PAPAS & MAMAS
1: Why My Son Attended KNI2: Anpanman and Beyond
3: Women and Beauty
4: Fundraising with Starbucks
5: Junk Mail Reduction
6: Editor's note
The newsletter from Parents Association of Kodomo no Ie
No.36 June 2009 Editor: Yu
Why My Son Attended KNI
by Megumi Sansui
My name is Maria Megumi Sansui and I am a Yonsei, a J.A. (Japanese American). My great-grandparents came from Japan and moved to Los Angeles, CA.
Both sides of my family were interned at Manzanar, CA as a Relocation Camp. We refer to them as, "camp." As an American citizen in CA, I learned about camp in the eighth grade. There was one paragraph on the subject while learning about WWII. At family gatherings, I had learned about this prior to junior high, but it hurt to read about it in the textbook and hear comments about, "those Japs". My grandfather on one side lost his three restaurants and his house. My other grandfather lost his produce business and his house. Remember, all that the people could take was what they could carry, which was usually two suitcases. Everything else was left behind. All those heirlooms from Japan and their families! And they could neither get money nor sell their houses because non-Japanese people knew they had to leave quickly. Thank you very much President Roosevelt for signing that Executive Order.
When I first learned about this at the family gatherings, I was very angry that this happened at all to American citizens, born and raised in the U.S.A. If you didn't know, Manzanar is in the desert. Hot during the day and freezing at night. They slept on cots in shabby, cheap barracks that still let the sand blow inside. There was barbed wire surrounding the camp with armed soldiers guarding the place. My great-grandma died there and my dad was born there. There is a cemetery there and I believe it is a National Monument. You can drive by and check it out. It's very unfortunate that all this happened as I am proud of my Japanese heritage, but I am really proud to be an American. Only with other J.A.'s do I say,"J.A." I am an American. My great Uncle Tok Tezuka died in Europe for the U.S. and received a Purple Heart (it's a medal). He served his country even though his country took everything away from him and his family.
My dad visited Japan once when he was in the U.S. Navy. My mom always wanted to go visit, but she was ill and she died before she was able to go. My mom's parents told me Japan was a great place as they visited Japan with the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1960's for their first time.
Why have I been sending Akira to KNI since he turned two? So we could learn Japanese together! I bought the First 1000 Words in Japanese book and we learned all of our body parts, colors, shapes and animals! I wanted to make sure he learned some of his Japanese culture that I didn't receive. You see, after WWII, not many people were speaking the Japanese language. Everyone wanted to show that they were American so they spoke English. Yes, there was J.A. school on Saturdays, but really the language was getting lost. When I was younger and someone asked me if I spoke another language, I was proud to say, "No, only English." Nowadays, it's cool to know multiple languages!
I want to know and learn more Japanese as a J.A. because I feel it's a part of me that I need to know and learn. My parents and my sister took Minyo, Japanese Folk Dancing for years and we always danced in the Nisei Week Parade in August in Little Tokyo. Because I was in Minyo, I was chosen to go to Japan to learn more Minyo from Gujo Hachchiman, Japan in the Gifu district. I went to Japan again with my students at Glendale High School as an exchange program. That was culture! My family celebrated Girl's Day. We always celebrated the Japanese New Year with all the Japanese foods! We had rice with every dinner meal. As a Japanese American, I feel the best thing I can do for my son is to expose him to as much as I can about the Japanese culture. I am trying, but it is difficult. American sports are on Saturdays and Japanese school is on Saturdays. American sports wins, but I hope to keep learning more Japanese even as we leave KNI this June.
Anpanman and Beyond
by Robert Barr
Whenever my family travels to Japan, we like to take mini-family vacations to parts we've never seen before. Taking advantage of the Japan Rail passes available to foreigners, it's affordable travel to all parts of the country. One year as all the kids could see, do or talk about was "ANPAN-MAN." In researching places to visit, we discovered that Anpanman's creator Takashi Yanase's hometown Kami City in Shikoku has an Anpanman Museum/ Children's play center. When we told the boys where we were going, they were more excited than if we'd said Disneyland. But we were soon to discover half the excitement was actually getting there.
