A Sum of My Parts / Iku Kiriyama

A Sum of My Parts

By Iku Kiriyama

Is "Japanese American" definable? In looking at what it is to be a Japanese American, and reflecting on my own life, the answer is colored by these things:

++Born in 1939, I am a child of the effects of the Depression. I am also the child of an Issei father from Kagoshima and a Nisei mother, growing up in a bilingual, bicultural (American and Japanese) household.++

Growing up poor has had a major influence. Our family suffered financially when I was an infant. My mother told me it was difficult to even buy me milk. Of three siblings, I was the only one to want for food. To be extremely conscious of "**mottainai**," "to save for a rainy day," and "waste not, want not"--Issei ethics which transferred to many Nisei, myself definitely included.

To be thrifty and not wasteful are legacies from my Depression-influenced parents. Every Nisei knows "mottainai." I clean my plate even when I'm full. I find it hard to throw food away. Only when I find a bag of something that rotted in the back of the refrigerator do I feel no guilt.

After the war (and Nisei always know which "war" we are talking about), we lived in a one-room rental house without a bathroom. Our toilet was an outhouse in the fields.

Growing up in the postwar '40s and '50s in Torrance, we three children were bought one pair of shoes and one new set of clothing a year. The shoes were a size big (we stuffed tissue inside), and if our feet didnít grow into the shoes before the soles got holes, we cut cardboard and stuck it inside. Likewise, we grew into our oversized clothes. However, we did not think of ourselves as poor because of all this. We accepted it all as normal, and thought all children did what we did.

It was so normal that, as a parent, I also bought my children shoes and clothing ìa little big.î It was prudent to do so since our economic situation during the early years of marriage was financially tight. It was, I think, a knee-jerk reaction to my own childhood. And, after all, who are our models for parenthood but our own parents? And again, I thought it was ìnormal,î thinking little of it until I heard that some of the other mothers talked about the way my kids dressed.

++I am the child of a family-owned (nursery) business. Starting work at age seven, I have worked continuously for 50 of my 57 years.++

With a family owned business, strict work ethic was a given. There was no choice of "I don't want to" or "I don't feel like it" or even "I want to play." In fact, "play" was a dirty word. My parents worked; my brother and I worked. Summers, we got up before dawn to plant flowers before the intense sun beat down on us. We worked after school. My friends knew not to invite me for any daytime events. My best friend in eighth grade and her parents would often treat me to drive-in movies--because it took place after dark.

The importance of education was another given. My parents never had to ask if I had homework, nor if I had done my homework. I did it, period. And school was the only excuse from not working in the nursery. If I had a school activity there was no argument. I think that was why I was so active in high school--a subconscious realization that I could get some respite from the nursery.

My father may have also approved of my taking leadership roles at school because he, too, was active in the Issei community.

++I am a child of the camps. At two-and-a-half, I became a "non-alien enemy" interned at Manzanar.++

I was a toddler in Manzanar but that experience manifested itself in my adult years. My only distinct memory as a child was feeling shame as an elementary school student every Dec. 7--Pearl Harbor Day. Every year in school, each teacher I had acknowledged the day. I especially remember my sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Dean, who really made a point of it. She had students stand up and speak about "the Japs." Two of us were Japanese American in the class. We sat across from each other in the circle of desks. I can still see Mrs. Deanís pink face, grinning, looking at mine--my face feeling very hot--as we looked at each other twisting our hands in unison. We hung our heads; our eyes looked straight ahead at each other.

Even until a few years ago, I have felt self-conscious on Dec. 7, avoiding public places like the post office, not wanting to feel the eyes of the old, gray-haired White men staring at my back because ìthey remembered.î

In the '60s, I was teaching high school in the San Fernando Valley, isolated from the Los Angeles community of my USC college days. I was busily involved with my students as a beginning teacher and was also isolated from the ìturbulent í60sî experienced by those a decade younger than me.

Anger that I had never felt before began coming out whenever I heard my students speak of the camps as "our protection,î or the incarceration as ìnecessary." Because those comments came out in the English honors classes I taught, I felt a responsibility to speak of the Bill of Rights, the principles of democracy, and was elated when they said, "I didnít know ... I had never thought of those things ... "

In my second or third year at Monroe High School, on Pearl Harbor Day, the Associated Student Body president came on the school intercom and intoned, "Dec. 7 ... "

It came out during a Japanese language class, and a few of my Sansei students squirmed a little. I told the class about my sixth grade experience and how insensitive it was to broadcast that when we had Japanese American students in the student body. I asked, then, why not "Remember the Alamo," and all the battles of the Revolutionary War and the Maine, etc. Some of my students told the ASB president, who had been a student of mine. He came to apologize to me and said that no one (including the administrators!!) had thought anything of it. While I was at Monroe until 1971, there was never such a broadcast again on Dec. 7.

From the '60s on, I went on a personal crusade to speak of the injustice of the incarceration. This feeling became more intense in the '70s when a few Japanese Americans in my neighborhood didnít believe anti-JA racism existed anymore(!). They felt my "preoccupation" with the camp experience was "negative" and dwelled on the past. They said they were Americans, not "Japanese" Americans. I could not relate to them, nor they to me.

And so, going back to the beginning: What is 'Japanese American?' It all depends. Maybe some of you fit my personal definition because of the common "ties that bind:" the Depression, an Issei parent, the incarceration and growing up poor in the ì**inaka**î of Southern California in the '50s.

For the most part, we have grown up thrifty, moderately bilingual, hardworking, responsible, financially conservative and with some of the hang-ups of the Issei and older Nisei. Both negatives and positives.

