This month I am submitting my two favourite desserts.

We arrived in Japan as the cherry blossoms were blooming. They were truly beautiful, particularly the trees at the Kyoto Imperial Park where the Imperial Family resided when Kyoto was home to the Imperial Family and capital of Japan pre-1868.

Consider then, that the first Bulletin was put together 51 years ago by Mickey Tanaka and a group of fellow volunteers using a typewriter, pen and paper, and lots of good old fashioned elbow grease. It seems a lot longer ago then it really was.

In bringing a hip and contemporary attitude to a traditional Japanese art form (with the musical chops to pull it off), the Yoshida Brothers are bringing a new audience to this ancient instrument.

In the mid 90s, while living in Nelson, BC, Oike became interested in clay, sculpture and firing techniques. After creating a series of sculptural vessels that were eventually shown in his first solo show he moved to Haida Gwaii where he was awed and inspired by the wildness and remoteness of the archipelago.

A woman buried with a piece of fallen star; a blind child riding on the back of the dreamer; a huge ship going nowhere; a panama hat; a barber; a goldfish seller; a thousand pigs. These extraordinary images are found in a series of extraordinary yet little-known tales written by Natsume Soseki, considered by many to be the foremost novelist of Meiji-era Japan.

Looking for a way that children could use their unique talents to contribute to society, she hit upon the idea of using their artwork to promote a message of peaceful coexistence. She began to collect children’s drawings from around the world and the Kids Earth Fund (KEF) was born.

My hope is that people will recognize that there is a pride in being of mixed race, that being a mixie is a specific identity. AND this may sound cheesy, but that we are all the sum of our parts, whatever those parts may be. Whether we identify as mixed-race, mixed culture, mixed gender, mixed education, mixed emotion, mixed parts, mixed nuts, whatever the mix is—it creates a 100% whole-grain person.

In a series of 36 interlocking scenes, Iizuka’s play explores the relationship between the imaginary and the real, and the lines and spaces that separate feelings and words, objects and images of objects, antiques and reproductions, and a person’s heritage and physical features.