Traveling from Omiya in Saitama prefecture, we used our rail passes on the Shinkansen trains to Okayama. This only took about five hours. Five hours of little excited voices saying "Are we there yet?" "I don't see Anpanman." "I'm hungry." Trip note: bring backpack full of bottled tea and snacks. At Okayama, we transferred trains, taking a rapid train across the Inland Sea over the amazing Seto-Ohashi Bridge. Kami City (Kochi prefecture) is more or less in the Southern Center of the island but our route (as we wanted to see the beautiful isle) took us along the north eastern coast to Takamatsu, then on a local train to see the spectacular Great Whirling Currents of Naruto at Tokushima. The bridge there is built with glass observation floors so you can walk out over the deep curling sea. It's really cool. By now though the children are in near mutiny against mommy and daddy as nothing looks like Anpanman.
From here we took another local train to Awaikeda to connect with the line that will take us inland to magical Kami City. I was so surprised when the train showed up. The train was painted with all the Anpanman characters. As we boarded, the Train Conductor handed the boys Anpanman Passports and stamped them. She showed us that at every station in Shikoku, there are these Stamp machines that have a different Anpanman character and that there were several different Anpanman Trains with different stamps. Now that is a really fun idea. Shortly we were on our way and I was busy enjoying the scenery of the mountains, rivers and green lush forests. I then noticed the boys had disappeared. I looked around and found everyone in the next rail car playing. The entire car was a padded Anpanman playground and the kids were playing themselves silly. Soon, though we arrived in the emerald mist shrouded city of Kami.
A short taxi ride from the train station brings you to the Anpanman Museum which is a beautiful 4 story tall building crammed full of everything Anpanman. The entry way houses the gift shop filled with Anpanman cookies, toys, films, umbrellas, cakes etc… The lower floor there is an Anpanman cartoon theatre playing continuous shows and nearby is the Anpanman land playground/maze with a house that you can play in. The upper floors are more like a fine art museum with framed Anpanman art work. The kids will only spend a short time here as they soon hid back down to the playground and theatre.
Anpanman is everywhere in Shikoku. We went to several other cities (Kubokawa, Uwajima, Matsuyama) riding on Anpanman trains when we could. The island is beautiful and much more relaxed and country like than say Tokyo. Although I had a tough time with the humidity, I really enjoyed exploring the isle. Next time maybe we'll walk the Sacred Temple Trail.
For more, please visit the following;
JR (Japan Rail) Pass http://www.japanrailpass.net
Anpanman Trains www.jr-shikoku.co.jp
Anpanman Museum www.anpanman-museum.net
Women and Beauty
by Michiko Yu
"If you gain weight, I will have to divorce you," said the husband of L, a friend of mine, as a condition of marriage. Some of her other friends displayed an outright disgust, but I did not think it was such a big deal. That may as well have been the husband's gesture suggesting that he wants his wife to mind her appearance so that she would be the focus of his attention. On the contrary, in my case with my husband, when I do wear make-up once in a long while, he would say, "You don't have to do that. It does not suit someone who is taking care of children." I see that he does not expect me to make myself look nice for him after giving birth to four children. Well, I don't exactly wear make-up for my husband.
By the way, why do women wish to be beautiful for their lifetime? Indeed, it is good to see beautiful things and I heard that beauty augments spiritual well being. However, even though you make yourself look beautiful, who is appreciating ‘the beautiful you'? - not you, but people around you. You wouldn't spend much time, effort and money to entertain other people but yourself. I combined the thoughts of my friends' and mine, and here is the list I came up with on the benefits of women being beautiful after marriage?
- Your husband is proud of having gotten a trophy wife
- At a school reunion, you would be spared comments like "Oh, you are a mother now," (implying you are not an attractive woman anymore) by your single former classmates who still enjoy dating
- When you see a man who dumped you, you could make him regret that it had been a mistake, otherwise; he would think it was the right thing to do
- Self satisfaction
- A good first impression
Now, first reason is a benefit for a husband and not for a wife. The second and the third are both about how people look at you, and I would say who cares! Just tell people this is how I look after several years of being married. As for the fourth, self satisfaction, you need to know why you like being pretty. And the fifth, I am sure the first impression would be faded after people get to know the inside of beautiful people. In addition, women may want to keep a distance with their fellow beautiful women.
