Thank you to the Native Spirit Festival and Japan House London for organizing a group discussion about the Ainu on October 15th. I was fortunate to be a part of this global community which included panelists from the UK, USA, and Japan. In addition, around 200 people from across the world viewed the event and asked questions.
In fact, due to popular demand, the Native Spirit Festival just extended the availability of “Ainu: Indigenous People of Japan” until November 15th. (Very excited about this!)
Participating in this festival was the perfect opportunity for me because I have been wanting to have a virtual screening and discussion with the Ainu community. I am looking forward to many more because I think it is very important to keep the dialogue going. I encourage anyone who wants to host a screening to please contact me for details.
And just an FYI: Should you watch the discussion, I mistakenly said that the year I started making my film was 2004, but in fact it was 2015. I must have been nervous. The year 2004 was when I arrived to the US from Japan!