Tokushima University

Weekend in Futaba at the Japan Writers Conference

Narrative and photographs by Suzanne Kamata

Many years ago, when my children were small and I was working on my first-to-be-published novel Losing Kei, I joined an online writing group made up of members of the Association of Foreign Wives of Japanese. Since I live off the beaten track, on the island of Shikoku, this group was a godsend for me. Not only was I able to connect with non-Japanese women raising biracial kids in a supposedly homogenous country, but I could also connect with others writing in English.

I ultimately finished my novel. I was not the only member of this group who went on to publish books. In addition to writing and publishing, another wonderful thing that came out of this now defunct virtual community was the Japan Writers Conference, which was first held in 2008. One of the members, poet and writer Jane Joritz-Nakagawa, whose most recent book is the searing LUNA (Isobar Press, 2024), proposed a grassroot gathering of writers in Japan. There would be no keynote speaker, no fees for participants, and no payments for presenters. We would just get together and share our writing and our expertise.

Another member, Diane Hawley Nagatomo, who recently published her second novel, Finding Naomi (Black Rose Writing, 2024) after an illustrious career in academia, volunteered to host the initial conference at her university. Chanoyu University, in Tokyo, is famously the institution attached to the kindergarten attended by the Japanese royal family. It was also the site of the first Japan Writers Conference.

Since then, the conference has been held at various universities and colleges around the country, including in Okinawa, Hokkaido, Kyoto, Iwate, and at Tokushima University, hosted by me in 2016. Over the years, many notable speakers have appeared, such as Vikas Swarup, whose novel Q & A became the film Slumdog Millionaire, popular American mystery writer Naomi Hirahara, and Eric Selland, poet and translator of The New York Times bestseller The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide. The list goes on and on.

This past year, the conference was held not at a university, but at the Futaba Business Incubation and Community Centre.

When I told my husband that I was going to Futaba, he looked it up on a map.

“That’s in the exclusionary zone,” he said, somewhat alarmed.

Indeed, the conference would be held on the coast in Fukushima Prefecture, not too far from the site of the nuclear power plant which was hit by a tsunami in 2011. For years, there have been concerns about radiation, however the area is staging a comeback. The host of this year’s conference would be the Futaba Area Tourism Research Association, an organisation committed to “promoting tourism and land operations, inviting people to rediscover the charms of Fukushima’s coastal areas. The company’s mission is to bring people worldwide to this unique place that has recovered from a nuclear disaster.”

“I don’t think they would hold the conference there if it wasn’t safe,” I told him.

The JWC website reported that although the town had been evacuated after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and the meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, evacuation orders had been lifted for about 10% of the town on August 30, 2022. Decontamination efforts are still underway. New homes are being built, new businesses are emerging, and the annual festival Daruma-Ichi resumed in 2023. The areas hosting the JWC had been deemed safe, “with radiation levels regularly monitored and within acceptable limits.” I reserved a room at the on-site ARM Hotel and went ahead with my plans.

Getting to Futaba from my home in Tokushima took all day. I got up before the sun and took a bus, a plane, then a succession of trains. As I got closer to my destination, I noted the absence of buildings along the coast. I tried to imagine the houses that might have been there before the grasses had gone wild. Later, the appearance of earth-moving equipment suggested future development.

From the nearly deserted train station, I took a bus, and then lugged my suitcase to the hotel’s registration desk. There was nothing around besides the convention center and the hotel. I saw a very tall breakwater, blocking my view of the ocean. I felt as if I were on the edge of the world.

The evening before the conference began, I had dinner at the hotel restaurant, where I met up with some writers I had gotten to know at past conferences. Ordinarily, we might have moved on to a bar to continue our literary discussions, but after the restaurant closed at eight, there was nowhere else to go. There was some talk of going to the beach. A few of us went out into the night and sat on the seawall, sipping Scotch from paper cups, and talking under the stars. At one point, we contemplated the waves below, all those who were washed out to sea and remained missing.

The conference began the following morning. I was amazed that, in spite of the effort that it had taken to get there, presenters had come from all over the world – a Syrian poet who was based in Canada, a poet from Great Britain, a Japanese writer and translator who lived in Germany, a Tunisian writer and motivational speaker who’d flown in from UAE.

I gave a presentation on writing for language learners and shared my haiku in another session. Others presented on a variety of topics including literary correspondence, storytelling and tourism, climate fiction, and writing the zuihitsu[1]. In between sessions, I caught up with old friends and met new ones. On Saturday night, there was a banquet with bentos featuring delicacies such as smoked duck, mushroom rice, and salad with Hokkigai clams.

In retrospect, it was especially meaningful to attend the conference in Futaba, and to feel that we were able to play some small part in the rejuvenation of the area. It was also exciting to interact with writers who came from so far away. Although it’s still very much a grassroots event, it has become truly international.

