Nakayoshi's 2nd Annual Ski Trip - Sign up Today!

The information and details for Nakayoshi's 2nd Annual Ski Trip is finally here!

If you're interested, hurry and reserve your spot today, we're capping this year's trip to 30 people! The trip dates are Friday, February 26th - Sunday, February 28th.

Our cabin is located in North Lake Tahoe and we'll be snowboarding/skiing again at Northstar.We'll be staying in a beautiful 5 bedroom/3 bathroom cabin. We provide Saturday night dinner and Sunday morning breakfast. Ski lift tickets are included (if you are paying for Option A - see below) and does not include ski/snowboarding equipment rentals.

We'll be arriving in Tahoe on Friday evening, spending most of the day in the snow on Saturday, activities will be organized for Saturday evening and we'll be leaving Sunday afternoon at 12:00pm (unless you'd like to stay on your own to ski/snowboard).

It should be a fun trip this year! If interested in attending, please let us know if you're available to be a driver and if you're available to carpool other people. Parking spaces are limited at the cabin.

Cost: There are two separate packages available for this year's trip. Option A for those who want to snowboard and ski, and Option B f those who want to hang out and have a great time bonding with Nakayoshi members.

Price includes the cabin for 2 nights, gas/carpool money group lift tickets, a Saturday night dinner and Sunday morning breakfast.

Option A- For those that want to snowboard and ski, cost includes lift ticket. TOTAL: $113.68

Option B- For those who don't want to snowboard/ski, but want to hang out. TOTAL: $66.68

*Please note: Rental equipment will be on a per person basis. They are not included in these packages.

For those interested in attending this year's ski trip, email nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com to reserve your spot.

Nakayoshi's 2nd Annual BBQ - We're Turning One!

It's Nakayoshi's 2nd Annual BBQ and we're turning ONE! It's been exactly one year since we first launched Nakayoshi and boy have we grown!

Nakayoshi's 2nd Annual BBQ @ Golden Gate Park

Sunday, June 7th 12:00 - 4:00 pm
Lindley Meadow - Table 3 30th Avenue & John F. Kennedy Drive
Look for Blue & White Balloons

Since June 2008, we've held 11 successful volunteer events:

- Nihonmachi Street fair w/ JCYC
- SF JACL Chapter AIDS Memorial Grove Clean Up
- JCCCNC’s Annual Event – Salute to a Vision
- Kimochi’s Sansei Live Event
- Trick or Vote Event w/ Asian Communities for Reproductive Justice (ACRJ)
- SF JACL Chapter Spaghetti & Crab Feed Benefit Dinner
- API Legal Outreach’s Oshogatsu Festival with SF JACL Chapter & JCCCNC
- San Francisco 2009 Day Of Remembrance
- San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival Volunteers
- Nichi Bei Tofu Dessert Competition & Festival
- West Valley JACL Chapter Booth @ San Jose Nikkei Matsuri Festival

and 12 successful social events:

- Meet & Greet Barbeque
- Goh Nakamura Album Release Party
- Karaoke Night
- North Beach Crawl
- Mission District Crawl
- Golden State Warriors API Heritage Night
- Nakayoshi’s 1st Annual Holiday Party
- Yerba Buena Ice Skating
- 1st Annual Ski Trip – Northstar Lake Tahoe
- San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival – Tokyo Sonata Showing
- Hiking @ Purisma Creek (Half Moon Bay)
- San Francisco Giant’s Japanese Heritage Night

and some local community festivals and fundraisers:

- 42nd Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival – Tabling
- Asian American Heritage Street Celebration – Tabling
- Nakayoshi’s Sushi Cooking Class

We have a lot more planned out for the rest of the year, so if you haven't come out to one of our Nakayoshi Volunteer or Social events yet, come out and see what Nakayoshi is all about at our Annual BBQ! We'd love to meet you and tell you what else we have in store for our 2nd year!

Plus it's FREE! So join us as we celebrate our 1 Year Anniversary in Golden Gate Park with delicious food (free food) and some amazing Nakayoshi members!

San Francisco's Golden Gate Park
Sunday, June 7th

Lindley Meadow - Table 3
30th Avenue & John F. Kennedy Drive
Look for Blue & White Balloons
12:00 - 4:00 pm

Bring running shoes, we may do another round of touch football!

