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This oral history is from an interview conducted by the Oral History cluster of the Landscapes of Injustice project.
Go back to where you came from.I said,
I live over there. That's where I came from.So there was a lot of overt racism back then. I think it's a mistake to think that it didn't exist, or that it was underneath it all. No it was out there, it was pretty direct. On the other hand it was a lot easier to take for my parents, for example, then the internment itself. Of course I didn't know about this. They felt they were making their way through life and in the Canadian Society, and whatever else. I know one of my mother's clothing clients was Dr. Best and his wife. Do you know Dr. Best? Oh yes. Yeah, yeah. Banting and Best? Yeah, exactly. She would come over with his wife, his wife would go upstairs with my mother and they would consult. I don't know what they were talking about because she couldn't speak much English and she didn't know any Japanese. But somehow they communicated and I sat in the living room with Dr. Best. And all he wanted to do was watch cartoons on TV
What do you want to do later in life?. I didn't really know, you gotta know, you just gotta know. So I said okay fine, who was this guy?
How did you and dad meet?and again I got the 'baka', 'aho' you know
You just went back there and got married?And he said,
yeah, yeah. I said
You didn't know her?
No, no, not at all.Well ok, fine.
And she was willing to come here?
No.
I will take you to him. He is working on a lumber raft up the coast of Vancouver Island.So what could she do? She didn't have much money, she couldn't you know wait for him in Vancouver or Victoria or wherever it was. So she went with the guy, and he was telling the truth
There's $100,000 missing from the bank accounts.Now $100,000 in 1930 whatever was it could have been a million or more
Jeez, where did you get that picture?and of course the mean when he worked on the longest was the Jikamura Lumber Camp, grandpa, you know? It wasn't as big as the others, but yeah, he did work for them for a long time. And most of his lasting friendships came out of that lumber camp. He worked at Britannia Beach, do you know that area? It's up the coast right on the mainland Coast, I think. You'll have to look that up. He worked for a pig abattoir there. One, was it a summer? Might have been. He was in between jobs so he had to get one there. So he went there, took my mother there. My brother wasn't born yet. There's a great story that comes out of that one. My father worked in the abattoir and my mother was the cook, camp cook. And it was just all Japanese Canadians. And she said life is pretty boring except for Friday and Saturday night when they had their pie and coffee party. Well they all go together, I don't know how many there were, but my mother made all kinds of different pies. And she was great at making pies. And she'd serve it, you know they talk and have a party basically. And then at the end of the evening my mother made a mistake. She saved the leftover pie and put it away and everyone went home. Then all the gossip started after that. Japanese Canadians do not confront one another. They started to gossip. The custom was that she gave the pies away to the families and they would take it home and eat it there at their leisure. But no she
oohbecause of the crack of the thunder and whatever else. So they said something bad is going to happen.
what are we going to do with him? We can't take care of him for the rest of his lifeyou know
it's not fair. He's not our child. Let's send him to Japan.
Nah. nah. You don't know nothing. You're an idiot anyway.They like using that word a lot. So, and the water was grey blue, it wasn't a lot of fun.
You'll never see that money again. Don't do it.So they said no. Somehow we got the money though to set up the mortgage at Greenwood and Gerrard. So you said there were quite a few Japanese Canadians at your high school. Why do you think they were so many in the East End? Well believe it or not, just after the war there was a Japantown in Toronto down at Spadina and Dundas. And they were all down there, well most of them were down there. And I think that's why my parents lived on McCaul Street. But they were all kinds of families down there and clubs grew, nissei clubs grew and they had social activities and whatever else. And the church was instrumental in setting up, oh what was that place. Furia? Do you remember Furia? Well the church set up a food co-op initially right next to it. And eventually they sold the rights or whatever to the Furia family and they set up a grocery store. And they also started the language school downtown. And all kinds of other activities. so once Japanese Canadians were basically allowed to move out they came into this area, over to Greenwood, basically because it was cheap, or relatively cheap. And from there they moved to Don Mills. So by the time I was growing up in the fifties there was still a lot of Japanese Canadian families in the area and they would send their kids to, well, Leslie Street Public School and Riverdale Collegiate, and Danforth Collegiate which is where I went. So, that's why. I think another part of the city would be Dufferin area, Oakwood, around there, there was a lot of Japanese Canadian families there as well. And after that they started moving way out to the suburbs. The dream, right, a split level house out in the suburbs. That's where you want to live. Now they all want to come back in
Might be people coming over, I have to be here, it be rude if no one was here.And I couldn't understand it myself, so I went with my father. As it turned out that first year that my mother was here, when she got married and came to Canada, it was the first Oshogatsu, she went with my father to the bosses house for food. Grandma took her aside and scolded her for not being at home.
What are you doing here? You're an idiot, you're so rudeetc etc. Tore a strip off of her actually. And from that day on she never left the house on New Year's Day. Even when it got to the point when no one was coming over, I mean no one. It died off unfortunately, we could still go to my grandparents house but that was about it. Even then my grandparents passed away, the oldest daughter, she caused a lot of trouble, but she didn't tell anyone that she wasn't going to do it. So you don't like father went to the house, knocked on the door and it was completely dark, and no one was there. I kept telling him,
Dad there is no one here. I'm sorry but it's not going to happen.
No they got to be here, its New Years, she is like my daughterand in fact they were very close, both families were very close. And it broke his heart, it really did break his heart and so I had to take him home. And I never forgave her for that. One phone call that's all it took. I mean she knew that people are going to come over, and there's going to be more than my dad because there's so many men that did that. So those are the food memories I have, lots of food memories
You know that chest of drawers that you have? That old chest of drawers. You don't want to do you? We'd like it, or I'd like it.And so I jumped in and I said well what do you want it for? Well Dad made it in the camp and we kind of like it.
