Fumiko's Archived Life
Fumiko was born in Mie and grew up in Nara, Japan and studied English Literature and Creative Writing while attending universities in Japan and in the States at different times. She became an English language professor, starting at a public high school and then moving on to national universities after obtaining a master's degree. After moving to San Diego in 1990, she was employed to teach Japanese by a private high school in La Jolla for several years developing a Japanese program in the 90's. But due to the school's political environment she changed her direction and left the school. After taking a year's break, she taught at Mesa College, Cal State San Marcos, lastly at Palomar College as a Japanese language professor. At Palomar, Fumiko received the Distinguished Faculty Award in 2006, also in the following year she was recognized by the Board of Directors of the San Marcos Chamber of Commerce as Palomar College's Most Distinguished Faculty. She enjoyed teaching languages as well as cultural exploration. For a decade, she took her students to Japan every summer. In 2008, she was asked to take over the chair position of the San Diego Japanese Speech Contest when Hisako Coox resigned after chairing for 11 years (1996–2006). Fumiko have served as a chair and directs the annual event till now since then under the North Park Lions Club (2017 - ) as non profit event. She has two grown children. She's been retired nearly a decade now, Fumiko enjoys playing the violin and piano, exploring cultural differences of people throughout the world through poetry, music, and language. She was once recognized as one of 36 Japanese women poets in the anthology "Other Side River" (Free Verse (Rock Spring Collection of Japanese Literature) published by Stone Bridge Press in Berkley in 1995. She sometimes enjoys the revision of the past work). Currently she is getting ready to start a youtube project combining music, poetry, and English language education. |