Portrait of Daiji Kataoka

This is a portrait of Daiji Kataoka. Daiji first came to New Zealand in 1998 during his final year of high school to fulfil his dream of swimming with dolphins. A year later, he came back to New Zealand to study English. At the time, he considered enrolling in university here, but could not decide what to study, so he returned to Japan and volunteered teaching standard Japanese to foreigners instead.

This teaching experience prompted Daiji to return to New Zealand to study for a teacher’s licence at Massey University, after which he taught Japanese at Kapiti College for three years. At this point he again returned to Japan intent on a change, but decided after a month that working in Japan did not suit him. He returned to New Zealand yet again for the fourth time in 2009 and began teaching Japanese at Wainuiomata College shortly thereafter.

At Wainui College, he directs the Language School and also teaches tourism. Daiji often brings Japanese students to New Zealand to study at Wainui College and New Zealand students to Japan for field trips. He also teaches Japanese at the Japan Information and Cultural Centre of the Japan Embassy regularly in the evenings. According to Daiji: "I was helped by studying language; it was an excellent experience, and I want to give this experience to my students, too."

This photograph is part of a set of 24 photographs featuring twelve people who are either Japanese immigrants to New Zealand, their children, or descendants of Japanese New Zealanders. The images were carefully staged for an exhibition in 2016 which was, in turn, the outcome of a project sponsored by the Japan Society of Wellington and organized by Japan Society member Susan Zou and Noriko Murakami in 2016.