Mmmmm. Chinese food. Just thinking about Lao Wang Noodle House in Denver, which I swear serves the best dumplings in the universe (it's where the photo above was taken) gets my mouth watering. It's a tiny hole-in-the-wall tucked into a tiny strip mall along the South Federal Asian strip of mostly Vietnamese eateries. It's run by an elderly couple who...
I just had an interesting phone conversation with Leo Duran, a producer at KPCC public radio in Los Angeles, about a burning issue the media must address: Why are there no Asian Santa Clauses? Granted, the image that immediately springs to mind when you say "Santa" is a big fat white man with rosy cheeks, a bushy white beard and a...
[caption id="attachment_4839" align="aligncenter" width="520"] Kimiko Side, recipient of the Order of the Rising Sun award from the Emperor of Japan, toasts "campai" during the Emperor's Birthday reception Dec. 3, with Consul General Ikuhiko Ono at the left of the photo and Denver Mayor Michael B. Hancock behind her.[/caption] This was a good year for Japanese and Japanese Americans in Colorado. A...
Living in Colorado has its benefits: Great weather, great outdoor recreation, great people and a central location for traveling to either coast. But it's not the most convenient place if you want to travel to, say, Europe or to Asia. In my case, it's a huge undertaking to plan a trip to Japan. That's because there's no direct flight from Denver...
I've read about, and talked about, and written about the internment of over 110,000 people of Japanese descent during World War II, so much that in a weird way, I've come to think of internment as a clinical, historical event. But once in a while, I'm reminded of the human scale of the tragedy, and feel the pain personally, of...
PSY, the Korean pop sensation whose viral hit video, "Gangnam Style," has been viewed alomst 800 million times on YouTube (that's the official video, never mind the countless other users' uploads and all the spoofs and tributes), closed out the American Music Awards on Nov. 18. In a savvy, surprising and ultimately, ironic, collaboration, the 35-year-old PSY (real name: Park...
I'm not much of a churchgoer, but I've attended and volunteered at events at both the Denver Buddhist Temple, and the Simpson Methodist Church, which are both focal points of the local Japanese and Japanese American communities. A couple of weeks ago, I was part of the Mile High JACL's Fall Festival team, and spent a long day cooking (and...
[caption id="attachment_4763" align="alignleft" width="520"] This bronze statue of Buddha, at 15 meters (almost 50 feet, or five stories) tall, is the largest bronze statue of Buddha in the world. It sits in one of the largest wooden structures in the world, Todaiji Temple in Nara, Japan. I shot this photo during a 2011 trip.[/caption] An excellent, thoughtful and thought-provoking article on...
This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We\'ll assume you\'re ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. Read More