Marvelous Miwa Lyric

Can you stand to read yet another hapa birthday blog? Among my many friends and acquaintances, it seems, I can count lots of spring babies.

One special child is the marvelous Miwa Lyric who shares my birthday--only she was born several decades after me. In spite of her tender age, Miwa is wise and filled with the kind of compassion that is available to others only as they grow older. But Miwa seems to have been born that way. She's a writer, a rapper, a social activist and, she even designs clothes. Wait! Am I talking about her or me? Actually, my social activism is limited to talking a lot about what should be done, and my rapping--well, let's not discuss. But when it comes to demonstrating concern for those who suffer from injustice, with Miwa, there's the walk and the talk, and the two of them go together.

I was first introduced to Miwa, several years ago, via email blasts sent to me about her performance dates. I later found out that Miwa, herself, was sending them. How she stumbled upon my email address I don't know, nor do I care, because I became so entranced by what she had to say about art and politics. Although I haven't been able to see as many of her shows as I would like to, what I have seen has impressed me as they have others. Miwa has a HUGE fan base, mostly in LA, but also internationally. Right now, she's in Japan.

A few weeks after Miwa began emailing me, I received another email from a young woman named Asani Winfrey who wondered if we were related. That's legit. Even Oprah's cousins have contacted me about that possibility. Asani, who is of duel heritage (Chickasaw and black), has a famous father, a musician named Toddy, who ended up living in Japan. As for Asani (here's the irony of all ironies)--her husband is a music producer who produced Miwa's first CD's when she was still with a group! None of the three of us knew any of these connections existed until we continued to communicate with each other and it all came out.

On top of it all, Asani's birthday is May 6 (two days after Miwa's and mine) so one year Miwa threw the mother of all parties at the Jazz Club in J-town, L.A. Hundreds of people turned up, Miwa performed along with some of her hiphop students, her sushi chef father made fresh sushi, and I shot video of the entire event. Someday, I'll post a clip on the Internet for everyone to see.

Meanwhile, I just wanted to shout out to my special little friend, the marvelous Miwa Lyric. Here's her site:

http://www.thesoulasystem.com

And, that's her in the pix above with me and Chuck D following a Culver City studio taping of Kool Mo Dee's TV show, I Am Hiphop, last year.

Your Hip Hapa,

Yayoi

P.S. Thank you again to Cassie and Doris for the wonderful gifts and that yoga card. You two are something else!

Hapa*Teez Hits Cyberspace!

At last! After months of delays, my Watermelon Sushi store is finally opened for business and my Hapa*Teez t-shirts are for sale. Just for you, I've created three designs splayed across the top of several styles of t's all using the word hapa.

Now, about that word that some communities like to claim as their own. Personally, I feel that it belongs to all of us blendies. Originally, the Hawai'ians used it to mean "half" as in a measurement. And, it was traditionally linked with the word haole--a combination of ha (life's breath) and ole (nothing); literally, "he without breath". You see, the first Europeans arriving on the scene looked much too pale to the Natives to contain any ha or life's breath, and because they didn't prostrate themselves before the King and expel their last ha as was the custom, the Hawai'ians figured they had none. Thus, haole. And, please, don't mispronounce it by saying howlie as if you're referring to a wolf or something. Instead, try "hah" "oh" "leh". Ah, much better.

As Europeans began marrying Hawai'ians, their offspring were called hapa haole--half European. Then, with the arrival of East Asians, even more intermarrying occurred. Soon, Native Hawai'ians could boast few among them as being pure blood. The hapa haole phrase then became more applicable to those who were half Asian and half white.

Like I said, I use hapa to describe anyone who is biracial. Half is half of any race as far as I'm concerned.

So, please check out my store at: http://www.cafepress.com/hapateez

I know some of the prices are a bit much, but believe me my commission is not. On a serious tip, I hope my Hapa*Teez t's grow so huge in popularity that I'll be able to finance my feature film this year. If that's the case, I'll give an onscreen credit to all of you who buy them.

Another project I'm currently working on is a short documentary about hapas. So, if you're biracial and have a story to share onscreen, contact me at watermelonsushi@comcast.net

And, here's a shout-out to my SWIRL girl, Jen Chau. You can read her blog at jenchau.typepad.com/thetimeisalwaysright or check out www.swirlinc.org to connect with the largest mixed-race organization on Planet Earth!

Next up, Mia G updates the www.watermelonsushi.com website with new photos of Kool Mo Dee and Chuck D at Studio 52 in LA where we watched Mo Dee tape his new TV pilot, iamhiphop.com this past November.

And, I'll keep you posted about that newspaper article featuring hapas (including yours truly) that should be published this weekend.

Alafia!

Your Hip Hapa,

Yayoi