WHAT: OKAGE SAMA DE (I am what I am because of you) by Alton Chung, Music by Mike Van Liew

WHEN: 8 PM Fridays and Saturdays, February 8th, 9th, 15th, 16th, 2008
No-Host bar from 7:30 to 8:00; Curtain at 8:00 pm

TICKETS: $12.00 includes complimentary snacks; beverages available for purchase

RESERVATIONS: 360-882-3581; Alton@altonchung.com; or purchase online through Brown Paper Tickets on our website www.portlandstorytheater.com

Caught up in the patriotic fever shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Nisei, second generation Japanese Americans, volunteer to join the 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team (RCT), the all Japanese-American unit to fight in Europe in WWII and the Military Intelligence Service to fight in the Pacific. These men fought against the enemy and prejudice with courage and distinction, leaving behind a rich legacy of honor for future generations.

MY FRIEND TED

Ted Tanouye graduated from Torrance High School in California during WWII. He and his family were sent to an Internment Camp where he volunteered to join the 442nd Regimental Combat Team. Hear the story of how he was eventually awarded the Medal of Honor, 55 years after the end of WWII.

HEROES

Shortly after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, two brothers from Hawaii join the 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team. During their journey from raw recruits to combat veterans they learn about courage and honor, to be part of a team, and the reality of war. For its size and duration of service, the 100th Battalion/442nd Regimental Combat Team is the most highly decorated unit in US Military history.

THROUGH THE EYES OF A CHILD

What you learn as a child, you will never forget. Born in Hawaii, raised in Okinawa, Takejiro Higa returned to Hawaii just before the US entered WWII. He ended up joining the Military Intelligence Service in the Pacific. It was a strange to be asked to help plan the invasion of the island where he grew up and stranger still to interrogate his own classmates from school. He also undertook the dangerous task of cave-flushing, trying to coax out Japanese soldiers and Okinawan civilians out of the deep tunnels. Through it all, he never lost his deep compassion for the land and people of his childhood.

ONE PERSON CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE

Chiume Sugihara was the Japanese Consul in Kaunas, Lithuania when Germany invaded Poland at the beginning of WWII. He learned of the plight of the Polish Jews at the hands of the Nazis and going against the orders of his government, he wrote over 2000 transit visas to allow the refugees to escape to Japan. It is estimated that perhaps 40,000 people are alive today because of this one man’s selfless act of kindness.

A TWICE SAVED LIFE

Solly Ganor was an 11 year old Lithuanian Jewish boy at the out break of WWII. He knew Chiume Sugihara, received a transit visa, but he and his family were caught off guard by the swift invasion by the Germans. Surviving in the Jewish ghetto for years, Solly and his family were spit up in 1944 and he was sent to Dachau. He was eventually saved by members of the 522 Artillery Battalion of the 442nd.