Award Ceremony of the "My Nikkei Identity" Contest

Community Event

In Person

Date: Dec. 28, 2009

On Monday, December 28, the eleven winning students of the “My Nikkei Identity” Composition Contest, organized by the 110th Anniversary Commission of Japanese Immigration to Peru, will be awarded. 155 works were submitted to this contest and the jury selected eleven winning works, belonging to students from La Unión School and Hideyo Noguchi School. Among the eleven winning works, the composition by the 5th year high school student from Hideyo Noguchi School, Yuri Antuanett Aguirre Rojas, who participated under the pseudonym “Jape09,” was the only one chosen unanimously by the jury chaired by Alejandro Sakuda, also executive president of the 110th Anniversary Commission, and composed of historian Amelia Morimoto; narrator Augusto Higa; the dean of the Faculty of Law of the University of Lima, Víctor García Toma; and the Director of the Department of Culture of the APJ, Jorge Yamashiro. The eleven winning works were turned into musical compositions thanks to the collaboration of the Peruvian Association of Authors and Composers (APDAYC), which thus joined in the celebrations for the 110th anniversary of Japanese immigration. The composition by student Aguirre Rojas, which was unanimously voted for, was presented under the title “Corazón nikkei.” The other winners were Marcela Abe Kawashita (pseudonym “Niji”), Juana Rosa Kamy Acosta Sánchez (Yuki), Saori Horikawa Miyagui (Sao), Narumi Salazar (Nari), Andrea Bustamante Yong (Teen Angel), Evelyn Alegría (La Prima), Renato Lorenzo Pérez Vásquez-Solís (Yoru-kun), Kelly Nakandakari Takamure (Claro de luna), Carmen Hiromi Uyema Nakankari (Kinben) and Daniela Tokuda Oyafuso (Danii). According to the rules of this competition, the participating students had to write an essay about Japanese immigration, its significance, its contribution to the country, etc., and to do so they had to research with their parents and grandparents and collect their testimonies. The members of the jury praised the submitted works and praised the fact that the students had spoken with their parents, grandparents and relatives in order to learn about the history of Japanese immigration and its contribution to the development of the country.

APJ Updated Dec. 7, 2024