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FULL CIRCLE
by Merilynne Hamano Quon
August 8, 2001
This article was published initially in the 2001 Nisei Week booklet under the title "Full Circle." It is posted here with permission from the author.
When I was growing up in the Crenshaw area of Los Angeles,
a "big highlight" of the year would be the Nisei Week Festival.
Every year I would go down to a big vacant lot near some railroad tracks
and practice ondo for the Nisei Week parade. Then my mother would dress
me up in a kimono and I would join with hundreds of others to dance in
the parade.
At that time the Japanese Americans were still recovering after being sent
to concentration camps during World War II. Community institutions that were
once strong before the war had been weakened by that disruption. There was
no Asian American Studies, Little Tokyo Towers, Little Tokyo Service Center,
Japanese American National Museum; Visual Communications; or Asian American
Drug Abuse Program. Redress and reparations for Japanese Americans incarcerated
during World War II was an impossible dream!
I was fortunate, however, to have been born just in time for the 60's and 70's.
That was when an entire generation of Americans-black, white, Asian, Chicano,
Native American; rich and poor; men and women-began to "move as one".
Together, we made up a "movement" with a vision of justice and equality
for all nationalities, better living and working conditions for all people,
equality for women, and world peace.
Full Circle 2 - Japanese American Community Services-Asian Involvement
"There was no Asian American Studies, Little Tokyo Towers,
Little Tokyo Service Center, Japanese American National Museum; Visual
Communications; or Asian American Drug Abuse Program. Redress and reparations
for Japanese Americans incarcerated during World War II was an impossible
dream!"