Well, we are kind of using it right now.And it's upstairs. You saw it when you went up to the washroom up there. It's just a simple wooden, I don't even know what it's made out of, chest of drawers. So that's a memento from that period of time. There was a box in the old house on Ivy that said Lyalta Alberta. I think that was a packing box. But other than that there wasn't very much help that they brought. Did your brother have any toys?
I'm going to lunch
you know I really wanted that Buck Rogers Ray Gun. That's what I was going to ask for. Buck Rogers Ray Gun.And he talked about it endlessly after that and I thought -- I assumed, in fact everyone in the family assumed that he had got one as a kid and that mom had given it away. As it turns out, he never had one until as an adult he went out and bought 5 of them. Even the gold special edition Ray Gun. God you can get so obsessed about it. But you were in your forties what did you want
Oh sit down. Would you like some hot dogs?
Hey Yuriand her husband Bill,
Hey, how you doing?Amazing people. So she met my son and took to him right away and held him in her arms. Of course you wanted to know about her so I would tell her, him, all the stories about her and other things. And my personal friendship with her. But she's not the only one there so many others that we have met over the decades. So he knows about the internment. I don't know how he feels about the internment but he knows about it at least. And one day he's promised to read my books
Oh dad don't worry I'll read it. One of these days. Ya ok, fine. He's listening to the music, he's going to concerts with me. And even jumped on stage and tried to take over the microphone and stuff like that. I had to drag him off. Stuff like that. He should know anyway. There's some artifacts around the room here. That one was done by Kazuo Nakamura
We got to put them in an internment campand whatever else. Bless him, but Norm Mineta who was the Senator of the time and Transportation Secretary actually stood up and told them
You can't do this. Look what you did to the Japanese-Americans. Look what you did to me during WWII. It's just against the Constitution, the way we live.etc etc. And actually I think he silenced them, he silenced them. But yeah I think it's up to Japanese Canadians, organizations like the National Association of Japanese Canadians to remind people of what happened and keep them mindful of the implications of the interment and make sure that it doesn't happen again. So yeah that's how I feel. Any other thoughts Momoye? Stuff you want to ask? I want to know, if you can describe how you felt as the story of the internment unfolded? Did you feel angry? Through the decades? Uhm, it was a surreal experience. Here I was thinking I was Canadian the whole time and then I found out that Japanese Canadians didn't get the vote until '49. In fact they couldn't even move around the country until '49. And that was like two years before I was born.
I Feel Like I'm Fixin to Die Rag, I don't know if you heard of it but it's by Country Joe and the Fish. And I love the lyric
Come on all you big strong men, Uncle Sam needs our help again. God himself into a terrible Jam, way down south in Vietnam.
Oh your son is such a good singerand whatever else, my mom
Oh you kidding me? He's got a frog voice
No, I don't like that one.
Who was this guy?
Oh a good friend of mine.I know he's a good friend of yours but who was he? He says
He was the yojimbo or right hand man of the head gangster in Vancouver. Mori Esuji.Right hand man, he was the enforcer, he did all the dirty work right. How did he get that nose? Well, one of his jobs was to go into Chinatown in Vancouver, go into the gambling dens in Vancouver and find all the issei Japanese Canadian guys. And then he would sort of sidle up to them and whisper in their ear
What are you doing here? They are cheating you. They're taking every dime you got. You know the guy over there is sleight of hand, you know, they're really cheating you. Come back to our neck of the woods and play at my bosses gambling place. we won't take all of your money, will take care of your family too.So that was his job but then the Chinese bosses caught him and they took him out in the back alley and beat him up and then cut his nose off. As a reminder, don't come back here. That was his job. Did your parents tell you stories about Morisa? No just about Ricky Matsu. Others told me about Morisa and the things he did and whatever else. Enigmatic character. I remember talking to Frank Moritsugu about -- well I wrote about Ricky Matsu for the Nikkei Voice. And then Frank took me aside, he was the editor, no he was the publisher at the time? He took me aside and said
We'll print this if you really insist, but you have to be careful.What do you mean? There are Mori supporters in this town. He's been dead since the early '70s, right. And still this was like 1990, whatever and I thought -- and so Frank said you're going to get death threats. You're going to get all kinds of, it's going to be dangerous for you. How old are these guys Frank? They must be in their eighties. Well I think I can outrun them
You should be working. Don't be like me, right? And the guy said
Well I got no job. I got no wife. I got nothing. What else can I do? I might as well go gamble.
This is my first time here. I'm not Japanese.
I didn't say you were.They're like volunteering this to me. I don't care, buddy. But this is the first time I'm here and I'm not Japanese. They insist on it. Well that's fine, you know. But I'd like them to realize that their Japanese Canadians. What does that mean? Well let's look at that. What does that mean? To define it and to live with it and embrace it in fact. I want them to embrace it and to love it as well as for the following generations as well. Yeah I find a lot of the so-called hapa generations now will come back in and explore their Japanese Canadian, their Japanese Canadian side as well and explore it. Because usually their Japanese Canadian parent doesn't talk about it. So yeah, so yeah I would like the non-Japanese Canadians and the Japanese Canadians to explore that past and realize that what happened to, and I use the word advisedly, us, is a human rights issue and it can inform our treatment of other groups in Canada as well from here on in.