tutor@grammarcaptive.com www.grammarcaptive.com

Senior Services

Keiro Northwest 1601 E Yesler Way, Seattle, WA 98122 ph: 206-323-7100 www.keironorthwest.org rehabilitation care | skilled nursing | assisted living | home care | senior day care | meal delivery | transportation | continuing education | catering services

Legacy House 803 South Lane Street Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-292-5184 fx: 206-838-3057 info@legacyhouse.org www.scidpda.org/programs/legacyhouse. aspx Services offered: Assisted Living, Adult Day Services, meal programs for low-income seniors.

Chinese Information & Service Center 611 S Lane St, Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-624-5633 fax: 206-624-5634 info@cisc-seattle.org www.cisc-seattle.org Creating opportunities for Asian immigrants and their families to succeed by helping them make the transition to a new life while keeping later generations in touch with their rich heritage.

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COMMUNITY RESOURCE DIRECTORY

Social & Health Services

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER

July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017 — 23

Since 1935

Tai Tung Restaurant International District Medical & Dental Clinic 720 8th Avenue S, Seattle, WA 98104 ph: 206-788-3700 email: info@ichs.com website: www.ichs.com

Banquet Facilities - Catering - Delivery

Bellevue Medical & Dental Clinic 1050 140th Avenue NE, Bellevue, WA 98005 ph: 425-373-3000 Shoreline Medical & Dental Clinic 16549 Aurora Avenue N, Shoreline, WA 98133 ph: 206-533-2600 Holly Park Medical & Dental Clinic 3815 S Othello St, Seattle, WA 98118 ph: 206-788-3500 The largest Asian, Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander community health center in Washington state, ICHS provides medical, dental, behavioral health and pharmacy care with multilingual doctors, nurses and staff experienced in meeting the needs of King County’s diverse and multicultural communities. All are welcome and sliding fee scales are available for uninsured patients.

7301 Beacon Ave S Seattle, WA 98108 ph: 206-587-3735 fax: 206-748-0282 www.idicseniorcenter.org info@idicseniorcenter.org

Come Enjoy the Oldest Chinese Restaurant in Town!

IDIC is a nonprofit human services organization that offers wellness and social service programs to Filipinos and API communities.

655 S King St, Seattle, WA 98104 (206) 622-7372

Parking & Transportation Services

Mon-Thurs 11am-10:30pm Fri-Sat 11am-12am Sun 11am-10pm

206-624-3426 transia@aol.com Merchants Parking provides convenient and affordable community parking. Transia provides community transportation: para-transportation services, shuttle services, and field trips in and out of Chinatown/International District, and King County.

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Answers to this puzzle are on Wednesday, August 2.

24 — July 19, 2017 – August 1, 2017

INTERNATIONAL EXAMINER