Noriko Eileen Kurahashi
Eileen Kurahashi lives in Northern California with her family. She is active in Sogetsu ikebana, the Mills College choir, and is studying French.
Updated September 2014
Stories from This Author
It Can Happen Here! The Fred Korematsu Story
Feb. 19, 2017 • Noriko Eileen Kurahashi
WHAT PROTECTIONS DO WE HAVE as American citizens when our country is under attack? Do we sacrifice constitutional protections for the perceived need for security? Fred Korematsu Speaks Up—an illustrated book written for young readers—raises these issues in the story of a young Japanese American citizen who is incarcerated when the country of his parents’ origin, Japan, and the country of his birth, the United States, go to war. Infamously, on December 7, 1941, the Empire of Japan attacked the …
What’s in a Name?
Sept. 30, 2014 • Noriko Eileen Kurahashi
By placing my Japanese given name first on my birth certificate, you know my parents were Issei. Technically, my mother was Nisei, but she was schooled in Japan for many years, making her closer to the original culture than most Nisei. My father died when I was young, but I remember he explained to me that he chose my name carefully and that the kanji (Chinese character) for “Nori” meant “wise teacher.” I know it is an old tradition in …
Masakazu Yoshizawa: Music Master and Magician
Sept. 28, 2007 • Noriko Eileen Kurahashi
As a respected composer, arranger and master of shakuhachi, other Japanese flutes, taiko, clarinet and piano, Masakazu Yoshizawa demonstrates how excellence can be achieved through an obsession with technique and structure. When he was first introduced to music, he remembers tediously hand-copying musical scores over and over again to understand the underlying structures and rhythms. In his elementary school, every student was required to choose an instrument, and Yoshizawa first dedicated himself to the accordion—and then revealed his uncanny musical …
