Life in a Jewish Japanese American family
When you create a multi-cultural family through the marriage of two people from very different heritages, you get to choose what kind of life to give your children. Do you choose one spouse's culture, or both, or none or something completely different? We choose both and we thought we coined the term Jewpanese (not!). Our kids were very busy. They attended Japanese school on Saturdays and Jewish school on Sundays. They are members of a very small set of people who answer "yes" to both questions: "Are you Japanese?" and "Are you Jewish?". That didn't just happen. It took work and commitment. It took negotiation, deciding what's in and what's out, and choosing to be together over all else. We wouldn't have it any other way and it creates amazing and unique opportunities. I do my best to support Yuriko passing on her ethnic identity to our kids. To be fair, I'm fascinated by all things Japanese, so it was no burden. Yuri...