It seems that although women spend time, effort and money to make themselves look beautiful, being beautiful does not have tangible benefits. We are just preoccupied with the idea that women should be beautiful without knowing why, and most women including myself believe in the misconception that beautiful women are blessed with many perks. The fact is there is no advantage.
A friend of mine was wondering when she can stop dyeing her hair black. Her point is that right now she is too young to have gray hair and she is trying to find out when she is old enough to show all her gray hair without hiding it. This thinking stems from the concept that young and beautiful is good.
It seems that besides the fact you somehow feel good about yourself, there is no advantage for being beautiful in itself. Plus you don't know the reason why you feel good being beautiful. However, when choosing a piece of furniture, for example, how it looks is as important as its function. Likewise, perhaps, women should dress up and look nice so that the Earth would be decorated nicely. After all, why bother thinking about advantages and reasons? I'll just follow my heart and continue exercising to be in good shape.
Fundraising with Starbucks
By Kumiko Anicich
It was in 2006, before my daughter Helen started at Kodomo No Ie, when I first thought of fundraising with Starbucks Coffee Company. A preschool in Burbank had a fundraiser event beautifying their school sponsored by Starbucks: The Starbucks corporate will donate to the school up to $1000 for the labor of volunteering parents and Starbucks employees at $10 per hour, so I needed accumulative labor hours of 100 at least to reach that. I ran my idea of doing this at KNI by KNI's parent association and they gave me a go.
So, I contacted the closest Starbucks store to KNI at Las Tunas & Rosemead. After excruciating attempts of having an application submitted to Starbucks Corporate, we were disappointed to be told that the store was not in shape to sponsor a project like this. That's when I switched to the Valley & Garfield store. Luckily for us, the store manager Miss Maira Kikuchi was very competent and submitted the application to the Corporate very quickly. Meanwhile, I made a folder showing a history of struggle with the Las Tunas & Rosemead store and sent it to the Starbucks corporate to beg for their approval. It worked! The fundraiser event date was finally set to January 20, 2008.
The main focus of the event was repairs and painting around the school. According to the Principal's requests, I made up job lists and job descriptions. Boy, that was a challenge because I'm not a handyman. I had to accept the humiliation of asking my civil-engineer husband to explain step-by-step how each job could be done. For some jobs, I solicited the store clerks' advice at OSH and Home Depot. Based on that, I put up sign-up sheets on the bulletin board asking for donations of materials and loan of equipment.
Meanwhile, I went to talk to several Home Depot, OSH, and Dunn Edwards stores to get donations and contractor prices on paints, etc. to lower the cost. The Principal wanted to redo the carpet in the "Piano Room" with the raised funds, so I wanted to leave as much of the $1000 untouched. Well, I learned Home Depot has a policy not to donate to religious organizations or church-affiliated schools, but an HR manager at one store was very kind and donated a $50 gift card. OSH gave us $25. I used these gift cards to purchase things that had not been donated.
Also, a lot of parents expressed that it was almost impossible for them to volunteer without child care, so another part of the event was a carnival for the kids, which would act as a child care room. I copied the City of Burbank's Halloween carnival for this. Kids would go around the church hall to play games and get stamps. When they accumulated the stamps, they got to pick a prize.
When the day of the event came, it was hectic but very rewarding. I had to run to Dunn Edwards to get more cans of paint at one point because novices like us can't paint as efficiently as the painters. (I had purchased only the numbers of cans needed if professional painters painted.) Overall, more parents, children and Starbucks associates participated than expected in the event. Both children and Starbucks associates told me they had a blast, which was a huge relief to me. I had been informed that Starbucks would count the number of children to calculate the labor hours for the donation, so I was sure KNI would receive $1000. A day after the event, Maira submitted paperwork to the Starbucks Corporate on behalf of KNI to start the donation process going. We both thought KNI would receive a check by April at the latest. How wrong we were…
Well, it turned out that the vendor Starbucks was using to process donation requests was managed very poorly, and it became a déjà vu scenario of the application process. At some point I got tired of being a polite Asian woman and wrote (threat?) to the Corporate manager that I want her to personally handle our case. After that, all I could do was to wait for the Starbucks internal requirements to be completed. Maira was very good with keeping me informed on what was going on internally. Some of the Starbucks associates who participated in our event were surveyed electronically online, and answered phone interviews by the Corporate manager, probably to make sure that the event really did happen and not a scam. It was a time-consuming process. Our check was finally approved and processed in the March batch at the Starbuck Corporate. It was a huge relief when the Principal called me during the spring break to tell me that she had received the $1000 check. We couldn't have received it without kind Starbucks associates and Maira's friendship with them.
