Asociación Tokyo-ko Euskal Etxea

The Asociación Tokyo-ko Euskal Etxea is the only recognised Basque house in Japan, and a house without a building: it has no premises and holds its events at different places in Tokyo. Its members are Basque professionals living in the country, people who teach Basque at Japanese universities and Japanese people interested in Basque culture, among them Yuichi Shimanuki, who in 2006 had founded the Basque-Japanese Society with the idea of opening a Basque centre in the city, and Professor Sho Hagio. The Basque Government recognised it on 9 December 2009, in the same round that gave Germany its first centre. Its website, in Basque and Japanese, went quiet after the Fukushima accident in 2011 and came back in October 2013, the year in which, with Jon Verastegui as president, it gave seminars on Basque subjects at the Asahi Culture Center. The register credits it with 21 members, and it organises the Korrika, bertso championships, tortilla competitions and Euskaraldia.