Saturday, April 9, 2011

Adding up number - it still is going up.

Yesterday, we finally managed to do Japan Tsunami Appeal at Hull University Student Union. Thanks for great help from volunteer people from the University, the University staff, Nippon Gohsei and our local friends from Japan, UK and the rest of world.

We had various activities and finally added up a total amount around 4 p.m yesterday.

so far, we raised...

£2710.15

and this number is still going up.
This is the total amount of cash and some cheques, which are confirmed to be processed later on Monday.

And I would like to say special thank you to a local company in Hull -Nippon Gohsei Ltd. The company offered to donate £1000 for our Tsunami Appeal. I hugely appreciate help from Mr. Hamada, Watanabe, Fujimura, and Uemura.

Also it cannot be forgotten to say very many thanks for our voluntary staff. We could not make this event without your effort! I do, massively, appreciate your help. Thank YOU.

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As for us or, rather, for me I should say, I had thought we Japanese had been a very small minorities in Hull, and felt almost powerless when just countable people had been in such a large area, across East Yorkshire. Overlooking something happening in places where we brought up, or know well, are extremely hard. And we are concerned if our family and friends there are coping ok.

There's a good thing throughout this Hull- Japan Tsunami Appeal.We had known that some Japanese had spread locally, in Yorkshire, though not had a chance to get together either. However, through the event, I thought this was the first time most Japanese in the area came to the same place and said hello to each other. This was an extremely rare opportunity for us, and it was a bonus of doing the fundraising event. I reassured that when something happens we can unite like as we did yesterday, not only Japanese but also locals, and people from all over the world. Thank you for your supports.

I have spoken to my father earlier today on skype. My family is in surbarban Tokyo and did not have massive damage from Tsunami. Though my family experienced huge impact from the earthquake. He told me something which came across to my mind too. He says:

"Although this was an unbelievable disaster we learnt one thing. We can unite. People probably had forgotten after the war, though, now, we learnt that Tohoku and the rest of Japan, and the rest of world can be united, to overcome this situation. That's what we learnt from the earthquake"

Yes, indeed. People in Hull are a part of that too. I am proud of everybody who helped us, and very much hopeful that our donation will be used for people who suffered from this disaster. Yet, still, people in Japan have the problems of radiation being spread in air and water from nuclear plants, and these will be a long-term issue. We hope, pray and try something with them. That's for sure.

Thank you for your thoughts and kind help everyone!

Lastly, I need to say greatest thank you for these girls.
Tough, gentle and wonderful organisers -Tomoko and Tsuneko - you are the stars!

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

Yorkshire Post

News, News, News!

Tomoko, a Japanese language tutor in Hull University, and an organiser of our Japan Tsunami Appeal event had a telephone interview from Yorkshire Post today. Check out newsagent on Thursday - our event may be mentioned there.

Sunday, April 3, 2011

Our Volunteers and Friends


Hull - Japan Tsunami Appeal event
8th April (Friday) 2011 12.00 - 16.00
Hull University Student Union



As you probably noticed from our previous post, we made Japan Tsunami Appeal posters which are displayed in various buildings in Hull University and local areas, such as Newland Avenue, Princes Avenue and Hull City Centre. I would like to say thank you for the university design team and press, for us to have a chance to provide a great piece of work to public.

Also I would like to introduce our volunteers who stood up and said "We will help you!" to our upcoming event, from the university and from our local area. Thank you in advance.

As we have teamed up about 40 people now, we will all welcome you to our Japan Tsunami Appeal event in Hull University, and hope you will come and enjoy whole experience of Japanese culture.


Note that the donation of this event will be passed to the British Red Cross, Japan Tsunami Appeal campaign. We will sum up a total amount of collection on 8th April, after the event, and one of the event organisers will be handing over the donation to Hull Red Cross branch on Monday 11th . We will update the total amount as a report through a post on this blog.


List of Volunteers in the University of Hull

Tomoko Miyairi, Kenta Shinohara, Tomoko Inoue, Tomohiro Matsuno, Mai Obata, Shuhei Kinoshita, Shoji Ito, Akira Shionoya, Hidetoshi Shibayama, Raymond Fee, Stuart Hicks, Simon Cowell, Wan Teng Tan, Ada Li , Jenius Ho, Yilin Wang, Hannah Afford, Lauren Feather, Marc Day, Vincent Nhin, Kirstie-Anne Stewart, Kendall Pickup, Vanessa Longthorpe, Dazheng Jin, Matthew Baker, Gabriella Roelofs, Nicola Lynn, Cara Hessey, Sophie Davison.


