Have you ever seen the haiku that goes, "Here are many mountains and rivers, where love and life lie?" This is the work on a stone monument located just to the left after entering the Japanese garden, at the foot of Osaka Bridge on Galvao Bueno Street in the Liberdade …
"Children with one parent of Japanese descent are one year ahead of their Iberian counterparts in mathematics achievement at public elementary schools," was the result of an intriguing survey published in the online edition of Folha newspaper at 2:00 a.m. on December 24, 2017. This is a groundbreaking survey that …
"Investing in Japanese language education in kindergartens is highly effective," concludes Makiko Matsuda, an associate professor at Kanazawa University who is currently conducting a study on "the Japanese language usage characteristics of plurilingual speakers in Japanese communities in South America." He was surprised to see that Japanese language schools in …
“I enjoyed it for the first time in three years.” In June, 2005, Makoto Oka, (age 66 at the time) chairperson of Brazil Okayama Kenjinkai (prefectural association) commented on the feijoada, a major Brazilian dish, with a face that showed his getting over some past woe.
This should be read as a sequel to my previous article, "South America's Japanese Creole Language, Colonia ." This time, I've written mainly about the subtle writing styles of Colonia, which are related to "identity." First of all, is "immigrant" a banned word on TV? In the "Reporter's Eye" column …
Read Part 1 >> Even the spelling of the president's name is different Naturally, there are differences between the way personal names are written in the Japanese media and the way they are written in Japanese-language newspapers in Brazil. For example, former President Dilma, who was impeached at the end …
It took me three months to get used to the Colonial language At the end of 1991, at the height of the bubble economy, I was working in Tokyo for a company listed on the second section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange, and for some reason I decided to start …
Read Part 1 >> From the Meiji Era Opening Up to Overseas Emigration As the years go by, the ugly grass loses its roots and is transplanted. In the home of Fumio Oura in Suzano Fukuhaku Village, a framed version of this tanka poem, handwritten by Mizuno in his final …
Mizuno Ryu (1859-1951, Kochi Prefecture) was the man who launched the first immigrant ship, the Kasato Maru, in 1908 and started the Japanese immigration to Brazil. When I interviewed Ryuzaburo Mizuno (85, second generation), the son of this great contributor, I was truly surprised to hear him say with emotion, …
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