World Languages and Cultures
Welcome from the Chair
The small Okinawan noodle shop was open, so we hoped. Three students and I had just spent hours walking around the beautiful and expansive Okinawa Peace Memorial Park, dedicated to those lost in the great World War II battle of 1945. We had hiked down steep limestone stairs to swim in the clear waters of the Pacific, slowed our pace around the thousands of names of the dead commemorated in the memorial walls, and in the balmy summer heat, worked up a ferocious appetite in the process. Our emotions were swirling, surrounded as we were by lush subtropical beauty and the memories of war, but our stomachs reminded us of more immediate needs. That’s when the noodle shop appeared... Read more in the 2023 WLC Chairs Welcome