Monday, July 18
We kicked off week 5 by meeting with Reiko Iwanaga, one of the directors of CATS, the Contemporary Asian Theatre Scene, and our supervisor for the week. Reiko took us to the Wesley United Methodist Church to meet with Reverend Keith Inouye and visit their week-long Bible Camp, Pandamania. After giving us a tour of the church and summer camp, we talked to Reverend Keith about the church's importance to the Japantown community.
Tuesday, July 19
Wednesday, July 20
Today was another short day, which we started off by visiting the Mexican Heritage Plaza. The Mexican Heritage Plaza (MHP) is a beautiful community building that has been in operation for 12 years. It has classroom facilities, a beautiful garden and pond, as well as its own theater. We met with Tamara Alvarado, the director of the Multicultural Arts Leadership Initiative. She gave us a tour of the MHP, while explaining its history of poor leadership and disappointment to the community. However, under new leadership, it is finally turning its reputation around. The new mission of the Mexican Heritage Plaza is to benefit the children of the community. During our visit, we were honored to have several scenes from Les Miserables performed to us by one of the programs offered at the MHP.
Thank you for visiting the School of Arts & Culture at MHP! You were there in our still start up phase. I have enjoyed reading your blog. The link to our Facebook page is www.facebook.com/SchoolofArtsandCultureatMHP hope you can visit it and like it. We had 165 children participate in the summer program and about 5000 people cycle through in our first month between School and Community activities!
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