TADAIMA ZOOM WITH OMOIDE STORIES
Oct
1
https://tinyurl.com/omoidewritingHere's the link to register for the Oct 15, 3pm Zoom
Me, Margaret, Chuck and DelReflections are because Sam took the picture, from our deck, outside the kitchen window
OMOIDE at the JCCCW (Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Washington), the “J”, is our writing group. OMOIDE was started in 1991 in my kitchen with Del Uchida, Margaret Yasuda, Chuck Kato and myself. We gabbed, had refreshments, sometimes included our spouses and did some writing. Christmas 1993, we used Pagemaker, went to Kinko for copies, folded and decorated construction paper covers and self-self-published a bunch of Christmas presents for family. We did that two more times.
In 2003 we became a program of the newly created Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Washington. Ats Kiuchi joined the program and helped us get a Kip Tokuda Civil Liberties grant from Washington State to publish OMOIDE IV. Aki Sogabe donated her Kirigami cover and my husband Sam Goto did the story illustrations. OMOIDE V is a compilation of OMOIDE I, II and III. Now, we are getting organized for OMOIDE VI.
For 20 years we have met on the third Saturday of each month, except December, from 1 - 4pm at the J. It was virtual during Covid. We have hot water from the kitchen and share refreshments between readings and kibitzing about our 500 word stories of incidents (two-minutes is the average attention span without another incident) from our memories. Directed to 5th grade, adults are telling us how much they are enjoying the stories.
Stories are important, getting together is important, and psychologically it is fulfilling. My purpose in life is sharing good heritage values with my kids and future generations. It’s a lot of fun!
Go to jcccw.org and the Hosekibako (jewel box) to purchase OMOIDE books.
