Hawaii’s Uta-Sanshin Master Grant “Masanduu” Sadami Murata: An Incredible Story About Identity
A typical night at Grant “Masanduu” Sadami Murata’s house consists of a group of his uta-sanshin students gathered on his covered lanai for their weekly practice. Uta-sanshin, the art of singing while playing the Okinawan three-stringed lute, is practiced four days a week, each night with a different group of students. They sit on folding […]
Digitizing Deliciousness: Jennifer Hasegawa Honors Community “Aunties” by Reviving Old Hawaiʻi Cookbooks
Jennifer Hasegawa seems an unlikely preserver of simple community cookbooks from the Hawaiian islands’ early statehood period of the 1960s through 1990s. The digital maven, a Sansei who had worked around the Bay Area’s tech industry since moving to the North American mainland from her childhood home on a Hawaiʻi “neighbor island,” appears a master […]
Bob Furuike: Creator of Delite-ful Pies at Gardena’s Pie Kitchen
Some of my favorite memories of childhood were of eating a slice of Citrus Delite pie, the signature dessert at Pie Kitchen in Gardena. Bright orange and yellow circles of tangy meringue on top of vanilla custard and a crisp, flaky crust — Citrus Delite tasted of summer evenings visiting with family and friends. Whenever […]
Muriel Miura: Trailblazer of Hawai’i Regional Cuisine
Author of nearly 30 cookbooks and host of two of the first TV shows focused on local Hawaiʻi and Japanese cooking, Muriel Miura Kaminaka was also a multiple award-winning home economist and a passionate educator to Hawaiʻi’s youth, home cooks, and aspiring chefs, including Sam Choy and Alan Wong. Muriel’s influential and long career as […]
Rob Tsuyuki and Shoyu Drip: Influenced by the Japanese Culture
One look at the Japanese American creator of ShoyuDrip, an internet apparel company featuring modern-day fashion with a distinctive Japanese flavor, and you’d probably never guess that he once considered himself a “non-Japanese.” But for Sansei Rob Tsuyuki, 55, this was basically who he was for a good part of his life. “Both of my […]
Tetsu Tanimoto: A Pioneer for Japanese American Basketball
If there was a last shot, a game-winning buzzer beater on the line, Tetsu Tanimoto would be the one to take it. This is how Kay Oda, and many other Nikkei basketball players in 1960s Southern California, remember Tanimoto’s skills on the court. “He was the most dominant player at the time in Southern California […]
Sparking that musical appreciation: Family traditions bring community together through music
Lisa Joe was a natural musician from a young age. It wasn’t just her talent, her mother once said. It was her drive. Even when Joe was a child, she practiced the flute so much it drove her mom, an acclaimed music teacher, crazy. The Long Beach native started playing when she was 9, spending […]
Naoki Hayashi: PLAY, PRINT, EAT
Step into the shop of gyotaku (Japanese fish printing) artist Naoki Hayashi and you’ll find a vintage Mustang parked within the complex, covered in dust and debris, one of his many do-it-yourself projects that he’s got on the side. “I like to fix and create things,” said Hayashi, explaining how he once worked for a […]
The Stellar Life of Stella Otsuka
“Progress! Things gotta keep moving!” Stella Otsuka said with energy and optimism as Huell Howser interviewed her in 2002. It was the third time the famed broadcaster had spoken with the Otsuka family for his acclaimed “Visiting…With Huell Howser” series on public television. At the time, Stella was reflecting on the end of an era: […]
Soji Kashiwagi and the Grace of a Traveling Theater Company
Soji Kashiwagi was 13 years old when the idea hit him. He was sitting in a Berkeley theater, quietly watching a play his father had written. The story was set in one of several incarceration camps where more than 120,000 people of Japanese descent – two -thirds of them U.S. citizens — were imprisoned during […]