AAPI Month and the Power of Gathering

Each May, AAPI Heritage Month offers an opportunity to honor the histories, cultures, and contributions of Asian American and Pacific Islander communities. This year, I had the opportunity to participate in Speaking Truth to Power, a powerful evening at Milliken Auditorium featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist Taro Yamasaki.

In a moment marked by uncertainty and polarization, we chose to gather—across identities, generations, and experiences—to witness stories that call us into deeper empathy and shared responsibility. For me personally, developing a friendship with Taro and co-curating this evening was both a privilege and a deeply meaningful experience.

A Night of Reckoning and Connection

The Lens of Justice

Taro Yamasaki has spent over four decades using photography to tell stories from the margins—children in conflict zones, families grappling with stigma, and communities navigating trauma. His work has not only appeared in Time and Newsweek, but has changed public opinion and influenced policy.

We began with Taro's early images: children in war-torn Nicaragua, orphans in post-Ceausescu Romania, and Ryan White, the teenager who became the face of the AIDS crisis in America. These were not easy stories to hear or see. But in their depth, they revealed how photography can be a mirror and a catalyst. Many in the audience expressed that the images stirred a sense of responsibility and awareness.

Why These Stories Matter

Remembering as an Act of Resistance

Later in the evening, we explored photos from the Manzanar War Relocation Center, one of ten camps where more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly incarcerated during World War II. This was a deeply personal moment for me, as someone with Japanese ancestry, raised in a household that navigated multiple cultural identities—an experience I share with Taro. Our shared heritage underscored the power and necessity of cross-cultural solidarity, like that seen between Japanese American and Arab American communities at the annual Manzanar pilgrimage, ten years after 9/11. Taro's photographs showed Japanese Americans, Arab Americans, and scores of other cultural, spiritual, and ethnic groups standing together in remembrance, a profound act of solidarity across generations and cultures.

To remember is to resist forgetting the pain of others. It is also a path to healing. From Gaza to Manzanar, the stories Taro shared revealed to us that while injustice may take many forms, so does resilience.

What We Heard and Felt

A Call to Engage

The audience's response was immediate and emotional. People reflected back a visceral connection to communities that seemed far away, in both time and place.

Though it required mental and emotional energy to hold space for these stories, it was a necessary labor. These images were difficult—but they made us feel. And from feeling comes the courage to act.

“As a photojournalist, I have always thought of my job as that of an educator, really. I feel like these stories are important for people to see," Taro shared with me. 

Rotary Charities’ Ongoing Commitment

Building Equity Through Relationships

Opportunities like this remind me that the pursuit of equity is deeply personal. It begins not with organizational strategy, but with presence—with listening to stories that reveal lived truths, to challenges that are often unheard, and to the possibilities that emerge when we choose to truly witness one another.

Co-creating this event with Taro exemplified what it means to build trust and shift perspective through relationship. It reminded me that equity work is not just about outcomes, but about the pathways we walk together.

This personal journey is also what draws me to the mission of Rotary Charities—not because of my role, but because our values are aligned in the belief that equity begins with deep, intentional relationships. In this shared work of building a just and connected region, every story matters. And every act of empathy is a step forward. 

With gratitude,

Sakura Takano
CEO, Rotary Charities of Traverse City