Check out pictures from our first BBQ:

6/29/08 Nakayoshi Meet & Greet BBQ

Much Needed Recap - We've been busy!

Over the past two months, our Nakayoshi calendar has been crazy busy! And things haven't slowed down one bit! But if you haven't joined us for our social or volunteer events... you're definitely missing out and we encourage you to join us! Just read about what's been happening with Nakayoshi over the past few months!

Tokyo Sonata Screening @ SFIAAF
Back in early March, our March Social began with a screening of Tokyo Sonata at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAFF) followed by dinner & karaoke. Event Coordinator Emily Leach did an amazing job in organizing group tickets for the screening and we even caught a group picture with Tokyo Sonata Director Kiyoshi Kurosawa! We later learned that Tokyo Sonata won Best Film and Best Screenwriter, and Kurosawa won Best Director at the festival! And of course, what better way to end a screening then with delicious shabu shabu! Heading down to Mum's to fill our stomachs and singing our hearts out karaoking in J-town. The night was definitely a successful social event!


Nichi Bei Time's 1st Annual Tofu Dessert Contest & Festival

For our March Volunteer event, Nakayoshi volunteered with Nichi Bei Times at their Tofu Dessert Contest and Festival and had an amazing time! The fun was never ending, with community vendors bringing their own unique tofu products to sample, children's tofu games with giant square sponges that looked like tofu, and tofu haiku contests there was entertainment for all! And what was more exciting, Nakayoshi members Vincent Chang and Emily Leach both competed in the Dessert Contest! We are definitely looking forward to next year's Tofu Festival!

Nakayoshi @ 42nd Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival
Participating at our first community festival, we couldn't have picked a better weekend then the 42nd Annual Northern California Cherry Blossom Festival. With many of our volunteers involved in all aspects of the festival, our hands were a bit busy but we still found time to table and meet some of the other young professionals enjoying the festival. If you stopped by the JACL table, we hope to see you soon @ our upcoming events! Look for us at our next festival - the Asian Heritage Street Celebration on May 16th (11am-6pm)!

Nakayoshi April Social - Hike @ Purisma Creek
Our Social Committee did an amazing job planning April's social event! Kudos goes to Event Coordinator Atsushi Miyamoto, who test ran the course prior to our hike! Hiking up in the hills at Half Moon Bay, the group had a great time chattin' it up and enjoying the beauty of all the greenery and flowers along the trail. Escaping from city life felt amazing, and it was almost felt like those elementary school days when your class took natural science hikes. Seeing all types of creatures, watching out for poison oak, and everyone eating home made packed lunches. Definitely an adventure and worth seeing the view from the top! Check out the video made by Nakayoshi member Matt Mori and view pictures on Nakayoshi's picasa albums!

Nakayoshi Volunteers with West Valley JACL Chapter @ Nikkei Matsuri
Helping out our fellow JACL Chapters, Nakayoshi helped volunteer at the WV JACL Chapter Strawberry Shortcake Booth! Not bad for a beautiful Sunday afternoon, helping serve up some sweet desserts for their chapter fundraiser! It was a great festival, with performances, a delicious variety of food booths, and tons of amazing vendors.

It's definitely been busy for the past few months, and there's more to come! So if you haven't already, come out and volunteer or network with other young professionals at one of our upcoming socials!

April Social Event - Sat 4/25/09 - Hiking at PurismaCreek

Hey guys! Hope you're enjoying the warmer weather. Come out and join Nakayoshi on Saturday 4/25/09 for our monthly Social event in Half Moon Bay. Here's the meeting location per Google Maps: http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=higgins+canyon+road+at+main+st+half+moon+bay+ca&sll=37.464384,-122.437563&sspn=0.009078,0.019226&ie=UTF8&ll=37.451456,-122.429388&spn=0.009079,0.019226&z=16&iwloc=addr

If you need a ride or have room in your car, please email me so I can coordinate carpools. FYI the location is about an hour from SF, Oakland, and San Jose. Due to lack of cell phone coverage in the hills, we'll initially meet at the corner of Main St & Higgins Canyon Rd, just off of Hwy 1 - at 9:45am. Then drive up together to the trailhead (about 10 minutes up Higgins Caynon Rd).

