Week 2: Hula, Zumba, NASCAR, and Surveys

Week two of NCI SJ started with us heading over to the Akiyama Wellness Center to do Zumba with our week two supervisor Kathy Sakamoto. Zumba was a fun experience that I have decided to hold off on doing again until I get into better shape. During the middle of the week we headed over to the Hula studio over on 6th street to do hula with Kathy. Hula is another activity that I will hold off doing again. These two experiences showed us how each business runs and what services are provided. This was more evident however with the Akiyama Wellness Center since they provide a multitude of services with Yu Ai Kai to the elderly population to help them stay not only up to date on technology but also physically and mentally sharp.

 Photo by Alec Matsumoto: Hula 6/24/15

Photo by Iszac Gaton: Zumba 6/22/15

During the whole week we spent with Kathy we were instructed to walk around to each business in Japantown and pass out flyers for the 125 yr. anniversary of Japantown, parking surveys, and ad order forms. Monday-Wednesday we hit the streets to pass out the "packets" and Friday we went around to remind and collect the businesses of the packets. This job taught me interpersonal skills and the importance of getting out into the community to make a personal connection. Even though it was initially intimidating for me to go out and meet new people, I felt comfortable doing so after the first few businesses. Most of the people in J-town are nice and friendly and are willing to take the time to talk to you even if they are slightly busy. Even if they were, most of them were polite about asking us to just leave the packets with them so that they could look at it once they had time after we explained what it was. I also found unfortunately that some of the businesses in J-town were not so friendly when we came in to talk to them, but that is apart of life and I learned that even if they may not be friendly, acting hostile back towards them will not be helpful. These businesses are important and vital for Japantown since they draw in people and help keep Japantown alive, even if they may not be open to filling out a survey their needs are still important so just by going around and saying that we are trying to help with the big issue of parking gets them to think about how beneficial working with the JBA and other associations may be for the collective good of the community.

We did more than just Zumba, Hula, and walking around this week. We also went to San Francisco's Japantown's JCCCNC for our weekly Intern-days where we had a workshop and met two the founder of Kimochi, Inc, and a NASCAR driver who is Japanese American. Meeting with the great Steve Nakajo, the founder of Kimochi, Inc was a great experience. We learned about the importance of community and giving back to those who gave to you as well as the importance of understanding that the JA community should not be so inclined to distinguish between generations, especially between Nikkei and Shi-Nikkei. 

During our workshop we learned of the numerous JA organizations that are out in the world and how they contribute to the JA community. We learned that just by getting involved with one of them we can get involved with more. Also the leader was kind of pushing us to join or think of joining JACL.

Photo by Chelsea Hayashi (SF Intern) 6/25/15: List of JA organizations that we knew of at the time

-Alec Matsumoto

Orientation and Interactions

Up in San Francisco, we got a chance to meet all of the NCI interns. There are a lot of colorful and positive characters within this community; I'm looking forward to getting to know them all better. We got to speak briefly on the first day and we all are probably going to share the same picture on our blogs. The San Jose group consists of only two members, the San Francisco branch has 7 members and LA has a massive group of twelve interns. It's a shame that San Jose interns won't get to work closely with the rest of the program, but it was wonderful to meet the whole community none the less.

One of the first workshops we took part in was a leadership identity exercise. Learning about what makes me a leader and what other people take from themselves into the leadership position opened my mind to other aspects of leadership that I hadn't thought about in the past. I know that it's a bit redundant, but one of the biggest take aways from this experience is how big this world. Despite that, we all somehow knew a mutual friend of another. There were a lot of other workshops and activities that all happened in a blur, but the main take away from the whole orientation experience is the depth and warmth from the Japanese American community. You can really see their passion for their home and the desire to make it a better place for the future. 

The few days of the actual internship have been mostly working with Duane Kubo. We've been discussing how the youth can get involved with the Japanese community and the ways we can push this community forwards in a positive direction. One of the projects we'll be focusing in on is video to shed light on and bring more character to the Issei Memorial Building. Not many people know much about it, but that doesn't mean that all of the huge contributions it has made to the community must go unnoticed. 

This is just a quick screenshot of a few of the things that the Issei Memorial Building (IMB) has been through since its creation. Alec and I are working to produce a piece that JACL and other groups may potentially hold in their arsenal to effectively get the Japantown culture out into the world on platforms that it hasn't been provided on before. So far one of the biggest aspects I've seen reaffirmed again and again is the positivity that comes from everyone in this community. It's been fun so far and I'm looking forward to the rest of the program.

-Iszac Gaton!

Opening Session and First Days of Work

Oppening Session:
Our first days of NCI (Nikkei Community Internship) had us split 3 days in San Francisco and San Jose to meet the other interns from SF and LA. There are 21 total interns in the program; 2 from San Jose, 7 from San Francisco, and 12 from Los Angeles. We learned that these 3 cities are the last remaining official J-Towns left in California. Learning this we learned why this program is important to the future of J-Town communities and how each of us can take what we learn from where we are placed and the workshops that we do and use it for the future of J-Towns and the Nikkei Community.

Picture of SJ,SF, and LA interns in SF J-Town 6/15/15

Meeting and getting to know my fellow interns was a great opportunity and experience. I got to meet people from different schools and leadership backgrounds as well as other people within the Nikkei Community. I soon realized that the Nikkei Community that I had grown up and been apart of for my life up until now was just a portion of what the actual community is. Just being apart of and active in the Mountain View Buddhist Temple/Buddhist Churches of America and subsequent youth groups/ organizations was the only idea or picture that I had of the Nikkei Community. I was aware of San Jose Japan Town and actually grew up there, going to pre-school and practicing Judo for a few years as well as being active in the Tri-City/ Nikkei sports leagues was the only other part of the Nikkei Community that I was aware of as well. My goal by the end of this program is to hopefully as my time here at NCI progresses on I will become more involved within the broader Nikkei Community of San Jose Japan Town and understand what it takes to help this community progress.

First Few Days:

As the day began we rolled into the Issei Memorial Building on 5th Street in San Jose Japan Town. We met with Roy Hirabayashi who showed us around the historic building that we will be calling "home base" for the next 8 weeks. Next we met with Duane Kubo who began to talk to us about our overarching project that we will be working on mostly for the time we are working in J-Town. He allowed us to think of a few ideas that we then narrowed down to creating a film or documentary to help raise awareness about the historic Issei Memorial Building. So for the past two days we have been working on research and filming ideas as well as a timetable to do such an "ambitious" project as Duane put it for the next 8 weeks. We are also working on a few smaller projects such as a social media campaign to help tie the community together as well as other even smaller projects like taking surveys for the JCCsj and the JBA while we are here.

Brainstorming ideas for our two main projects with Duane

Alec Matsumoto 5/19/15