“My ambition is to teach people Japanese, especially the culture of people who are enthusiasts of Japanese culture, ” said Japanese Culture Club Co-Founder Kevan Chi. “I wanted to teach them to be able to speak the basics of the language so they could enjoy the culture and enjoy learning the language.”

Ayala’s Japanese Culture Club is Ayala’s newest addition to one of the many extra curriculars offered on campus. Founded by Juniors Kevan Chi and Mason Xu, the duo dedicates their time to teaching the Ayala Community more about Japanese culture.

Every first and third Friday of every month after school, they meet in Ms. Guo’s room (B131) with their club members, teaching them Japanese on the first meeting and doing an activity on the second.

 “At Ayala, we don’t have Japanese, so it’s a good choice for students who want to learn,” advisor Ms. Guo said. 

Teaching members the basics of the language, they slowly work to help develop their ability to speak Japanese to engage themselves in the culture, without physically being in Japan.

 “We teach the fundamentals of Japanese culture, and then we also teach them what Japanese does at certain time periods of the year,”  junior Co-President Mason Xu said. 

On Friday, October 8th, they made Japanese lanterns for the summer festival happening in Japan called Natsumatsuri.

Members will be learning about Japanese festivities along with the history behind it while making lanterns in celebration of the festival.

This event is just one of the many activities that they will be doing throughout the school year as they continue to familiarize themselves with Japanese culture. Each activity will resonate with an event that’s going on around the relative time in Japan as those events aren’t celebrated often in our community.

 “The Japanese culture is not vast around this area as there are only two Japanese-related restaurants around this area,” Xu said. 

Be sure to drop by the Japanese Culture Club to learn more about this unique culture from the Asian community.