This year has certainly sped by.  In January, we had our annual meeting with guest speaker The Honorable Steve Bromberg.  His talk was fascinating and it gave us a better understanding of the local judicial system.

 

In February, we had 10 students visit us from Antibes, France.  They participated in many activities during their stay with us. April saw our students flying off to Antibes along with a one night stop over in Paris before returning home.  The French Committee just reported that a fundraiser was held at a store in South Coast Plaza, Jo Malone’s, on November 6^th.

 

 

Our 2008 French delegation in Paris

 

 

In April, we held the Mayor’s Luncheon that always follows the start of the Newport to Ensenada Sailing Race. Leonardo Flores hosted the luncheon at his home in Newport Coast.  We listened to a live mariachi band and those that attended enjoyed the afternoon very much.

 

In June, a group of Sister City members drove to Los Angeles to see the Sumo wrestling competition. NBSCA is a member of the Kytomoski Fan Club.  Kytomoski is from Okazaki, Japan and was a participant of this competition.  Our members were able to meet him and his mother following the matches.

 

Many of us attended the grand opening of the Japanese schoolhouse at Crystal Cove in June.  It has fascinating history.

 

July saw several students head off to Okazaki.  The reports came back that they all had a great time. We especially would like to thank our two wonderful chaperones, Gwen and Jim Blankenship for a job well done. If you haven’t had an opportunity to view their “you tube” video here is your chance. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bszLa07A_Uo

 

September gave us the opportunity to entertain two French individuals that are on the Antibes Sister City Committee.  They had a nice time sightseeing with Justin Myers as their guide.  They are looking forward to celebrating our 20^th Anniversary with Antibes in 2010.

 

In October, we had the students from Okazaki here visiting.  At an occasion, the Japanese students performed a little dance and sang “America the Beautiful”!  Wow, they really worked hard at that.  All that attended the Rotary BBQ thoroughly enjoyed themselves and the kids had lots of fun carving the pumpkins and receiving lots of candy!  Thank you to Newport Beach Fire Dept for the delicious hamburgers that they served up. There were many tears shed as our Japanese students left at 5:00 in the morning!  Yes, unbelievably, there was a large group that turned out to say good bye to their new friends.

   

 

Disneyland Oct 2008 Japanese students and Newport Student hosts and chaperones

 

Mark your calendar for October 4, 2009 as this is the date for the International Festival at Mariner’s Park.  Connie Skibba is heading up the committee and she could certainly use any assistance.  Please give her a call to see how you might help out. Connie’s phone number is 949-650-0594 or you may email her at cskibba@dslextreme.com if you are interested in helping with her committee.

 

Our Annual Holiday Recognition Breakfast is set for December 4^th at 8 am at Five Crowns.  Orange Coast Interfaith Shelter will be in attendance.  As we have done in the past, we ask that you bring a donation of a $10 or $20 gift card from either Target or K-Mart to be given to the shelter.

 

Our Annual Dinner will be held in January of 2009 with more details to come later.

 

2009 is the year that we will be celebrating our 25^th Anniversary of relations with Okazaki, Japan.  What a great milestone!!

 

We are grateful for your continued support of NBSCA.  

 

Cherri Penne-Myers, President

 

 

 

 

 

The November sumo tournament is underway and after several days, Newport Beach hometown favorite, Kotomitsuki, stands at 7 wins and 2 losses. It is hoped that he will continue on and do as well as he did during the September tournament where he compiled a 10-5 record.

Kotomitsuki, who has been newly appointed to the rank of Ozeki due to his strong performances, is now ranked among the top 6 wrestlers in the country. His sponsor and President of the Kotomitsuki Supporters Association, Dr. Tsuneo Okada, is holding yet another reception for his wrestler in December. On September 30, Ozeki Kotomitsuki was honored at a grand reception held at the New Otani Hotel in Tokyo where a special proclamation from Newport Beach Mayor Steve Rosansky was presented to him. This event was widely covered by the media.

Dr Okada later wrote Mayor Rosansky, “On his behalf, I would like to express my appreciation to you for this honor. To the best of my knowledge, he is probably the very first one to be honored with a proclamation from a prominent city like Newport Beach. We would like to thank you for your very special consideration.” The Association truly appreciates the support of our Mayor and City Council in all matters concerning our wide variety of sister city activities.

