The Cats of Mirikitani

The Cats of Mirikitani is an eye opener into Japanese history.
From Jimmy's story, I have traveled through the streets of New York in the eyes of an eighty-year-old homeless man and a young adult placed in a camp for being of a certain ethnic background.
What has really struck with me is Jimmy's descriptions of some of his work.
In one image, he describes his time at Tule Lake, the place where the camps were located.
He explains how he had a friend there who would always ask him to draw for him, and unfortunately how this person did not make it out of the camps.

An interesting point that was brought up by Mirikitani is the idea of an American citizen being put into a camp because their foreign counterparts were in conflict with America.The Japanese citizens of America, the land of the free, were placed in camps even though they were deemed rights equal to that of other American citizens. The idea is both paradoxical and hypocritical.

And as Jimmy put it, the only thing that the government could say is "sorry". Sorry for disrupting the lives of those who are citizens of the land, and degrading them in such a way that they are viewed as worthless to other diverse Americans in what was supposed to be a just system.

Racial profiling has once again took control of government policies post 9/11, and now those of Middle Eastern descent are being categorized as terrorists. The American majority, however is unaware of the small number of Muslims that are actually terrorists.

What I admired most about Jimmy was the fact that he was independent and was not a bitter individual. He was homeless for almost a decade and did not complain about his poverty. There were times during the documentary when Linda Hattendorf (director) would ask if he was hungry or needed an extra blanket, and he would kindly decline, saying that he was just fine. He did not complain about anything minuscule but instead devoted his time to his passion, art.

When topics such as the bombing of Nagasaki or Hiroshima were raised, he would discuss with such anger and passion what was done to his family and his country. He spoke openly and honestly about what occurred in the camps and I honestly felt the anger being relieved of him during the reunion. The Cats of Mirikitani shed light on what we normally do not think about. As busy as people are and as "in the moment" as we try to be, we forget to really think about the past of others and everyone's history. Jimmy Mirikitani mirrors that person that we should try to be: moving on but never forgetting.