Vancouver Japanese Language School-Japanese Hall: 4th Floor

Homing Pidgin is a tongue-in-cheek riff off of the bird called a Homing Pidgeon, referring to the bird’s ability to always return home, even if released at night, in a foreign place hundreds of miles away from its roost. Homing Pidgin also refers to the unique hybrid language developed by the first Japanese Canadians in BC. Similar to how indigenous people developed the trader language, called Chinook Wau Wau. There are places like Steveston and groups on the surrounding BC islands who developed their own unique Japanese Canadian pidgin. Come and join in a lively discussion with the artist Haruko Okano. She collected and used the pidgin as part of a collaborative performance with writer Fred Wah and in her own book of poetry “The Waiter’s Bill Pad.” 

About the Facilitator: Haruko Okano is a 3rd generation Japanese Canadian, currently living in Vancouver. Her grandfather began our Canadian roots in Haney, BC, in the late 1800s. She was born in Toronto during the last year of WWII. Orphaned at the age of 9, she was raised through the Ontario foster care system. She considers herself a cultural hybrid.