Monika Hudgins

a.k.a; Monica Sue Hudgins, zoe, tamago, 卵, 萌丹香, 渡辺モニカ, 渡辺萌丹香, Monika Watanabe, Monika Hudgins-Watanabe, 卵黄

星座：猿 (師猿！) Herstory:

Born in 1/3/1969 to 1st generation college professors (Patricia Hudgins Bond, M.D., Dr. Aubrey Clyde "Doc" Hudgins Jr., PhD, div. 1971) Monica was raised by her father in the suburbs outside of Richmond, VA and was mildly successful as a young athlete, artist, musician and actor. After matriculating in public schools, Monika graduated in 1991 from the Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) with a BA in Philosophy (minor fields TESOL & Japanese via exchange program with the University of Richmond (U of R) while participating in international exchage study/work programs over the summers including EASLI, University of Indiana), she then obtained her first MA at the University of Virginia in East Asian Studies (Thesis: Multi-generational anthropological study of WWII Japanese American Internees & East Coast Relocation Efforts). In America, Monika's early writing career includes founding editor of PARADIGM (UVA, Asian America Literary Magazine), several short stories published as zoe and investigative journalism work as a reporter/editor during an internship at The UVA Women's Center newspaper IN OUR OWN WORDS. (Featured article - interview with Chai Ling)

To further her lifework studies in discrimination (差別), Monika 'immigrated' to Azusagawa village in Nagano, Japan where she was legally known as 萌丹香 (ハジンズ・モニカ) and worked for 4 years as an O-yatoi-gaikokujin (お雇い外国人, hired foreigner) as a JHS English teacher, curriculum developer and PD consultant for the Mombusho (文部書) via the JET Programme. Six months after a honeymoon when meeting her partner (渡辺孝太) on holiday in Thailand in 1995, she relocated to Tokyo and embarked on a 9 year career as a Publishing Editor, Producer, Director, Translation Supervisor and International Localization Project Manager for various localization and Video Game companies in Japan (DataEast, SEGA, Microsoft, and Konami - featured projects include; the Shenmue Series, Crazy Taxi, Sonic Adventure Series, Seaman, NFL, NBA Starting Five, Evolution Skateboarding, K-1 Series, CyGirls, Silent Scope Series, Rumble Roses, Nanocide, etc.,) in addition to interpreting, translation, freelance writing, editing and TV/Movie work for various creative and other endeavors worldwide Publications in Japan include Pacific Friend, NHK, Mombusho Press and various Video Game related journalism and story creation. 萌丹香 also continued to sing, songwrite and perform during her years in Japan (featured performance Asahi Live '95).

Monika 're-immigrated' back to the US (NYC) in June, 2004 as Monika Hudgins-Watanabe, to resume her teaching career on the NYCT Fellows Program (MS Ed - TESOL, LIU 07') and has been working as a Global Studies/English teacher and adviser to recent immigrant students for the last 3+ years in Brooklyn. Now mainly writing and working in non-profit collaboration with Tibetan refugees, Monika also developing as a creator via several academic related wikis and musical projects under the producer name「卵黄」 (RanOu) while working on mastering Mandarin, Tibetan and Unicode. Her partner (渡辺孝太) plan to really immigrate for back to Japan next summer to plant roots, complete her PhD, further expand on recent creative multi-media projects and most importantly, to better support the social democracy (大衆＞多衆！) movement in Asia.

「出版か死ぬか！-卵黄」渡辺萌丹香 Monika Watanabe (aka Ranou)