Gil Asakawa's Nikkei View | japan
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THINGS_JAPANESEAll the Japanese Americans I know have all sorts of ways to show their cultural roots. It may not be evident when you meet them, but the signs are there, in their homes. When I was a kid living in Japan, it never occurred to me that the stuff in our house was… well, Japanese. And when we moved to the U.S., we took a lot of our stuff with us – folding screens, small artworks, dolls, dishware, pottery, chopsticks and cooking utensils, and a lot more. Once we moved into a suburban Northern Virginia home in the mid-1960s, we set about fitting in to our all-American Wonder Years life: nice ranch home, big back yard, all our Japanese stuff inside. Oh, except for my dad built a Japanese rock garden in the back yard complete with a stone lantern, and he planted a cherry blossom tree in the front yard, which bloomed every spring at the same time the famous cherry blossoms that were given to the US. That tree has grown huge in the decades since – I’ve seen photos, and it looks like a giant fluffy ball of pink cotton candy that dominates the yard, and hides most of the old house behind it.

[caption id="attachment_5367" align="aligncenter" width="520"]Nagomi Visit Travelers are treated to home-cooked Japanese food when they book a meal with Nagomi Visit. (Photo courtesy of Nagomi Visit)[/caption]   There's no getting around it: One of the most reliable ways to generate international friendship and cultural understanding is through the stomach. Diversity in dining is a reflection of an evolving society. Just think of a typical American culinary palette of the 1950s: Pot roast, mashed potatoes, gravy, spinach boiled to drab green mush, creamed corn. Your plate was all white and tan, with maybe a green highlight or two (it helped if you had an iceberg lettuce salad on the side). The one bright spot, color-wise might have been a jiggling red blob of Jell-O for dessert. I'm oversimplifying, of course. Depending on where in the U.S. of A. you lived in during the decade when I was born, you would have grown up having Italian food, or Jewish food, or maybe Mexican or Americanized Chinese food. But Middle America -- the land of Better Home and Gardens Cookbooks -- was all about red meat and multiple kinds of carbs. Don't get me wrong -- I love white and tan food. Except for that over-cooked spinach, which is a crying shame, I love that typical '50s meal, including the Jell-O. But for 2013, I'm sure glad that Americans have a much wider appreciation for ethnic cuisine, from Italian and Mexican to Chinese, Korean and Thai. I grew up eating Japanese food, naturally. My mom cooked Japanese food for herself even if she cooked spaghetti, or steak, for the rest of us. In fact, we had rice every night, even if we had pasta, mom made rice and I often had a serving on the side alongside my noodles. But mostly, my brothers and I grew up eating my mom's home-cooked Japanese food. Whether it was basic like teriyaki chicken or grilled salmon, or fancy and more "ethnic" dishes like oden (a traditional winter stew) or chawan mushi (a hot savory egg custard), we knew we were always getting a true authentic taste of Japan, because that's what my mom grew up with. A lot of us love to travel to Japan so we can have authentic Japanese cooking. Eating in restaurants in Japan, whether expensive high-end eateries or funky hole-in-the-wall joints, can be a satisfying way to hook into Japanese culture. But imagine the awesome experience of having a home-cooked Japanese meal, in a Japanese home. OK, so you don't have relatives that you can mooch off, or friends who you can crash with who'll cook for you. No worries -- there's a brilliant service called Nagomi Visit International through which you can set up a home-cooked lunch or dinner during your travels in Japan, and make new friends while you're at it.

United flight 139 from Denver International Airport to Tokyo's Narita Airport flies direct daily, and shaves off hours of travel time and stress from flying to the west coast for a connecting flight to Narita. Here's what I wrote when the direct flight on Boeing's 787 Dreamliner was first announced. Technical issues grounded the plane for several months from the original...

The Montbello High School Drumline -- an awesome precision drumming group -- is traveling to Japan for a once-in-a-lifetime cultural exchange, on the new United 787 Dreamliner's direct flight between Denver and Tokyo. After performing at the home of U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos, the students will travel on to Takayama, Denver's Sister City, to perform for schools and in a concert hall with a famous taiko drum group. The Montbello group was invited by Denver Mayor Michael B. Hancock, who had traveled to Takayama himself when he was a high school student, and who was a principle player in bringing the direct Tokyo flight to Denver International Airport.

David Wagner, a consultant, trainer and journalist who is originally from Colorado but has lived for years in Japan, had the opportunity to sit down and speak with two giants of Japan scholarship. Dr. Donald Keene and Dr. Joyce Lebra (a professor at the University of Colorado). It's a fascinating and far-ranging conversation, starting with both Keene and Lebra's...

[caption id="attachment_4911" align="aligncenter" width="520"] Jiro Ono (left) and his son, Yoshikazu.[/caption]For the past year, people have been telling us to watch "Jiro Dreams of Sushi," the 2011 documentary by David Gelb about Jiro Ono, the 85-year-old artisan sushi chef who operates a Michelin 3-star restaurant, Sukibayashi Jiro, tucked into a Tokyo underground station. We finally saw it, and it's a charming...

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...