*Please call me if you are running late or have to cancel last minute*

We'll start the hike around 10am and should last about 3-3.5 hours. Bring your own lunch and snacks and so can all eat somewhere near the top while we take a rest. This page has detailed info on the hike: http://www.bahiker.com/southbayhikes/purisimahiggins.html (the trails are clearly marked)

Although the event officially ends after the hike, we can hit up the beach afterwards to relax before heading back to our respective locations. Here's the site for the beach: http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=531This is optional, but the easiest way to get to the beach is to head back up North on Hwy 1 and take a left at Kelly Ave follow that all the way to the parking lot.

Items to bring:
-Lots of water (~1.5-2 liters)
-Lunch, snacks to eat at the top
-Sunblock (trail is mostly shaded, but some exposed areas)

It should be fairly warm on the trail so you should be okay with a t-shirt, but conditions can change. You might want to wear layers if the weather's less than ideal.

Please contact Atsushi if you have any questions or comments: nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com. Hope to see you all out there!

Happy hour with filmmaker Tad Nakamura and Hapihour.org

More great stuff coming up in connection to the SFIAAFF. A big thanks goes out to Keith Kamisugi and the rest of the folks with Hapihour.org, who are hosting a free happy hour reception on Saturday, March 14 at 6:30pm at A5 Steak Lounge in SF for Tad Nakamura and his new film, "A Song for Ourselves." Make sure to RSVP on Facebook or evite.com for your chance to meed Tad Nakamura! Hope you guys can make it!

Originally posted at: http://hapihour.org/2009/03/happy-hour-a-song-for-ourselves-a-film-on-chris-iijima/#more-405

Happy Hour: “A Song for Ourselves” a Film on Chris Iijima


Nakamura Sundance Interview on CNN TRT: 9 min. from Tadashi Nakamura on Vimeo.

Dale Minami, Yuri Kochiyama, Audee Kochiyama Holman, Marjorie Fujiki, Diane Matsuda, Eddie Wong and Keith Kamisugi invite you to join us for a special happy hour on Saturday, March 14, from 6:30 p.m. at the new A5 Steak Lounge, 244 Jackson St., San Francisco, to celebrate Tad Nakamura’s, A SONG FOR OURSELVES, a moving tribute to pioneering singer and activist Chris Iijima. RSVP on Facebook or evite.com.

In the film, colleagues, friends and family reminisce about his life and commitment to peace and justice, from his early days in New York to his final years in Hawai’i.

Director Tad Nakamura will join us that evening. His previous film, YELLOW BROTHERHOOD, was awarded Best Documentary Short at the San Diego Asian Film Festival and has also been screened in numerous film festivals around the country.

The event takes place at the new A5 STEAK LOUNGE, a sleeker, more modern version of a steakhouse, blending the vibe of a cocktail lounge with an old-school steak palace. Special thanks to Steve Chen for having us that night.

The event is free with no-host bar. Food will be available for order in the lounge.
The film is showing during the 27th Annual San Francisco Asian American Film Festival in mid-March.

Read a review of the film on BeyondChron.com.
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Additionally, here's an interview done by Asia Pacific Arts of the UCLA Asia Institute with Tad on his new film: http://www.asiaarts.ucla.edu/090220/article.asp?parentID=104913

Join Nakayoshi for "Tokyo Sonata"

Buy your tickets now to see the San Francisco premiere of Tokyo Sonata with Nakayoshi on Friday, March 13th at 6:45 pm at the Sundance Kabuki Theaters!



The director Kiyoshi Kurosawa himself will be at the screening to answer any questions and for a discussion on the film. Tickets to most San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival (SFIAAFF) movies sell out, so reserve your seat early with Nakayoshi!

To purchase tickets, send an email to emily.leach@gmail.com with the # of tickets. Tickets are $10 each. We only have 15 seats total and will be distributed on a first come, first serve basis.

Please be prepared to arrive 15 minutes early to guarantee your seat (that would be at 6:30, folks). Since these shows do sell-out any open seats have their tickets released back to the rush line for purchasing.


