10th Annual Japan Week
Bellevue College
By Andy Kawahara
Bellevue College Student
For the Time table for October 10th, Click here!!
For the past 10 years, the Japanese Culture Exchange Club of Bellevue College has put on the biggest event organized and presented by students. That event is Japan Week! A whole week of workshops and lectures for students to become more educated on Japanese culture. While these weekday events are limited to Bellevue College students, everyone is welcome to join the public celebration on October 10 on the Bellevue College campus. There will be a variety of different activities for people of all ages to participate in.
2026 marks the 40th anniversaries of the Dragon Ball TV series and Super Mario Bros. globally, and the 30th anniversary of Pokémon. For Dragon Ball, there will be a scavenger hunt across the Bellevue College campus where attendees collect seven stamps (representing the seven Dragon Balls). For Pokémon, there will be a Pokémon card swap event where attendees can meet other collectors and trade in an all-inclusive environment.
There will also be a special guest lecture titled, “Behind the Music: Composing for Games, Films, and Anime” from Kazuma Jinnouchi, an award-winning composer for film, television, and video games. His orchestra-based composing style helps evoke the emotional setting for every project he works on. Jinnouchi’s cinematic composition has led him to collaborate with studios across the world (Europe, United States and Japan). Discover the creative process behind his music for acclaimed works including Suzume, Halo, Metal Gear Solid, Batman: Arkham Shadow, Star Wars Vision, and much more!
Japan Week will also be acknowledging tragedy through a Hiroshima-Nagasaki Atomic Bomb exhibition. A powerful reminder of the lasting impact of nuclear weapons and the urgent need for peace. The exhibit will contain a variety of curated photos, data panels, and historical material from the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum in Japan. Make sure to stop by and learn about the tragic historic events and how we constantly strive for peace.
Volunteers and members of Vancouver, British Columbia’s Mikoshi Sakurakai Society will parade around a portable shrine (mikoshi, 神輿) with the children’s yosakoi (unique festival dance, よさこい) dancers and a kid’s mikoshi by Pikake School preschoolers of Bellevue. Other events include workshops on manga drawing and onigiri making, contests in cosplay, Beyblades (spinning tops), and paper airplane making, a tea ceremony demonstration, Anime Cafe, a Japan travel booth, Japan Market/Flea Market, karaoke, manga swap, and much more!
For more information: https://bit.ly/JapanWeekWebsite.
Japan Week T-shirts for Volunteers for 2026