Outside the University of Hull

Tsuneko Lead, Seiko Hatfield, Kimiyo Whitlam, Tomoko Kidahashi, Antony Hatfield, Satomi Ettenfield, Maki Uemura, Gabi Breithaupt, Shiho Kotaka.


Special thanks to

Hull University, Marina Mozzon-McPherson, Angie Lead, Richard Madden, Katie Starkey, Sarah L Lilleyman, Marina Mozzon-McPherson, Kerry A Dobson, Helen J Hunt, Jonathan Hall, Pippa T King, Jonathan Hall, Paul Tatton, Martin Arnold, Jenny R Macleod

British Red Cross: Max Newton, Neene Gichaara, Liz Adams-Graves.

Nihon Gohsei Ltd: N Hamada, K Uemura, H Watanabe, K Fujimura.

Our Friends: Keiko Oikawa, Yukiko Iwata, Keiko Cole, Vince Coleman, Anna-Lisa, Rob Byass, Sufi.


Premises who agreed to display our posters

Hull Univerisity, Tesco Beverley, Tesco St. Stephans Hull, Chong Wah, Planet Coffee, Pave , Indian and continental food shop , Grain, Newland Avenue Post Office , Waitrose Willerby, Jing Jing Oriental Food, Adelphi.



Friday, April 1, 2011

Sunday, March 27, 2011

Supporting British Red Cross and with University of Hull




We are pleased to announce that we officially work with British Red Cross now. Thanks to kind help and support from Julie (Hedon branch manager) and Neena (sheffield office) we are happy to show British Red Cross banners for Hull - Japan Tsunami Appeal.






And, of course, I would like to say a big thank you to University of Hull and Hull University Union for supporting this event, and to do publicity work on our behalf, as well as giving us the permission of the use of properties.



Hull- Japan Tsunami Appeal is on 8th April (Friday)
1300-1600 at Hull University Union.
for details of activities, follow this link.


Please do join us if you are interested in Japanese culture - or just drop in for a nice cup of green tea. We are still looking for volunteers who help us on a day so let us know if you could help too. please contact Tsuneko tsunerofu@googlemail.com

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Activities for Fundraising

Hull-Japan Tsunami Appeal - Supporting the British Red Cross


12.00 to 16.00

Friday 8th April 2011

Students Union, University of Hull

(Cottingham Road)

Hello. My name is Tomoko and I am one of the organisers for the fundraising event. I teach Japanese in the Department of Modern Languages, University of Hull. My students as well as Japanese students in the university are supporting the event. Also, the University of Hull will press-release the event to the local media a few days prior to the fundraising. I look forward to working with you for the fundraising for Japan this time.




Current Plan for the Day:

11.00am to 12.15pm - Distributing Flyers in the Campus

Last-minute advertising of the event in the University of Hull campus, holding poster, placards and donation buckets (Cosplay and kimono costume included)


1.00pm to 4.00pm - Fundraising Event

Theme: Give it a go and experience Japan!

Activities: (Volunteer members will be joining one of the activities below to support the event.)

Zone 1 - Language and Society (organised by students in the University of Hull)


  • Quiz with prizes (13.00-) (15.00-)

  • Learn some basic Japanese & Write your name in Japanese (13.30-) (14.30-)

  • 'Using chopsticks' game (14.00-) (15.30-)

Zone 2 - Japanese Traditional Culture (organised by Tsuneko, Maki and Satomi)



  • Demonstration of the tea ceremony (13.00-) (14.00-)

  • Wear a Kimono costume (13.00-16.00)

  • Japanese souvenirs' Raffle (13.00 - 16.00)
  • Japanese and English Cakes (13.00 - 16.00)

Zone 3 - Japanese Pop-Culture (organised by Seiko and other friends)


    (all 13.00 - 16.00)

  • Nintendo DS Games

  • Hello Kitty

  • Amine and manga
  • Japanese Paper Craft - Origami



Thursday, March 24, 2011

Tsunami Appeal Event day has been moved to 8th April (Fri)

Just a quick updates for readers.
We proposed 9th April (Sat) originally, however, a date has been changed to 8th April (Friday).

We now have a confirmation to work with Hull University Union and are discussing about detailed plans for event activities.

We still wants volunteers who will be working with us - if you are interested please let us know.

Thank you for your interests.