*(Iku Kiriyama is a ... living in Gardena. Opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of *The Rafu Shimpo*.)*



	A Sum of My Parts By Iku Kiriyama
	Is "Japanese American" definable? In looking at what it is to be a Japanese American, and reflecting on my own life, the answer is colored by these things: ++Born in 1939, I am a child of the effects of the Depression. I am also the child of an Issei father from Kagoshima and a Nisei mother, growing up in a bilingual, bicultural (American and Japanese) household.++ Growing up poor has had a major influence. Our family suffered financially when I was an infant. My mother told me it was difficult to even buy me milk. Of three siblings, I was the only one to want for food. To be extremely conscious of "mottainai," "to save for a rainy day," and "waste not, want not"--Issei ethics which transferred to many Nisei, myself definitely included. To be thrifty and not wasteful are legacies from my Depression-influenced parents. Every Nisei knows "mottainai." I clean my plate even when I'm full. I find it hard to throw food away. Only when I find a bag of something that rotted in the back of the refrigerator do I feel no guilt. After the war (and Nisei always know which "war" we are talking about), we lived in a one-room rental house without a bathroom. Our toilet was an outhouse in the fields. Growing up in the postwar '40s and '50s in Torrance, we three children were bought one pair of shoes and one new set of clothing a year. The shoes were a size big (we stuffed tissue inside), and if our feet didnít grow into the shoes before the soles got holes, we cut cardboard and stuck it inside. Likewise, we grew into our oversized clothes. However, we did not think of ourselves as poor because of all this. We accepted it all as normal, and thought all children did what we did. It was so normal that, as a parent, I also bought my children shoes and clothing ìa little big.î It was prudent to do so since our economic situation during the early years of marriage was financially tight. It was, I think, a knee-jerk reaction to my own childhood. And, after all, who are our models for parenthood but our own parents? And again, I thought it was ìnormal,î thinking little of it until I heard that some of the other mothers talked about the way my kids dressed. ++I am the child of a family-owned (nursery) business. Starting work at age seven, I have worked continuously for 50 of my 57 years.++ With a family owned business, strict work ethic was a given. There was no choice of "I don't want to" or "I don't feel like it" or even "I want to play." In fact, "play" was a dirty word. My parents worked; my brother and I worked. Summers, we got up before dawn to plant flowers before the intense sun beat down on us. We worked after school. My friends knew not to invite me for any daytime events. My best friend in eighth grade and her parents would often treat me to drive-in movies--because it took place after dark. The importance of education was another given. My parents never had to ask if I had homework, nor if I had done my homework. I did it, period. And school was the only excuse from not working in the nursery. If I had a school activity there was no argument. I think that was why I was so active in high school--a subconscious realization that I could get some respite from the nursery. My father may have also approved of my taking leadership roles at school because he, too, was active in the Issei community. ++I am a child of the camps. At two-and-a-half, I became a "non-alien enemy" interned at Manzanar.++ I was a toddler in Manzanar but that experience manifested itself in my adult years. My only distinct memory as a child was feeling shame as an elementary school student every Dec. 7--Pearl Harbor Day. Every year in school, each teacher I had acknowledged the day. I especially remember my sixth grade teacher, Mrs. Dean, who really made a point of it. She had students stand up and speak about "the Japs." Two of us were Japanese American in the class. We sat across from each other in the circle of desks. I can still see Mrs. Deanís pink face, grinning, looking at mine--my face feeling very hot--as we looked at each other twisting our hands in unison. We hung our heads; our eyes looked straight ahead at each other. Even until a few years ago, I have felt self-conscious on Dec. 7, avoiding public places like the post office, not wanting to feel the eyes of the old, gray-haired White men staring at my back because ìthey remembered.î In the '60s, I was teaching high school in the San Fernando Valley, isolated from the Los Angeles community of my USC college days. I was busily involved with my students as a beginning teacher and was also isolated from the ìturbulent í60sî experienced by those a decade younger than me. Anger that I had never felt before began coming out whenever I heard my students speak of the camps as "our protection,î or the incarceration as ìnecessary." Because those comments came out in the English honors classes I taught, I felt a responsibility to speak of the Bill of Rights, the principles of democracy, and was elated when they said, "I didnít know ... I had never thought of those things ... " In my second or third year at Monroe High School, on Pearl Harbor Day, the Associated Student Body president came on the school intercom and intoned, "Dec. 7 ... " It came out during a Japanese language class, and a few of my Sansei students squirmed a little. I told the class about my sixth grade experience and how insensitive it was to broadcast that when we had Japanese American students in the student body. I asked, then, why not "Remember the Alamo," and all the battles of the Revolutionary War and the Maine, etc. Some of my students told the ASB president, who had been a student of mine. He came to apologize to me and said that no one (including the administrators!!) had thought anything of it. While I was at Monroe until 1971, there was never such a broadcast again on Dec. 7. From the '60s on, I went on a personal crusade to speak of the injustice of the incarceration. This feeling became more intense in the '70s when a few Japanese Americans in my neighborhood didnít believe anti-JA racism existed anymore(!). They felt my "preoccupation" with the camp experience was "negative" and dwelled on the past. They said they were Americans, not "Japanese" Americans. I could not relate to them, nor they to me. And so, going back to the beginning: What is 'Japanese American?' It all depends. Maybe some of you fit my personal definition because of the common "ties that bind:" the Depression, an Issei parent, the incarceration and growing up poor in the ìinakaî of Southern California in the '50s. For the most part, we have grown up thrifty, moderately bilingual, hardworking, responsible, financially conservative and with some of the hang-ups of the Issei and older Nisei. Both negatives and positives. (Iku Kiriyama is a ... living in Gardena. Opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of The Rafu Shimpo.)