Bellevue College to Host 9th Annual Japan Week 

The community is invited to attend the ninth annual Japan Week Oct. 6-9 for Bellevue College students and Oct. 11 for the public.  

The Saturday festival will feature many different activities, games, and traditions, including martial arts, a tea ceremony, origami, and calligraphy, among others. However, three main events are sure to draw crowds. Those include a Rakugo comedy show, a Mikoshi parade routing through campus, and an exhibit on the atomic bombings of Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. The exhibit is meant to remember the tragic events that occurred 80 years ago this past August.  

Anne Matsumoto Stewart, a faculty emeritus, who helps lead and organize the event’s production, said this year’s Japan Week is especially meaningful to her because her family had strong connections to the Hiroshima bombing, Pearl Harbor, Japanese internment camps, and the war.  

“For me, Japan Week is about passing on Japanese culture,” Stewart said. “But every year I want to include at least one speaker who talks about Japanese incarceration. My family never wanted to talk about the camps, the past … but I don’t want everybody to forget that this happened in U.S. history. We shouldn’t forget it.” 

The exhibit is supported by the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum and includes 32 photos and data panels, a short film of a survivor’s testimony, a Google Earth tour of Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park that includes an inside view of the Atomic Bomb Dome, and presentations from Stan Shikuma of Tsuru for Solidarity and Bill Wright of the Nisei Veterans Committee.  

Stewart taught Japanese at Bellevue College for 15 years before retiring last year. She has been an organizer of Japan Week alongside a group of students within the college’s student Japanese Culture Exchange Club.  

President of the club, Marcos Perez, said he first became interested in Japanese culture as he grew up watching anime in Mexico.  

“Anime is a huge thing in Mexico with shows like Dragon Ball Z – but they were all in Spanish and I grew up in a small town,” Perez said. “I didn’t realize the shows were Japanese until I moved to California.” 

Perez eventually joined the military where he learned more about World War II and he then began to study Japanese on his own. He’s since traveled to Japan and is excited to be part of an event that pays homage to authentic Japanese cultural traditions.  

“It’s something I’ve never experienced before,” Perez said. “I’ve gone to small Japanese festivals and Japanese gardens, but I’m looking forward to this larger event. A tea ceremony is something I’ve always wanted to do; just to have space to relax and be present and in the moment. That’s one of the events I’m looking forward to most.” 

For the event schedule, a list of activities, and information about parking, visit the Japan Week website.