Japanese Community Festival in June
Topic: Festival
Gardena Valley Japanese Cultural Institute, June 24, 25 (Sat, Sun)
Venice Japanese Community Center, June 24, 25 (Sat, Sun)
San Fernando Valley Japanese American Community Center, June 24, 25 (Sat, Sun)
Long Beach Japanese Community Center, June 24 (Sat)

Temecula to present Children's Matsuri, Jun. 4
Topic: Festival
The Temecula Sister City Association proudly presents its Fourth Annual Children’s Matsuri, Sunday, June 4 from 11:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the Temecula Community Recreation Center on 30875 Rancho Vista Road in Temecula.

The theme is "Food & Family." In addition to the usual excitement of traditional Japanese dance, music, taiko and martial arts, there will be a Family “Iron Chef” Contest” where contestants will make creations based on Japanese food ingredients.

In addition, gyotaku (fish painting) the art where dead fish are creatively painted and then placed on paper to make a work of art, will return due to popular demand.

Children will learn about Japanese culture, traditions, and way of life through activities and games. Now a tradition, a number of guests from the sister city, Daisen-Nakayama, Tottori prefecture, will make a trip to Southern California and participate in the festival.

Admission is free and there will be plenty of prizes from the games and drawing opportunities.

The Temecula Sister City Association established the “Children’s Matsuri” in 2003. Due to the uniqueness of this event, the number of attendees has surpassed all expectations to well over 1400 in three short years. People have traveled from as far as Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Los Angeles and San Diego counties.

Mervyn’s is the presenting sponsor with Target and Tenkobushi Temple Martial Arts as other major sponsors. Kirin has been the Haiku Contest sponsor since 2004.

For more information about the festivities, visit the website at www.TemeculaSisterCityAssociation.org.

Photo: Mr. Munetaka Miyagawa of Daisen-Nakayama, Tottori prefecture, teaches the calligraphy Sheldon Reynolds. (Photo courtesy of Temecula Sister City Assoicaton)

Japanese art-theme festival in Central Valley, Apr. 30
Topic: Festival
HANFORD, California - The Ruth and Sherman Lee Institute for Japanese Art invites the public to its sixth annual Spring Festival on Sunday, April 30. The event will feature a wide variety of activities including tours of the new exhibition, Art Show & Sale featuring 18 California artists, bonsai demonstration by Bonsai Master Kenji Miyata, music performance by the Japan America Chamber Ensemble of Southern California.

There will also be a number of special ticketed activities including tours of the private garden, Japanese tea ceremonies, bonsai workshops by Hanford Bonsai Society, sushi demonstration by Chef Andy Matsuda, founder of Sushi Chef Institute in Los Angeles, sashiko (Japanese embroidery technique) workshops by mixed media artist Lucy Arai, and a lecture by internationally acclaimed Fresno architect Arthur Dyson.

Refreshments and bento box (picnic style) lunches will be available for purchase (reservation recommended).

Starting at 10 a.m. and running through the afternoon until 5 p.m., the institute gallery, library, and outdoor courtyard will be bustling with Japanese cultural activities. Admission to the Spring Festival is $7 per person for non-members in advance and $10 on the day of the event. Lee Institute members and children under 12 are admitted free.


Special ticketed activities: Reservations are required.

Sashiko (embroidery technique) Workshop
2 sessions: 10:15 a.m. and 3 p.m. in Tent A
Sashiko is a traditional Japanese embroidery technique based upon running-stitch designs of geometric patterns, and it flourished among the agrarian commoners during Edo period (1615-1868). The hand-sewn designs are complex geometric patterns borrowed from nature: waves of water, flowers, and birds. Participants will create two coasters using this sashiko technique. (120 minutes)
$20 for members: $25 for non-members (Fee includes material.)

Bonsai Workshop for kids
Noon in Tent B
Hanford Bonsai Society will conduct a bonsai workshop just for kids, ages 6 to 12. Explore the art of bonsai! (60 minutes)
$15 for members: $20 for non-members (Fee includes a bonsai tree.)

Bonsai Workshop
2 sessions: 1:30 p.m. and 3:30 p.m. in Tent B
Participants will learn the fundamentals of bonsai and leave the workshop with an actual bonsai they have created. Hanford Bonsai Society will conduct this workshop. (90 minutes)
$20 for members: $25 for non-members
(Fee includes a bonsai tree.)

?Drinking from the Cup of Humanity? Lecture by Arthur Dyson
4 p.m. in the Gallery
Internationally acclaimed Fresno architect Arthur Dyson who has received over one hundred and thirty professional design awards and honors, will share his distinctive approach to creative architecture for the 21st century. In this talk Dyson discusses the influence of Japanese aesthetics and philosophy, and traces the evolution of his work. Dyson makes a compelling case for multi-cultural modernism as a vital and flexible architectural language for our time. Always controversial, Dyson?s work was recently described as a ?fusion of Japanese Zen artistry and Star Wars technology?. (60 minutes)
$5 for members: $7 for non-members

?Art of Sushi and Japanese Cuisine?
Demonstration by Chef Andy Matsuda
2 sessions: 11:30 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. in the Library
Chef Andy Matsuda, founder of Sushi Chef Institute in Los Angeles will demonstrate how to make sushi and talk about Japanese cuisine. This is a great opportunity to gain knowledge in Japanese food. (60 minutes)
$7 for members: $10 for non-members

