ErikaTanaka, the winner of the Miss Asian American Colorado 2009 Program, is a senior at Regis University and prospective medical student.
She was crowned Miss Asian American Colorado 2009 in May and has been working on raising awareness for mental health and suicide prevention in the Asian American community. She is currently working for the National Asian American Pacific Islander Mental Health Association focusing on mental health education for Asian American medical students. She is also a member of Mirai Daiko, a local Japanese taiko drum performance group and enjoys sharing the beauty of taiko drumming with the community.
A broad perspective
Born and raised in Colorado, Tanaka is the oldest of two, to an immigrant from Japan and a refugee from Vietnam. She grew up in Golden, Colo. where she often found herself being the “only Asian” in her social circles. However, her parents instilled a strong sense of their cultural identity into her.
“Even though I grew up in a white neighborhood… my parents taught me about my background and encouraged me to be proud of it,” she said.
Her father is an aikido instructor, so as far back as she can remember, martial arts has been a part of her life.
“I’ve been doing (aikido) pretty much my whole life,” she said. “(My father) does demonstrations at the Cherry Blossom Festival. I’ve been attending Japanese festivals my whole life.”
Her mother was a refugee from the Vietnam War and her experiences helped shape her daughter’s upbringing.
“I’ve always been really aware of my mom’s story,” Tanaka said. “She was a refugee, so my grandma always told me stories about it.”
Growing up in a multicultural family had its struggles. Tanaka said she had difficulties figuring out her own identity.
“Sometimes I didn’t feel like I was super Vietnamese or super Japanese, so a lot of times I struggled with that,” she said.
But it was her diversity that helped her realize that she had a broader look at the world.
“Now I realize that you can just balance it out and it just gives me so many resources to look at the world from,” she said. “I have three different perspectives to look at the world from as an American, a Japanese American and a Vietnamese American.
“I feel like it makes my perspective on the world much more multidimensional. You can look at things in different ways and see other people’s points of view and be open to it.”
But what goes along with having different heritages is lots of good food, something Tanaka enjoys, from eating pho late at night after Thanksgiving dinner to sushi at nearly every family gathering.
“I think that’s the biggest thing growing up in Asian families – everything revolves around food,” she said. “So having Japanese and Vietnamese was a perk.”
Read the full article on Asian Avenue Magazine here.
