Quote of the Day- May 15, 2022

Quote of the Day- May 15, 2022

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I first met Yuri as a freshman in college. Many of us were making our way into a crowded bus, holding signs, headed to a Mumia Abu Jamal rally in Philadelphia. As a bright eyed, angst-riddled, curious girl, trying to make sense of the frenetic energy and an environment that felt as though it was about to swallow me up, I felt a bit lost, disconnected…alone. At that moment, I felt a hand on my elbow, gently steering me to the side, ‘You’re new, I don’t think we’ve met’. Yuri’s voice immediately soothed me. It was as though she could see right past my doubts, my questions. ‘It’s a bit crazy, but we’re all friends here.’ Holding her blow horn, Yuri helped steer everyone in the right direction, but still kept me at her side. During that bus ride, we swapped stories - she asked me about my family and how a girl from Hawaii ended up in Western Massachusetts. I asked her if she was a professor because she seemed to know everyone on that bus. She gave me a cookie. We laughed. Sang songs. Ate more cookies. In those hours, while it was clear that I had so much to learn about the movements that brought us together that day, in Yuri’s magical way, she began to show me how compassion is at the center of change. By the end, I no longer felt alone, but a part of something larger. I was inspired, moved….touched. Thank you, Yuri, for that memory, for your wisdom since then, for your kindness, and for always remembering our bus ride together. You steered me in the direction I needed to move towards that day…and your memory continues to do the same today. Rest in peace.

Eloise Lee Harris is a wife, daughter and new mom based in Hawaii, and professionally, a communications strategist specializing in conservation and climate change issues.

She did not let the experience of injustice paralyze her. She did not let bitterness take root. She did not lower her head and stay silent. She learned, and she found her voice. She learned that citizenship in this world, this country, did not mean anything if it didn’t honor everyone equally, consistently, justly. She saw herself and the world around her through a different lens. She learned and changed and she grew into someone she may never had anticipated. She did not let her own understanding define herself, her work, her advocacy, her legacy. She learned from those around her. And her leadership made those around her better for it. She defied stereotypes and redefined the archetype. She remained invisible in the textbooks and history books written and taught by the dominant culture that continued its attempt at defining you and a generation. Yet, Yuri, you cannot be erased. Thank you, Yuri, for refusing to let government, politics, and culture define you and limit you. Thank you, Yuri, for your example of courage, faithfulness, integrity, humility, and leadership. Thank you.

Kathy Khang is a writer, speaker, and regional multiethnic ministry director, InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA

I remember the day I met Yuri Kochiyama and was the eager college student who got to be her assistant for a day. My story with Yuri is this - She fell asleep during a workshop because she was tired from her medication. At the end of the day, she wrote me a letter thanking me for helping her all day and thanked me for not judging her for falling alseep during the workshop. She said she was so embarassed from that.

First - when I read that, I was thinking, you’re YURI KOCHIYAMA, you have nothing to be embarassed about! 

Second - throughout her life, she never failed to write letters to acknoweldge people’s contribution and struggle. From the days of writing to internees on the camps til 2006 when I met her, she was still writing letters. 

Lesson learned - that there is humbleness even when you are a legend and that is one of the most important traits of being a committed organizer to the movement. 

I am saddened by our movement’s loss, but know that Yuri has done more than enough for our movement and we take the torch and carry it on. Yuri, thank you for a lifetime of contribution to fighting for racial justice here in New York City and beyond. 

Cathy Dang is the executive director of CAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities.

For many Yuri Kochiyama was a major figure who radicalized people’s thinking and political outlook. She was an inspirational woman who touched many in particular, many progressive minded Hip Hop generation Asian activists who saw as a mother figure. She was someone who we would see at all the key rallies and demonstrations  who was accessible and mentored many.  If you ever met and spoke with her, you could see she spit more wisdom about civil rights and social justice than most who have stood on podiums demanding hefty fees. Yuri was uncompromising and unwavering in her fight to end oppression…Honor her by learning about her work and building off the foundation she laid down…She will be missed RIP Yuri Kochiyama.

Davey D is a journalist, Hip Hop historian, and host of Hard Knock Radio. Be sure to check out Davey D’s interview with former Black Panther Sister Kiilu Nysha about Yuri’s life and legacy on the Hard Knock Radio tribute show at hiphopandpolitics.com.

I loved Yuri’s courage, humility and clarity.  She moved me, and my Ethnic Studies Students at SF State, to learn about my own history, to develop empathy and SOLIDARITY for other oppressed people, and to build UNITY and to STRUGGLE against our common enemies. But now her death is hitting me even harder when I connect it to the recent passing of others like Maya Angelou, Vincent Harding, Amiri Baraka, Mayor Chokwe Lumumba, Mandela and local SF Bay Area movement friends Carl Bloice and Karega Hart. But I know Yuri, Amiri, Carl and Karega would have cautioned us against mourning and encouraged us to continue rebuilding our movements together for a new world for all our children.

