Image search results - "nikkei"
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The Museum of Japanese Emigration to Hawaii.
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Go right for the front entrance.
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The museum is a large, two-story, Japanese-style house donated in 1997 by the family of Fukumoto Choemon (1881-1970) who emigrated to California and became successful and rich enough to build this house after returning to Japan. The museum opened in 1999.
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Museum Web site
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The museum is a spacious Japanese-style house.
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The museum is full of panel exhibits, mementos, artifacts, old books, and scrapbooks. It had a lot more than I had expected.
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The museum staff person there could immediately tell that I was from Hawai'i even though I had said little more than "Hello" in fluent Japanese.
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He knew immediately that I was from Hawai'i. That made me feel good actually, to know that I still haven't lost my Hawaiian traits even after living in Japan for many years.
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Oar from the Hokule'a signed by Nainoa Thompson when they visited Suo-Oshima in May 2007. That was a big event for the island and the Hawaiian community in Japan. I saw the Hokule'a only when they arrived at Yokohama.The Hokule'a is a traditional canoe where they use only the stars, wave motions, and bird observations for navigation like they did in ancient times. Nainoa was a pioneer in resurrecting and mastering this ancient form of navigation. You can read about their adventures on Suo-Oshima here, from May 20:
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People from Suo-Oshima were among the first boatload of Kan'yaku Imin immigrants to Hawai'i in 1885. They emigrated due to dire economic conditions on the island.
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All the books in the museum are in open stacks where you can pull it out and read freely. Great for AJA researchers.
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The scrapbooks and other delicate materials should be digitized though, something which they haven't done yet.
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Old directory of all Japanese and Japanese-Americans living in Hawai'i. Never knew about this book.
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The museum also has two rooms full of Japanese school stuff. One room is full of books, scrapbooks, etc., donated by Ichisaburo Nakamura. He was a member of the Hawaii Kyoiku-kai (education council) which developed and published Japanese school textbooks.One of his scrapbooks had group photos of the Hawaii Kyoiku-kai who met every summer. I could recognize some of the faces. They were mainly Japanese school principals/teachers in Hawai'i. I spent a good amount of time in that room alone. Another room displayed old Japanese school textbooks including those published in Japan. I remember some of them from Japanese school and UH Manoa. Amazing to see all of them in one room.
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Also see my list of other Japanese-American and nikkei museums in Japan here..
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View of Suo-Oshima from the 2nd floor of the museum. The island is quite well populated with houses and fishing ports in many locations.
     
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