My name is Peter Wakayama. I was born in Port Hammond which is about 30 miles east of Vancouver. My dad made tofu. My mother and dad made tofu in age and they distributed — made and distributed around the Maple Ridge area which includes Haney which was next to Hammond and there is Mission, Whonnock and basically it’s the Maple Ridge area right now. When my — when the war came and before the evacuation started my dad must have had some premonition or heard some stories about the people being relocated, so my dad had a green van and that’s where he made the rounds around the Maple Ridge area. He also brought — bought cigarettes and confectionery that he bought from the union store in Vancouver, and he then distributed tofu and sold the cigarettes and confectionery around the area.
So he decided that he would go to Kelowna, that he would go before the evacuation started — they would get outside the coastal area to the interior, and so he went to Kelowna, tried to find accommodations and a job in Kelowna. The problem was because of the timing that he couldn’t find — they weren’t hiring Japanese. Then the other problem was he couldn’t get back to meet the family in Hammond because they were restricting movements. So when the actual evacuation order came and my family, my mother and my two brothers and sister, had to do the packing before they got assembled in Hasting Park. My grandfather and grandmother were also living in Hammond so they helped do the packing and we had very limited things that we could do that you could pack and take to Hasting Park. So my recollection of Hastings Park was that — and I was six at the time — therefore, my recollection of the internment period was really more events and places rather than people per se. When I was in Hastings Park my memory of Hastings Park was well, you saw the bunk beds and then because there were children I guess I was with the mother and children area. I went to the washroom one time and I saw this blood in the washroom and I said “My God there is blood all over the washroom.” And it was some lady who is having her period. Because I didn’t know that since I was young. That was my recollection of Hastings Park.
Then from Hastings Park we went to Tashme. Because my dad was in Kelowna he wasn’t with the family at that period. We were — and I can’t remember how long we were in Hasting Park — but we got located into Tashme. Now we were one of the lucky ones because in Tashme there were the cabins, rows and rows of cabin that you can see in the pictures but we were in what was called the apartments because the apartment was — it was formerly a ranch — and there were barns in the farm buildings around it. So they had converted the barn into a second floor and they had rooms where the people were located. They had a communal kitchen in one of the side buildings which people — my mom and them used — the ladies or the mothers used to cook in there and then I think they brought the food back to the rooms to eat. There was a communal bath which everybody used.
And what happened — what the good thing about the apartment was — we had electricity, none of the cabins had it. We had toilets which none of the other people had in the cabin area. So we were kind of living in the luxurious part of Tashme. So I was going through the grade schools in Tashme, I don’t remember my teacher’s name and I don’t remember the classmates, but do I remember in Tashme that they used — there was another barn where they had the classes and they had assembly hall and this is where they had the shibai and the movies and I remember our class that had to go in one year — I had to lead an all girls orchestra and I remember being all dressed in white and standing in front of the audience and leading this class of all girls orchestra and so that was my recollection of that.
And as part of the shibai I remember Bobby Ito and I don’t know if people remember Bobby Ito but he was the actor who was in Quincy and he was the assistant to the — to Quincy. He became… so he used to dance or tap dance, I think, in Tashme, and he then —- I heard that he went on to — became a ballet dancer, and he went to Winnipeg and then he went to New York, but then he got this role in the TV series and then he became known as an actor. And of course he’s been in several films and feature films and that. So Bob — Bobby Ito — was in Tashme so that was my recollection of Tashme.
Tashme — since I was a little boy it was fun for me. And they used to have movies and they had these silent movies which was done by Mr. Tsuyuki and Mr. Tsuyuki did all the voices and he did the music and there were a lot of samurai movies and some of the Japanese movies. I think what he used to do was he used to also go around to the internment camps to also play these Japanese movies as entertainment because there wasn’t much entertainment in those days. And after Mr. Tsuyuki left my uncle took over that role and he — his name was Yoshimaru Abe — and Yoshimaru Abe was a fairly well known person especially in Winnipeg because that’s where he went to. And his wife is the daughter of Tommy – Tomekichi Honma — and if people know the Japanese Canadian history he was well known because he tried to get the vote. And he actually got the vote, the right to vote, but then it went up to the British parliament and it got turned down. So anyways, my uncle was in the shibai and did the movies.
Some other recollection of Tashme in the apartments was the ofuro. It was a communal one and the women and children went first. And therefore the water was still clean and not smelly. So of course you tried to get in there early. And then the men folks went in afterwards. Now if you didn’t make the early one as a child then you went in with the men and it was smelly because the men folks seemed to have — I don’t know, they sweated more — people came in more. That was the ofuro story.
The other thing I remember was that there was an area farther away from the cabin areas and from the apartments area where there was a baseball diamond. There were also cremations in Tashme. And cremations were — they burned the burial and then of course the smoke goes up and then a lot of times the white smoke would go up and then all the kids would go to — running up to the stairs to see this white smoke going up and I think there is a Japanese word for this — word that goes — it’s called tamaokuri or something. It’s the spirit or something going up the heaven. And so this was another thing that we used to do whenever there was — we knew there was a cremation if we saw this little smoke and we thought it was the spirit because it was just white smoke.