Eric Mar is a member of the SF Board of Supervisors, the former President of the SF Board of Education and a longtime social justice activist.

The intersectionality of Yuri Kochiyama’s activism constantly reminds me of the importance of looking across the racial and social boundaries still deeply entrenched in today’s society. Her work taught me the importance of fighting not only the oppressions you may face, but that of others as well—such as how she so fervently stood beside other people of color. She truly was a trailblazer that will continue to inspire generations to come—including that of my own—to inspire all to keep up the fight. 

Alton Wang is a current student at Wesleyan University where he chairs the Asian American Student Collective.

Dear Yuri Kochiyama: We’re strangers. I’ve only met you in person once. At a crowded INCITE conference in Chicago over a decade ago, with API/A queer people, women, & trans community. I was a 20 year old shaky kid just honored to meet you. You were so fierce, humble, determined, inquisitive, and what I remember most was, deliberately compassionate. For all the years and cities and lives you grew with and shaped. For everything you witnessed & created with others. For all the work you continued to do that lives within us. Gratitude is a word that can’t hold this loss and this celebration of you enough. For the life you lived that wasn’t trying to be legacy just liberation. Sending love to those you love closest in your circle, to your family, your comrades. Thank you for your movement building— it continues!

Kay Ulanday Barrett is a poet, performer, and educator.

It is with great generosity that Yuri shared her life and her stories, raising scores of organizers, activists, thinkers, and writers. Today this indomitable spirit still burns in her work, her mentees, and her family – who continue the revolutionary resistance she embodied. We will still fight for freedom in our government and society, in the way Yuri fought to achieve a more just and free-thinking world.

With each generation the conversation changes, but the spirit of these mentors, thinkers, and elders persists. There is so much more learning, so much more sharing to be done.

Sean Miura is an LA-based community organizer, writer, curator, and performer who produces & curates the nation’s longest-still-running Asian American open mic series, Tuesday Night Cafe.

A human rights giant like Yuri Kochiyama comes along once in a generation. Over the course of her 93 years, she worked tirelessly towards social justice for all people. From her sadly short-lived partnership with Malcolm X, to fighting for the rights of political prisoners and championing reparations for those impacted by the Japanese Internment, Kochiyama’s prolific efforts have informed the work of so many women activists like myself. She will be dearly missed.

Arisha Hatch is Campaign Director at ColorofChange.org.

There is a saying in Japanese: fall down seven times, get up eight times. I think Yuri Kochiyama did that. Through racism, sexism, Japanese American internment, government harassment and surveillance, and the loss of friends, she lived her convictions. She loved and worked across the usual racial and religious boundaries.

Yuri Kochiyama matters to me, because she engaged in cross-racial organizing for radical causes. She did not fit the usual cultural narrative. Civil rights aren’t just for whites or Latin@s or African Americans or Native Americans or Asian Americans or Pacific Islanders. We needed her because she was holding our country accountable for its actions. We needed her because she upended convention in favor of human rights.

The Rev. Laura Mariko Cheifetz is the executive director of Church & Public Relations at the Presbyterian Publishing Corporation and a 4th generation Japanese American.

I can’t summarize your life or your opinions or even quote anything you said to me like so many others can.  But I know that I paid attention to the plight of political prisoners because you did. Because of your example I absorbed the concept of a life in struggle even though I’m only now able to grapple with what that means and how profound a choice it is. That social movements are made up of people and people are not an abstraction. We have to love one another and really build and connect with one another. And in the most intimate way, we can live lives in struggle and find and create partnerships in struggle that don’t limit us but help us to better define ourselves both individually and collectively. That rather than simply be insular, those partnerships can also be starting blocks as we create and embrace wider concentric circles of love, community, and justice. I will not mourn your transition. I will redouble my efforts to support the next generations in struggle and live a more intentional and purposeful life. I will never whisper your name.

Parag Khandhar is a member of the board of the Asian American Literary Review.

Yuri Kochiyama was a radical activist who believed, first and foremost, in energizing others towards action and activism … She believed that all of us — including and particularly Asian Americans — had both the power and the duty to uplift ourselves and our fellow men and women towards the goal of racial and gender equality.

Yuri Kochiyama was my hero.

Today seems a little darker without Yuri’s light in the world.  But I think Yuri would be the first to want us to mourn her passing by rededicating ourselves to the fight; by finding our missions; by learning from each other; and by vowing to never let our battle cries fall silent.

Jenn Fang is an activist & blogger at Reappropriate.

Yuri Kochiyama is now a blooming flower in our garden of social justice. The life and legacy of Yuri will continue to shed light and hope into the hearts of many, including Arab Americans. Through the darkest period of her experience in the Japanese internment camps - she found the courage to fight for justice for all regardless of race or ethnicity. She embodies hope, love and resilience that we continue to implement in our work to protect the civil rights of Arab and Muslim Americans.

Nadia Tonova is the Director of the National Network for Arab American Communities (NNAAC).