About Tokyo Sonata (from the 2009 SFIAAFF website):

Winner of the Jury Prize in the Un Certain Regard section of the Cannes Film Festival, Kiyoshi Kurosawa's latest film finds the filmmaker departing from the supernatural terrain of his recent string of horror films to present a piercing, devastating family drama. Like Yasujiro Ozu and Mikio Naruse, whose influences are evident in both style and theme, Kurosawa examines a modern Japanese family against the backdrop of a changing world, in this case a crumbling social fabric and an uncertain geopolitical landscape.

Check out the film's official website in Japanese or English.

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Don't forget you can also sign up to volunteer with Nakayoshi at the SFIAAFF!

For any questions, please email nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com.

Mochitsuki Time!

Make your mochi for the New Year!

Mon and Tues, Dec 29-30, 2008
Japanese Cultural and Community Center of Northern California

Shift 1 3:30-4:00 p.m.
Shift 2 4:00-4:30 p.m.
Shift 3 5:00-5:30 p.m.
Shift 4 5:30-6:00 p.m.
Shift 5 6:00-6:30 p.m.

In 1999, Yamada Seika, a manju-ya in San Francisco Japantown, closed its doors after 36 years of business. The owner, Mr. George Yamada, not only generously donated his mochi making machine to the JCCCNC but has shared his talents and joy of mochi making with the community. Participants will have the opportunity to watch Mr. Yamada transform hot cooked rice into mochi. Participants will then have the opportunity to make their own mochi balls to take home.

Sign up to participate ($12/JCCCNC members; $17 guests) OR sign up to volunteer and eat free mochi! For more info, contact Ken at Kmaeshiro@jcccnc.org

Singles Mingle at Nakayoshi Gokon

Now we know all of you joined Nakayoshi because you want to do some good in the community right? Wait, you wanted to meet other (single) people too?

Don't worry, we get it. That's why Nakayoshi had our first Gokon last Thursday evening at Pisco Latin Lounge. Put together by Nakayoshi committee member Emily Leach, she and some of our fun (and very eligible) singles got to mix it up and get to know one another over some delicious drinks, appetizers and laughter.

For those of you unfamiliar, a Gokon is basically a kind of group blind date that's practiced in Japan these days. It'll typically be set up with a group of guy friends and a corresponding group of girls seated across from each other to hold conversations or play casual games to help ease nervousness and get people to meet new people in a relaxed environment.

We'd love to have more of you single people come out the next time we put a Gokon together. Come on now, don't be shy! You never know who you might meet, or learn about your new friends!

For those of you looking for another chance to go out with Nakayoshi for a fun night out, don't forget about our monthly mixer coming up this Friday night starting at Kilowatt in SF's Mission District! For any of you that want to get more involved and help us plan more social events or other activities, come on out to our meeting this Sunday in San Francisco Japantown. E-mail nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com if you need more info. See you guys on Friday!

Weekend Recap: North Beach Crawl and Volunteering at Sansei Live!

Nakayoshi had quite the fun weekend this past Friday and Saturday. Were you in on it too?

We started out with our crawl through North Beach on Friday night. I arrived promptly at 9pm at the SF Brewing Co., but just as I suspected, Nakayoshi members all knew to arrive fashionably late. Luckily that gave me time to nurse my diet coke as Nakayoshi members started to trickle in the door. By the time we were ready to move on to the next spot, our group was close to 30 strong. Nakayoshi proceeded to take over 15 Romolo later in the night and finally finished the night off at Rosewood on Broadway.

It was great seeing you all come out! We really hope that we see even more faces the next time around. If you missed this month's social, make sure you and your friends are free on Friday, November 21st when we go out for another night on the town.

Make sure to check out more pictures from Friday night on the Nakayoshi online photo gallery!

While Nakayoshi spent Friday night out on the town, a handful of us also found the time on Saturday night to volunteer at the 25th Annual Sansei Live! benefit at the Presidio Officer's Club in San Francisco. The annual fundraiser for Kimochi, Inc. featured lots of live music, hors d'oeuvres, culinary demonstrations, and plenty of dancing. Kimochi, Inc. provides many valuable services to the aging nisei generation in Japantown, so we felt like this was a great event to support another organization that serves our community in countless ways.

