Nisei Week 2011

The official opening ceremony for the 2011, Nisei Week Festival was held on July 17th. Over 200 people attended this ceremony and prayed for a successful festival.

At the ceremony, the eight candidates for the 2011 Nisei Week Queen were introduced. Candidates will represent their sponsors during their 1-year term. One of the eight beautiful Japanese American candidates will be announced as the Nisei Queen at the Coronation Ball on August 13th.

This year marks the 71st Nisei Week Festival and this year’s theme is “Honoring Our Community Heroes.”

Reverend Mark Nakagawa, who is this year’s president made a speech about the important elements for this year’s Festival.

Nisei Week Festival will run from August 13 to August 21st.

ANA 25 Year Celebration

ANA airlines celebrated their 25th anniversary on July 16th. The celebration featured 3 different types of stewardess uniforms that were worn from 1986 to today.

The customers boarding the plane during the celebration felt the history of 25 years and some even took pictures as a memoriam.

25 years ago on this date, the first scheduled flights between Los Angeles and Narita took place. At that time, there were only 5 scheduled flights per week to and from Los Angeles.

Today, there are 8 flights daily to six cities with the additions of San Francisco, Chicago, New York, Washington and Honolulu.

ANA is currently expanding their air travel service. They started flying scheduled flights from Los Angeles to Haneda Airport last October and was also the recipient of the world’s first Boeing 787.

Tulip In Harmony

A charity concert was held by the volunteer music group “Tulip in Harmony” in Glendale on July 17th. “Tulip in Harmony”, a group of six Japanese professional women musicians, is active mainly in Los Angeles. Formed in April for the charity, the group’s sole purpose was to benefit the disaster victims in Japan. During the performance, the group played with thoughts of Japan on their minds. Motoko Honda, a pianist who grew up in Miyagi prefecture in Japan played the Japanese folk songs “Furosato”. The members of “Tulip in Harmony” pushed the importance of long-term support. That is why they scheduled this concert four months after the earthquake. This concert is the first in a series that “Tulip in Harmony” plans to continue.

Badminton

On July 12th, a popular Japanese pair played at the U.S. Open 2011 Badminton Tournament.

As part of the selection process for the 2012 Olympic Games, this tournament had a significant impact on the Olympic aspiring “Ikeshio” pair, which is the mixed doubles pair of Shintaro Ikeda and Reiko Shiota.

In the first round was held on October 12th in which they beat the Hong Kong team in straight sets to go on to round 2. They showed steady heart in round 2, but lost to the Korean team to end the tournament in 3rd place.

Also in the tournament, the world's 3rd seated women's team of Suetsuna and Maeda. They showed their skill against the American team in a fixed 18 minute.

Placing 4th in the 2008 Beijing Olympics, they are aiming for a medal in next year's Olympic Games. Unfortunately, in this year's U.S. Open, the met defeat in the semi-final round to finish 3rd.