American authors Karen Hill Anton and David Joiner talk about literary correspondence

(To find out about the next Japan Writers Conference and sign up for the mailing list, go to https://japanwritersconference.org/)

[1] A loose collection of personal essays

Suzanne Kamata was born and raised in Grand Haven, Michigan. She now lives in Japan with her husband and two children. Her short stories, essays, articles and book reviews have appeared in over 100 publications. Her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize five times, and received a Special Mention in 2006. She is also a two-time winner of the All Nippon Airways/Wingspan Fiction Contest, winner of the Paris Book Festival, and winner of a SCBWI Magazine Merit Award.

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Bridging Cultures Through Music

Suzanne Kamata brings to us people, experiences and cultures from Japan

Masaki Nakagawa. Photo provided by Suzanne Kamata

For Kobe native and YouTube sensation, Masaki Nakagawa, a university trip to Latvia turned out to be a life-changing experience.

Nakagawa was a student of international culture in the Integrated Arts and Sciences Department at Tokushima University. By his own admission, he wasn’t a great student – his TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication) score was around 200 – but he had an avid interest in other cultures. He first studied abroad in Korea, where he improved his English language skills, and later, in 2014, went with a Tokushima University professor to Riga for a summer seminar. He felt an immediate connection with the small, European country.

“I felt like this is the country I will live in in my future,” he says via webcam. From the very beginning, he loved the people, the language, the atmosphere, the many historical buildings, the food, and the drinks.

“Someone told me that maybe I was Latvian in a past life,” he jokes.

Although the university did not have an official exchange program with any Latvian university at that time, he decided that he would go there for foreign study. During his seven months abroad as a student at the University of Latvia, he discovered that while most Latvians knew quite a bit about Japan, few Japanese people had any idea about them. He made it his goal to create more links between the two countries. Kobe is already the sister city of Riga, but he created a project to promote a sister city relationship between Tokushima and Jelgava, which is ongoing.

From a young age, Nakagawa has also been a musician. His mother was a piano teacher, so naturally he began playing the piano at the age of three. However, when he was fourteen-years-old, he bought his first guitar. “I still have it,” he says. “It is my important thing.” In high school, he played guitar and sang vocals in a band.

During his visit to Latvia, he discovered the importance of music in that country. “Latvia is a musical country,” he says. “They love dancing with music, eating with nice music. The Latvian language is quite beautiful, and Latvian songs are very, very beautiful.” He also found that singing in Latvian was an effective way to study.

After graduating from university, he got a job at Mercedes, where he continues to work as a store manager, however his passion for Latvia remained. He decided to combine his loves for Latvia and music. “As a musician, I can connect countries,” he says.

In 2017, he learned “Mana dziesma” (“My song”), which was originally performed by Brainstorm, one Latvia’s most famous bands, and made a recording of himself singing it while playing the guitar. Then, he uploaded it to YouTube. The video received an astonishing 150,000 views. Nakagawa realized that he was onto something, and he continued to record and upload videos.

In some videos, he sings in Latvian against a Japanese background, such as along a river in Kyoto. In others, he sings in a combination of Latvian and Japanese in a Latvian setting. Recently, he has begun to add Japanese subtitles. While he continues to record Latvian favorites, he has also written and recorded original songs in both languages.

His popularity has continued to grow, leading to interviews in magazines, on the radio, and on Latvian television. By his estimate, he has appeared on television in that country “twenty or thirty times.”

When asked if he is perhaps the most famous Japanese person in Latvia, he laughs. “Maybe.”

Nakagawa performing at a reception in Tokyo for the Latvian president.

When the president of Latvia visited Japan for the coronation of the new emperor, Nakagawa was invited to perform at a closed reception at the Latvian Embassy in Tokyo. He had a chance to talk to the president and the first lady, who, as it turned out, was a big fan.

His most recent TV appearance, via Zoom, marked the occasion of his one millionth view on YouTube, the 100^th year of Latvian-Japanese friendship, and of his latest single, “Es Lepojos Ar Tevi,” recorded with German musician Joran Steinhauer, another lover of Latvia. A few years ago, the two friends collaborated on a YouTube series called “Masaki Learns Latvian” in which Steinhauer taught Nakagawa two or three phrases per episode. “Es lepojos ar tevi”, which means “I’m proud of you,” is the first phrase that Nakagawa learned. This song in Latvian, uniquely created by two foreigners, premiered on the TV show “900 Seconds” in April of this year.

Nakagawa has been branching out a bit in his musical career, writing songs for aspiring idol groups in Japan, and singing on Japanese anime soundtracks. His vocals can be heard in the theme song for the anime “Dark Hero Yoshitsune” which will be released nationwide in Japan in fall 2021. Fans can follow his activities via Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/masaki.lv/.

He maintains, however, that developing relations between Latvia and Japan is his main priority. “As a musician, I really would love for people to know about Latvian culture.”

Nakagawa with his girlfriend Arta Voicehovska, who works as Coordinator for International Relations Latvia-Japan at Higashikawa Town Hall in Hokkaido

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