The Newport Beach Sister City Association is a member of the Kotomitsuki Supporters Association and has followed his career closely for several years now. We wish him continued good health and success in the ring.

by Kent Moore

I enjoyed having Tami Mitsui, a teacher, as my guest for the Okazaki delegation visit to Newport Beach. We had a pleasant time together--she enjoyed a USC football game at the Coliseum and dinner at Little Tokyo in Los Angeles. Also, she was thrilled with the beauty of our city, which is very different from her hometown. She found the visit to an East Bluff Elementary kindergarten class interesting and gave the teacher origami papers.

Tami appreciated all the activities that the Committee planned for her and especially enjoyed Disneyland.

Tami has invited me to Okazaki and to a "riokan" Inn for hot baths. I will hope to see her again in Japan.

by Dixie Allen

I volunteered to host a guest as a way of saying ‘thank-you’ for the hospitality that was shown to us delegates by the people of Okazaki in April 2007. I am new to the Sister City organization and this was my first hosting experience. My guest, Ryoko Kohayakawa, knew more English than I know Japanese, but we each learned to communicate more effectively by the end of the visit. I learned about life and customs in Japan and she experienced many things ‘American’ including learning how to set a table and entertain dinner guests. One night she cooked dinner (beef curry on rice) for me, Kent and Yuki. It was delicious! Ryoko was very knowledgeable about and fascinated with American celebrities, music, movies, etc. She loved touring Hollywood, Beverly Hills, Brentwood, and Santa Monica, an activity which we did with Dory Ford and her guests.

Ryoko maintained high energy throughout the trip and looked forward to and enjoyed all of the activities. When we got home, she gave me the greatest shiatsu massages—saying that I was stressed and needed to relax! She also wrote in her diary every night and read me what she wrote. On the last night after giving me a massage and writing in her diary, she drew my picture, wrote a message in characters and a thank you note in English. I found out that she was up until midnight! I was touched that she made this effort and she showed more maturity than I expected.

Getting to know the other hosts and members of the organization who worked so hard to entertain the essay contest winners was the best part of the experience.

by Gerry Kawamura

My house guest was Mr. Yukio “Happy Man” Kato. You see, Yukio translated into English means happy man and he certainly was that. He liked to be called Yuki and explained to everyone he met here that he was, indeed, very, very happy.

Yuki is retired from a Toyota subsidiary company where he worked in their Public Relations Division. I’ll bet he served them well because he has a lot of drive and a warm, engaging personality. Nobody could have had a better time visiting Newport Beach than Yuki.

I was particularly happy that Yuki liked high performance vehicles and we went on several “hot laps” together during his stay. I took him to the weekly “Cars and Coffee” event down at the Irvine Spectrum which he really enjoyed. He must have taken a photo of every car in attendance and boasted to me during his visit that he had taken over 1,000 photos. This makes sense, though, because Yuki is an accomplished amateur photographer and he brought me several of his beautiful outdoor shots to frame and hang in my home. (But where will they possibly go?)

Every morning and evening you could find him out on the deck taking photos of Newport Harbor and the Pavilion. The various lights and shadows he captured reflected upon his first-class talent as a photographer.

Yuki loved American breakfasts and we had two or three at local places where he delighted in always ordering pancakes, bacon and scrambled eggs. He also liked putting ketchup and hot sauce on his eggs and I told him he was a real “native.”

While Yuki’s English skills weren’t the greatest we managed to communicate sort of well together. He was always up for seeing more sights and meeting new people, especially where white wine was being served. It didn’t matter whether it was Chardonnay, Fumé Blanc, Viognier or Pinot Grigio--this man loved his whites and we certainly “tipped” a couple during his brief stay.

The morning he left, the happy man let his guard down a little and actually shed a few ters as he boarded the van to LAX. He had me promise to mail some postcards for him and they were all addressed in Japanese. The message, however, was in English and it was the same on all the cards he was sending to his friends at home.

The message read, “I am having a good time in Newport Beach. I don’t want to come home.” We had heard this from several visitors, both essay winners and students.

I’ll look forward to keeping in touch with my new friend and hope to see him again on our next trip to Okazaki in 2009, celebrating the 25th anniversary of our sister city relationship.

by Kent Moore