VJCC Festival Planning Committee |
By Gail Sharp
When you’re school-aged, the month of June cannot come fast enough. June signals the end of the school year and the beginning of summer. For most of us it is business as usual, only with lighter clothing. For one group, it signals the final countdown to an event they’ve been organizing for months. On the Center calendar since the first Executive Council meeting of 2005, the 3rd weekend of June looms large for the VJCC Festival Planning Committee.
| From its first meeting in February, the Committee, headed this year by Karen Sorensen and Ross Yasuda, is busy reviewing the previous year’s Festival to determine what went well, what did not and what changes to make for the current year. People who have handled tasks year after year are consulted to make sure they are still excited about and looking forward to another: Joe Belli on udon dashi, Barbara Fukuji, Mickey Fukunaga, Diane Fukuwa teaching the Japanese dances, Dave Hirota, Eleanor Suzuki on sushi, and Kelvin Uyeda, to name a few. The first item ordered – raffle tickets. |
Booth setup |
In March, VJCC clubs and organizations are contacted to confirm booth, display room and demonstration commitments. If space opens up, it is made available to other VJCC groups. If groups running game booths want to make a change, this is the time to notify Tad Suzuki who has the responsibility of ordering and keeping track of games and prizes. Toban schedules are set for trash pick-up, bathroom patrol and parking lot supervision by the clubs and organizations. The raffle tickets arrive and the Line Dance Class sets to stapling them in booklets of ten each.
Festival setup takes teamwork! |
Nothing in the city happens without the proper paperwork. Early in April, Jim Akioka updates the drawing of the Festival plot plan and starts the paper gathering process by obtaining a permit from the Fire Department, the prerequisite for securing the seven additional permits necessary to hold the Festival. About this time, the Executive Council and anyone caught loitering too long around the VJCC office or classrooms are drafted to stuff envelopes to get the raffle tickets in the mail and distributed by the end of the month. |
In May, the clubs and organizations receive reminders about their toban duties, raffle prize donations, and requests to their members for help with set-up and clean-up. By this time, the Festival flyer has been seen by the membership in the previous month’s issue of the VJCC Newsletter where it will make repeat appearances this month and in June. To reach the rest of the community, dates and articles are submitted to the Rafu Shimpo and Argonaut to be added to their calendar of events. Raffle ticket stubs and donations, from those who open their mail and take care of business promptly, are flooding the VJCC mailbox. Sharon Aratani and Bob Kawano take care of finances while Kuni Nishiya and Kazumi Ota remove thousands of staples from the stub booklets that continue to trickle in until minutes before the raffle drawing.
It is hard to describe everything the Committee does. It is even harder to include everyone who goes above and beyond the norm in preparing for the Festival on behalf of the VJCC. All I know is June seems to sail smoothly from Festival set-up through clean-up and it is thanks to the people mentioned and unmentioned on the VJCC Festival Planning Committee.
Visions for the VJCC
By Tiffany Yoshikawa
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Trent Nishiyama is a junior at Venice High School and he has been part of the VJCC for over 12 years. He and his family are very active in the VJCC Judo Club. Besides judo, Trent played with the VYC Diamondbacks basketball team for 4 years from 5th through 8th grade. When asked the question of why he comes and gets involved with the VJCC, Trent, like many other guys his age, said, “I come and get involved with the VJCC to meet new girls.” Trent’s vision for the VJCC in five years is to see the VJCC “with more girls, bigger and more space.” In the future, he would also like to see a new floor for the gym. Trent’s best memories of the VJCC have been about going to the annual Festivals. He says that the food at the Festivals is good. Hopefully when Trent goes off to college, he will always come back in the summer and make new memories at the Festival. |
