Writing Opportunity – Man discovers his samurai roots through old family photos
Academic, Article/Journalism, Interview/Profile 
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This is an article idea suggested by Bobby Okinaka (Wakayama-ken, 1992-95) who works for the Japanese American National Museum. If interested in writing about this, email stevenwaseda atto jetwit dotto com for contact info.
Story pitch – Man discovers his samurai roots through old family photos
Mitch Homma still has thousands of family photos to sort through, but he has already done an incredible job documenting his family’s history. He discovered that two of his great-grandparents came from important samurai families in northern Japan.
Reverend Masahiko Wada (1880-1957)
Born to a high-ranking samurai family serving the Date clan of Sendai.
Mrs. Kuni Anazawa Wada (1887-1967)
related to Inazo Nitobe, man on the 5000 yen note (cousin)
Rev. Wada, a Christian, came to southern California in 1928 to minister to Japanese immigrants in the United States. His wife and family joined him in 1931. During WWII, they were arrested as potential threats to the security of the U.S. and later sent to a relocation camp. After the war, they went on to live normal American lives and their samurai roots were forgotten until Mr. Homma started digging into his family’s past.
What makes this story interesting is that Mr. Homma has thousands of photos, documents and family heirlooms that belonged to his great-grandparents. This is rare because for many immigrants, family possessions were lost or destroyed because of World War II. Also, most Japanese immigrants to the United States were poor laborers and farmers.
He has contacted the family of Masahiko Wada in Japan and returned a copy of the koseki that was destroyed by American firebombs. Mr. Homma has compiled his family’s history into a picture book of 89 pages.
Mr. Homma has done extensive research and he has many stories about his family. This would make for a good piece on a man discovering his Japanese family’s history as well as pre-war Christianity in Japan or the Japanese American wartime experience.
Mitch lives in San Diego, CA.
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La-la-la-la-la O-ba-ma & Japanese Songwriting
Audio, Celebrity, Humor, Japan Trends, Music, Uncategorized, Video Comments Off on La-la-la-la-la O-ba-ma & Japanese Songwriting
Obama-shi, Japan is so happy about the US election, they’ve come up with a song and video about it. Meanwhile, have you ever written a song in Japanese (or partly in Japanese)? Let me know and I’ll post it, or perhaps we can collaborate with other JET alums to come up with a tune and/or record it. Just email me at stevenwaseda at-mark jetwit dotto com.
The 44th President of the United States – Barack Obama
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WITLife – Episode #2
Article/Journalism, Blogs, Translating/Interpreting, WIT Life, Writers Comments Off on WITLife – Episode #2
WITLife is a periodic post by Writer/Interpreter/Translator Stacy Smith (Kumamoto-ken, 2000-03).
I have now begun my second assignment for the International Visitor Leadership Program, and this time around the person I am interpreting for is a female entrepreneur from the northern island of Hokkaido. We will be traveling around the country together for the next 3 weeks to study issues relating to women and work such as telecommuting, returning to the workplace after an extended absence and work flexibility. Not only that, but she is lucky enough to be here during this monumental presidential election!
In this spirit, our program coordinator arranged for us to visit a polling station in Arlington, Virginia that Read More
Bankruptcy Bill in the WSJ Law Blog
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“Bankruptcy Bill to the Rescue” – The Wall Street Journal‘s Dionne Searcey yesterday wrote a nice item in the WSJ Law Blog about Bankruptcy Bill, the cartoon written by Steven Horowitz (Aichi-ken, 1992-94) and illustrated by Gideon Kendall.
From a Japanese perspective, the article is also notable in that it mentioned Bill’s bankruptcy haiku. :-)
