The annual Tucson Japanese Festival (TJF) tentatively set for January 21, 2023 has been cancelled by the 13 member Southern Az Japanese Cultural Coalition Council. This decision was based on the ongoing covid pandemic, and also because of a conflict with Chinese New Year in January 2023.
This popular New Year event started up in January 2014 as a small mochi pounding event at Yume Japanese Gardens, but has grown to a large Japanese festival over the years (2015 to 2020). It was cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic in 2021 and 2022.
This TJF celebrating the New Year has been held the past two years at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center, 1288 W. River Rd. The Tucson Chinese Association is planning on hosting a Lunar New Year Gala for the new Year of the Rabbit on January 21 likely at that location. For more Information go to tucsonchinese.org.
Please stay tuned for the TJF for January 2024, location TBA.
Why Phoenix had event but not Tucson? Why we don’t have awaodori or obon dance? Why we don’t have Japanese food or japanese street food event? Why we are not so great in Tucson?
Our SAJCC Council decided to cancel the 2023 Tucson Japanese Festival as we didn’t have enough time to plan it, and some were still afraid of covid restrictions. We have not considered a summer bon dance because we have no Japanese Buddhist temple here in Tucson, like Phoenix does with their AZ Buddhist Temple. Please attend the Japanese language & culture event at PCC Downtown on May 9. It’s on the Upcoming Events page of our website,http://www.southernazjapan.org/upcoming-events/. There are more Japanese Nationals and Japanese Americans in Phoenix than in Tucson, which explains why we don’t have any Japanese street food events, but there are over a hundred Japanese restaurants here. Please refer to our Calendar for more events in Southern AZ. (Plus the date of Jan. 21 for the Tucson Japanese Festival coincided with Chinese New Year in 2023, so there was a conflict of events at the Tucson Chinese Cultural Center).