Tea Ceremony
2 sessions: Noon and 3:15pm
Enjoy the art of tea in the private garden. Kay Tokumoto, a master of the Ura Senke School, will perform a tea ceremony. Observe the graceful movements of Mrs. Tokumoto preparing and serving the tea in the serene setting of the Japanese garden. (45 minutes)
$5 for members: $7 for non-members

Garden Tours
8 tours: 10:15 a.m., 10:45 a.m., 11:15 a.m., 1 p.m., 1:30 p.m., 2 p.m., 2:30 p.m. and 4:15 p.m.
Landscape architect Bob Boro and docents will take you on a tour of the beautiful private Japanese garden. (30 minutes)
$7 for members: $10 for non-members


For more information, visit the website at www.shermanleeinstitute.org or call (559) 582-4915.

This event is sponsored by Land O'Lakes Foundation, The Bertha and John Garabedian Charitable Foundation, and Valley Public Television.

The Lee Institute is a public museum gallery and library study center dedicated to Japanese art located 6 miles south of Highway 198 in Hanford between Jackson and Jersey Avenues at 15770 Tenth Avenue.

(Photo)
Bonsai displays by Hanford Bonsai Society (Photo courtesy of Lee Institute)

City of Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Festival, Apr. 22, 23
Topic: Festival
The City of Monterey Park’s 9th Annual Cherry Blossom Festival will be held on April 22 and 23 at Barnes Park, 350 S. McPherrin Ave, Monterey Park. The festival will feature a wide array of Japanese cultural arts and entertainment, food, crafts, and games.

Among the highlights of the festival are renowned contemporary jazz musician, Keiko Matsui, KABC Channel 7 News Anchor David Ono, famed Koto player June Kuramoto and award winning Taiko group TAIKOPROJECT.

Admission to the Festival is free.

The Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Festival is a local community oriented celebration, which has a long history of being held in the City of Monterey Park, since the early 1970's.

Initially started as a fundraising endeavor by the Veterans for Foreign Wars Post as a carnival in the old Atlantic Square Shopping Center, it changed to include cultural promotion of the Japanese culture in the 1980s.

Discontinued shortly after, the Cherry Blossom Festival was resurrected by a group of community volunteers whose efforts were realized through the successful re-establishment of the Cherry Blossom Festival in April 1998.

The festival, which had over 8,000 attendees in 2005, coincides with the Nation’s annual Festival held in Washington, D.C. every spring to celebrate the 1912 gift to the city of 3,000 cherry trees from Mayor Yukio Ozaki of Tokyo.

This gift was to enhance the growing friendship between the U.S. and Japan and celebrate the continued close relationship between these two countries. First Lady Lady Bird Johnson accepted three thousand, eight hundred more trees in 1965.

In 1981 the cycle of giving came full circle when Japanese horticulturalists came to take cuttings from the trees growing in Washington, D.C. to replace some Yoshino cherry trees in Japan which had been destroyed in a flood.

This year’s Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Committee is led by Karen Ogawa and Dale Higashi.

Performances are scheduled to begin Saturday April 22, at 11:00 a.m. Additional information regarding this year’s festival is available on the festival website http://ci.monterey-park.ca.us

(Photo)
A taiko performance at Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Festival (Courtesy of Monterey Park Cherry Blossom Festival Committee)

Japan America Kite Festival to return to Seal Beach, Sept. 25
Topic: Festival
The annual Japan America Kite Festival will take place from 10:00 a.m.–Sundown on Sunday, Sept. 25 on an area spanning three acres on the beach next to the Seal Beach Pier in Seal Beach.

The purpose of the festival is to bring Japanese and American families together at an event focused on promoting and highlighting the rich art and history of Japanese kites. Initiated in 2000, the festival attracts over 5,000 people of all ages.

The Japan America Kite Festival has become California’s second largest kite festival. Only the 25-year-old Berkeley Kite Festival is larger.

Joining this year’s Japan America Kite Festival is world renowned Japanese Kite Master, Mikio Toki. Toki will conduct workshops and display and demonstrate his hand-made, traditional Edo-Kaku-Dako (Tokyo style kites). He has been making and teaching the art of Edo kites since 1973, and his kites are displayed in museums around the world.

Other highlights of the festival include Japanese and international kites of all sizes, shapes and colors. For children, there are free sode (kimono kite) workshops. In addition, there will be Japanese food booths, huge 50’ x 100’ kites, taiko drum performances, a raffle drawing, kite “candy drops,” and stunt and synchronized “ballet” kite flying demonstrations.

The Japan America Kite Festival is presented by the Japan America Society and Up Up & Away Kites in Seal Beach. The festival is free and open to the public. The festival is supported by Hitachi, Bridge USA, New Otani Hotel and Garden, Drachen Foundation, Seal Beach Chamber of Commerce. For more information about the festival, call the Japan America Society at (213) 627-6217, ext. 202, or visit www.jas-socal.org.


(Photo Caption) Madame & Consul General Yoshio Nomoto were flying a unique, commemorative, 150-meter long, single line kite that includes 150 alternating US and Japanese flag kites, each separated one meter apart. This spectacular kite was made by Japanese Kite Master, Mikio Toki, and was flown throughout the day during the 2004 festival to commemorate the 150th Anniversary of the US-Japan Relationship.