Back when I was in college, we were all buzzed that Yuri and Bill Kochiyama came to us, giving strength to our cause in getting an Asian American studies class on campus and on forming an Asian group whose sole purpose wasn’t just to throw parties. They had both just come back fresh from testifying to Congress about Japanese American redress and it was mind-blowing to learn about the internment first-hand. Yuri and Bill always had time for young people, in their home and in their hearts. Later, when I was trying to write a profile about Yuri for a Hawaiian newspaper, I was a little frustrated because she refused to talk about herself, her individual experience. She would talk about people and movements and the inevitable triumph of justice. Rarely would she reflect on the young woman who went by “Mary” and how that young woman grew up to move mountains. A few years after that, I had the sad duty to write about Bill’s life when he passed away. I remember the ceremony and the gathering of people from all backgrounds coming together to celebrate the man. Now two decades later, Yuri and Bill are back together. Some people will point out Yuri’s strengths. But I will always remember her one adorable weakness. She and Bill kept a room full of teddy bears. She loved them.

Ed Lin is a New York-based writer.

A little bit over a decade ago, I was in a church in Harlem at an event honoring her. As soon as she stepped in the room all you heard for 10 minutes straight was her name shaking the foundation of the church, “Yuri! Yuri! Yuri!” As if she was running for office or something. But she wasn’t running for office, she was just being herself. Just one of the many elders that fought for justice but have been written out of the mainstream narratives of what is generically referred to as “the Civil Rights Movement.” One of the few that was still standing tall as her contemporaries were assassinated, imprisoned, absorbed by the poverty pimp complex or eviscerated by the war on drugs. I can say that I exist because of her, because of people like her. I do what I do because of her and people like her. When I was confused about what justice meant or how to fight for it, it was the story of Yuri Kochiyama as told to me by my mentor at the time, Maggie Chen Hernandez, that gave me more clarity. But now she is gone. This year so many like her have left us, so many that fought and taught folks like me how to fight. I always call them “humble lights” because when you meet them and talk to them, they never played themselves or carried themselves like they were much. But Yuri, people like you meant so much to folks like me, who were trying to be soldiers, who were trying to fight for justice, trying to build a better world, even though I never met you personally. Now, so many people that I grew up studying about, analyzing their life, learning their lessons, etc. are gone. And I simultaneously feel lost and found. I have said too much already and said this too many times this year. But Yuri Kochiyama, may the Spirit of Love, Truth and Justice bless you and keep you. May you rest until risen and may all those that you have inspired by your strength and presence do right by your memory.

Subhash Kateel is a writer, communicator, and the host of the radio show Let’s Talk About It!

Yuri Kochiyama was a civil rights icon that showed us the importance of building community at the intersections. She was involved in many struggles for the liberation of all people and lived a life of fighting injustice. May Yuri’s spirit continue to be a grounding force in our work for generations to come.

Gregory Cendana is the executive director of the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance.

I cannot believe this. My elder, Yuri Kochiyama, has become an ancestor. This hits hard and deep. I recall being a child in her small, dark Harlem apartment; hidden amongst the stacks of papers, listening to my mom and others discuss strategies for black liberation. I remember talking to her here, in Oakland, about how sickle cell had impacted both our lives. Her fierce determination, her love for all the people, will live on forever. Rise in power.

Malkia Cyril is a writer, communications organizer, and director of the Center for Media Justice, the home of the Media Action Grassroots Network.

I don’t want to mythologize or co-opt the memory of someone I admired so much, and I want to be especially cautious as I didn’t meet up with her much in person or get a chance to work with her often. But I felt compelled to share this nonetheless. One of the only times I’ve ever been speechless in my adult life was when I met Yuri. From what I recall, it’s because I agreed to be a part of an awareness-raising event for Viet Mike Ngo and Eddy Zheng, two inmates trying to start an Asian American studies program in prison. And at the same time, students at Berkeley were trying to raise awareness about deportations. Yuri was involved in both causes, no doubt many more, and activist Anmol Chaddha asked me if I would like to meet her. What do you say to her? She had done so much through history, for so many different communities and people, was inspiring countless young Asian Americans and other people. And yet, she never projected a demand for respect or to be deified. She was sincere, down to earth, fierce, smart, humble, inquisitive. She had political stickers all over her walker. Pictures of loved ones and I seem to recall, Hello Kitty, all over her walls. I wanted to learn all I could about her but instead found myself answering her questions about me as she jotted down notes in various notebooks with different colored pens.  Anmol gave her a ride to a poetry reading I did on his motorbike. I was an even shittier poet back then, yet she was gracious and kind about my work. I didn’t get to hang out with her much or work with her much. But she did so much in her long life that inspired me. I feel like a failure all the time. All the time. Yuri’s great gift to us was to show by example that through all the important work she did, she remained a supportive, intelligent, warm and generous human being. Activists don’t have to be cold, strident, or stoic. Activists are human beings. They are not hero figures but members of the communities that they fight for. There are not words enough to thank her for that. My heart goes out to her family and the members of the community she worked with most closest. May she rest. And may the rest of us work.

Bao Phi is a poet & activist.