Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
@mtsukayamaSansei whose paternal and maternal grandparents were from the town of Yonabaru, Okinawa. She now works as a freelance translator (English/Spanish) and blogger at Jiritsu, where she shares personal stories and research on Japanese immigration to Peru and related topics.
Updated December 2017
Stories from This Author
John Azama: The Peruvian Nikkei Who Revitalized Ryukyu Damashii, the Eisa Group of Dallas-Fort Worth
Feb. 16, 2024 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
“I was a very shy child,” he confesses, preferring to be at the back of the group during sanshin presentations. That’s how John remembers his beginnings as an artist in Peru. The son of Yochan Azama, a well-known Nikkei singer in Peru, he has innate musical talent. John Azama is Yonsei, born in Peru, and for the past seven years he has lived in Texas, where he has a family and works in information technology at an airline. But passion …
Ayumi Takenaka: “Even though we don’t have an exact definition of Nikkei cuisine, its origins are in Peru”
Nov. 29, 2023 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
“What is Nikkei cuisine?” seems like a simple question, but beneath it is a complex definition that is even hard for Nikkei themselve to describe. Ayumi Takenaka is a Japanese sociologist with a strong interest in Nikkei cuisine in Peru. For 10 years, Dr. Takenaka has interviewed the leading exemplars of Nikkei cuisine, attended numerous culinary fairs featuring Nikkei and Peruvian food, explored the Nikkei menus of gourmet restaurants in Peru, the United States, Spain, and Great Britain, and has …
Tsukayama, seasoning runs in the family
July 31, 2023 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato , Asociación Peruano Japonesa
Choko Tsukayama is 78 years old and has extensive experience in Nikkei cuisine, the kind that was born in inns and family businesses and that he learned by watching. YouTubers have made their stuffed potato viral and several restaurants in Lima serve their soba and ramen noodles. And if we talk about Okinawan food and okwaashi, as the cakes are called in the Uchinaguchi language, the Tsukayama surname is undoubtedly the main reference since 1965. KWAASHIYAA TSUKAYAMA Choko was 16 …
Jorge Otsu, a self-taught master of Registration Law
April 17, 2023 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
Mr. Jorge Otsu Maradiegue is the father of Dr. George Otsu, who has recently been appointed Director of the Criminological Policy Directorate of the General Directorate of Criminological Affairs of the Ministry of Justice and Human Rights. As behind every great son, there is a great father, Don Jorge's story deserves to be highlighted in a separate note. Don Jorge worked for almost 40 years at the Ortiz de Zevallos notary office and is considered a master by lawyers specializing …
Pepe Irei and rock with Peruvian-Japanese DNA
Nov. 24, 2021 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
“I think I inherited my grandfather's rebellious streak. His family made fun of him, because he wanted to be a broadcaster. He told me that he escaped from the farm on a bicycle, to go to Lima and see transistors, electronics courses, etc., even though they told him 'why are you going there, if you have to stay and take care of the farm?' . Something similar happened to me. ' You have to be here on the radio' . …
Tetsuya Hirahara: The Japanese Hour in Peru told by a Japanese researcher
Nov. 5, 2021 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
Tetsuya Hirahara is a diexistist and a hobbyist researcher. Since he first picked up a Cuzco station 44 years ago from Japan, Hirahara delved deeper into Latin American radio stations and in the midst of the Internet era, he discovered that Japanese radio programs existed in Latin America. Thus, he began to investigate the history of La Hora Japonesa in Brazil, Argentina, Bolivia, Paraguay, Mexico and Peru. After several years of research, Hirahara published two books in Japanese: A Hora …
When our reality surpasses fiction: the “two” Caqui haciendas
Aug. 6, 2021 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
With the agrarian reform (1969-1979), 9,065,772 haciendas and 15,826 farms in Peru were expropriated and thousands of peasants became owners of the land they worked. This marked the decline of the large estates and large estates, which survive as best they can today in the face of the passage of time, the apathy and forgetfulness of local authorities and the hardships of their current owners. As a Nikkei community, the Huaral haciendas evoke history and characters like Nikumatsu Okada. David …
A quarantine blog
May 6, 2020 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
Until May 10, Peru will remain in quarantine. I was anxiously waiting for it to end on April 26 as scheduled, but the virus is still on the streets. As soon as this confinement ends, the first thing I'm going to do is go to the shopping center, eat in a restaurant and everything that we can't do now. But what I want most is to see people without masks and now hiding their faces. It is not the same …
Angie Teruya, the youtuber who shows an “amazing reality” of Japan
Jan. 31, 2020 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
Ángela Janet Teruya Rondón is a Nikkei Peruvian, who on her paternal side has Okinawan roots (Chatan-Cho). He came to Japan 11 years ago and currently lives in Shizuoka. For a year, Angie has been recording videos for YouTube about her daily life in Japan. But it was her medical condition that motivated her to record and she does it from her wheelchair, to share “the amazing things that Japan has for people with physical limitations.” Shock in Japan: silence …
Ginyu Igei, the life of a sensei in Peru that inspires a play in Okinawa
Oct. 28, 2019 • Milagros Tsukayama Shinzato
Ginyu Igei, the sensei and patriarch of the Nikkei community in Peru, has a life story to tell and it will be this November 4, 2019. In his homeland, Okinawa, the play Ginyu Igei Monogatari (The Story) will premiere by Ginyu Igei) , which will portray Ginyu's life in Peru. Those behind this initiative are 3 Japanese: Akihito Arai, Tomoya Ogoshi and Daiichi Hirata, who fulfill the roles of director and screenwriter, artistic manager and supervisor for this project. For …