A big thanks goes out to Tamiko Wong, Kimochi, Inc.'s volunteer coordinator for the event. Thanks also go out to our volunteers, including Graig, Emily, Atsushi, Matt and Jessica, as well as to our lovely friends (and members!) from this year's Northern California Cherry Blossom Queen Court. Nakayoshi also had a great time meeting other volunteers from UC Davis JASS. Make sure you guys join Nakayoshi when you graduate, ok?

For those of you who can't wait for the next Nakayoshi event, come on out to our next meeting, this Sunday, October 26th from 1:00-4:00pm at the JACL HQ in Japantown. E-mail us at nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com if you need more info!

Spice'n It Up: A Night @ the Asian Art Museum of SF

On September 4th, some of the Nakayoshi members found themselves at the Asian Art Museum for their MATCHA event series. The night's theme: Tea & Spice.

If you haven't visited the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, definitely add it to your list of "to do's".

It's one amazingly beautiful venue, with cascading stairways, stone pillars, and fascinating artifacts.

Intrigued by the idea of sampling teas all night long, we all had a lot of fun going through the various stations the museum had set up. One room contained an erected Tea Temple filled with pillow pads and lacquered tables, with trays of various types of oolong teas.

Stations out in the veranda were stocked with different teas, colored pots and servers who were full of information as to how to brew and strain their particular teas or how they were grown and harvested.

It was definitely fun to taste all of the tea flavors and spices. And what was probably the most entertaining and interactive was the opportunity to create your own tea spice mixture.

With two table stations stocked with various spices ranging from nutmeg, black tea, and cloves to cardamon and cinnamon, you would pour however much you wanted of whatever spice into your own saucer, then take a turn at the bowl and pestle to grind your spices into a fine tea powder.

The end product: leaving with your own soothing bag of tea. Mine is making my cubicle at work smell absolutely wonderful!

So check out the events that are taking place @ the AA Museum, next month's theme is Japanese Tattoos!

You can also take a look at their photos, you may see some familiar faces!

August Event: Goh Nakamura "Ulysses" Album Release Show!

Support your local JA and API artists/musicians!

If you haven't already received our invitation sent out to the members of the Nakayoshi Facebook group, here's the scoop: Thanks to Kurt Kurasaki, we've been generously given tickets for Nakayoshi members to the record release show for local singer/songwriter Goh Nakamura's new album, "Ulysses" next Wednesday (August 20th) at 8:30pm at Cafe du Nord in San Francisco. Local Asian American band Scrabbel and Michelle Amador are also performing.

Let us know soon if you want a ticket! Most of our free tickets have been given away already. Cover is $10 for you slowpokes who don't snag one of our freebies. Contact Nakayoshi at nakayoshi.ncwnp@gmail.com if you want tickets to the show.

Here's a little background about Goh Nakamura (from his website):

Goh Nakamura is a SF Bay Area based musician who likes to write ditties about parking tickets, impossible crushes and faraway dreamlands (amongst other things). Accompanying himself with digital samplers and an acoustic guitar, his live solo shows are always unique and often unpredictable.

Goh has contributed his guitar and vocal work to the Ridley Scott films "A Good Year" and most recently "American Gangster". His song "Daylight Savings" was chosen to be included on the soundtrack to the Robert Benton film "Feast of Love" starring Morgan Freeman and Greg Kinnear. His debut album "Daylight Savings" is available at cdbaby.com and itunes. His long awaited 2nd album, "Ulysses" will be available on August 20th.

So how would I describe Goh's music? If you took a blender and tossed in some Elliot Smith on a sunny day, some vocal stylings sometimes reminiscent of Elvis Costello and the instrumental backing of Simon and Garfunkel (before the breakup!), then you might come close. Or you could take a listen to some samplings and decide for yourself. Here are some links to Goh and his music:

www.gohnakamura.com

Goh's MySpace Page

Goh's YouTube Channel

Goh's Facebook Fan Page

Nakayoshi will also be tabling and passing out our info by the merch table at the show. Be sure to stop by and say hi!

Goh Nakamura - "Embarcadero Blues"