Building 640 at the Presidio in San Francisco

Building 640 at the Presidio in San Francisco
Information Source for the Military Intelligence Service Historic Learning Center

Wednesday, February 29, 2012

A Fun Day Scanning Photos Taken by Isago Tanaka - Terry Wong

I had a fun day scanning historically significant picture-artifacts dating as far back as during the WWII taken by photographer Isago Isao Tanaka. The pictures in the particular album I scanned vividly represented the strong cultural roots of the Japanese in Americaa back in the past. People were celebrating the "Bon Odori" commemoration in the pictures I scanned. I assumed that it is a Japanese holiday event that consists of parades, carnivals and playing cultural musical instruments. Occasionally, there's a "Hakujin" in kimono in one of those pictures. This shows the harmonious period that these pictures were taken in, as opposed to the war period. Japanese American people were having a blast while enjoying the peace and harmony. These pictures should be preserved for its presented happiness that we as social justice workers strive for.

                                                                                                                  - Terry Wong
                                                                                                                    NJAHS volunteer intern

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Internship at NJAHS - Mika

I have been doing internship at NJAHS for about three months.
Before I came here, I was very nervous because I had never had working experience here in America but I have learned a lot of things more than I expected.


First of all, all the works they gave me were very challenging especially transcription and reformatting. They were the most difficult tasks. I think that's because no body had done that before so I was the first one to find the way to finish. I could manage to do it because other people in NJAHS helped me a lot and they always asked me to how it is going so I felt comfortable to ask them whenever I had questions. They really helped me a lot. I appreciate that very much. When I did transcription, they were mostly about the world war so I could learn how they had life at that time in America and how they survived. Some stories about the camps were very sad but still, I was impressed by how they were strong and managed to have life here in America. It was really interesting for me as a student from Japan.

I still have a lots of things to do before I leave but I feel confident to finish all of them. It is the great place to intern because I could experience like real office work at the company or even more and also I can challenge myself in this organization. I am sure I will make use of these experiences for my future. Thank you so much.

Mika