Looking back, it would have been easier to raise $1000 if I put the same energy in my business and donated to KNI personally. But, parents working together and the event bringing us closer were just priceless. Still, I wouldn't fundraise with Starbucks again. (I did send personal thank-you cards to all Starbucks associates with origami as a Japanese touch and to the Corporate manager with a photo album with photos from the event, just in case YOU want to lead the fundraiser with Starbucks in the future. It's important to leave a good impression to get approval again, you know?) Well, here's my proposal for the next fundraiser: If you refer me business owners who don't have a web site or are dissatisfied with their current one, and they end up purchasing my company's web solutions, I'll pay you $200-referral fees and give KNI 10% of the sale. That'll be probably easier than my 3-year process with Starbucks.
Junk Mail Reduction
By Nami Hayashi
What is in your mailbox in this time and age when you could receive just about everything over the Internet - files, pictures, invitations, bills, cards, etc. You would say mostly unsolicited mail or unwanted mail, so called junk mail, that goes to trash or recycling bins without ever being read or even opened.
With being green considered a standard practice, many businesses, schools and households are going paperless. But with all the junk mail (read: paper waste) it is almost as if the amount of junk mail cancels out the effort. Some junk mail especially from big corporations is really elaborate with full color printing on glossy paper and many inserts. But most are destined to a trash can. Paper is recyclable. True. But some of them include product samples such as medicine. Medicines are treated as household hazardous waste so if you really want to recycle properly, you'd have to take the samples off. It is a hassle.
Many non-profit organizations send you their donation solicitation with one of those address labels. Address labels are less and less in demand as the use of the Internet is partially replacing tasks that needed traditional mailing service Furthermore, with sticky parts and your name and address showing, you'd think for a moment if the labels are recyclable and be hesitant to put them in a trash can.
There is a certain return of investment factor to those unsolicited mail and it may be a necessary evil for businesses to increase sales and win new customers or non profit institutions in which operations depend on donations. Still, looking at unnecessary waste whether being recycled or not makes one wonder if it is possible to receive less.
Your name and address is entered in a database after you make purchases, entering a contest, making a donation or other actions that involve submitting your name and address. The database is borrowed, exchanged or sold, thus you receive unsolicited mail from places where you never did business with before. Many of them belong to Direct Marketing Association and use their national list. Write (Mail Preference Service/DMA Attn: Dept. 9407644 P.O. Box 643 Carmel, NY 10512 (212)768-7277) to them to have your name removed from the list. Make sure to include other household members at your address. A one-dollar handling fee is required.
There is a business called a list broker that handles collection and sales of household addresses. You could send them a letter requesting a removal of your information. One such company is Donnelly Marketing, Inc. (Attn: Data Base Operations 416 South Bell Ames, IA 50010)
For coupons and product samples, you could call Vallasio, formerly known as ADVO and self claimed biggest direct marketer in the US, to remove your name from their list. The phone number is 1-800-437-0479.
For credit card solicitations, call 1-888-5OPUOUT (888-567-8688) and follow prompts to have them remove your name and address. This number takes care of all of the four major credit bureaus.
If you'd like to stop catalogs from the merchants you shopped from in the past, just call the customer service number in the catalog. Once you are in a mailing list, be it charitable organizations or small businesses, you would be receiving various correspondence. If you'd rather not hear from them any longer, call to have your name removed from their mailing list.
Editor's note
Hope you enjoyed this edition of newsletter and found it informative. Any comments, contact michikoyanagawa@earthlink.net. Have a great summer!
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