So another thing I remember about Tashme was these Japanese samurai movies, chanchan barabara what they called and I remember one samurai hero or the main character his name was Tsukigata Haanpeita and I thought that was a great, great name, Tsukigata Haanpeita and of course all the kids would make these sticks that we used to make swords and fight like a samurai and that was sort of fun.
But you know, I don’t remember the people in my class. I don’t remember my schoolteacher. And one of the reunions in Toronto where they had a Tashme reunion one of the girls in my class brought the class picture and there is about six or seven to eight of us who we knew in Toronto and we didn’t know we were in the same class and they said oh, well, you’re in the same class and the teacher was there. She was there. So I found out who the teachers were in my class — until then I didn’t know, and so whenever I see her we have greetings.
After the war was finished we went — you had two choices. You could go to Japan or you had to move out of the province. My dad decided that he would move out. He wasn’t going to Japan. My dad eventually came from Kelowna and joined our family in Tashme and he worked at an old camp called the Red Pass road camp which I just found out and the photo exhibit that’s out there and I can see my dad in this group of people in the road camp in front of what the — wherever the picture was taken. So we decided to go to — because at a certain time Tashme was where people who were going to Japan went — there was one more move that they did and that’s where I ended up, in Rosebery. Because we eventually went from Tashme. People who were in the other camps who were going to Japan were all moved to Tashme. And the other people then came out who were going east and went to some of the other camps — that’s why we ended up in Rosebery. And then we stayed what month in Rosebery — one month — and then we went to New Denver. And my recollection of Rosebery is the cabins are right by the lake and I remember going on the little dock or whatever, the wharf there was and fishing with a little eye hook and a little stick and string trying to catch some fish.
In New Denver we were located in a little plateau area called Nelson Ranch which was on a plateau area overlooking the orchard area where the main cabins were located and if you go to New Denver now that’s where the internment centre [Nikkei Memorial Internment Centre] is now. So we had a great view overlooking the lake, overlooking the town. And so we used to go down to the town, go to school there and so I went to school in New Denver.
Because we were in front of an orchard there used to be deers come in and I remember my dad trying to catch a deer with this wire hook that he made, you know, out in the orchard and of course he never caught a deer because the deer could go through this hoop. I also remember that there were wolves at night because we were right beside the mountain. You could hear them especially in the winter, we could hear them. In the summer time there was a railroad track right beside Nelson Ranch up in the mountain area and then you would see the bears along the tracks. So actually New Denver was a beautiful area and if you go there it still was a lovely area. And as you said it could be a resort town.
It is a resort town. It was a really idyllic place from a living point of view. Tashme was really in a valley area, you know, amongst the mountains whereas New Denver was right beside the lake and it was quite attractive and quite pretty.
So the internment period… and I can’t remember how long we were in New Denver. I knew we were there about a year and I don’t know if you know New Denver but the place we had had a hill and in the wintertime when it snowed people used to either toboggan with homemade toboggans or some people had skis and they skied down the hill. It wasn’t big but it was something. But then we had to go down and we had to keep climbing up at night, after school because the school was actually down in the orchard area.
And there was also one lady who was doing Japanese language classes at Nelson Ranch and so after school we used to go to her classes and I don’t remember too much about that but she was having Japanese classes, language classes at Nelson Ranch.
So New Denver was — we weren’t there very long — but my impression was it was just a lovely area to go swimming in and the view of the mountain was just terrific. So after New Denver my dad had known somebody in Ontario and so he had made arrangements that we would go to stay at a farm because they had already been there and so we moved to an area, a little town called Cedar Springs which is just about 12 miles outside of Chatham, Ontario. So my dad… our family then worked for a summer at Cedar Springs picking peaches and so on and picking fruits and that and so then he bought a house in Chatham for a thousand dollars… a tiny little bungalow in the east end of Chatham and there were quite a few people who actually lived in the Chatham area in Ontario.
Chatham was one of the larger areas or cities that had a population of Japanese Canadians. There was Chatham, London, Hamilton, and Toronto which were the main cities that had Japanese Canadian groups. And so the post-war period, that’s where I went to school and then eventually I went to Toronto which is where I currently am, but the internment period for me because of my age was kind of a fun time.
Of course for people who are older and for our parents it was a totally different experience. And so therefore the stories that you gather are based primarily on how old they were and where they lived and what they went through. And so everybody, everybody has a different story.
And so that’s why this particular type of workshop is so wonderful. And you know in Hawaii there is a little — or the Japanese saying, they said okagesama day which is really to say it’s because of our parents that we have benefited from what they went through and as the speaker said this morning it’s because what our parents went through that we have benefited and when you think about it, I mean, here they were, they came from a country to a totally different environment. They didn’t know the language, they didn’t know the culture, they started their own business, they worked hard. And then the war came, they got evacuated, they lost everything they had. My dad — they had a large property in Hammond. They just had built a new house. And they lost that all. So now everybody had to start over again.
And solely for their sake, for our parents, I think we totally owe them a huge amount of gratitude and thanks because it’s because of them that we were able to survive and do well. You know, I just think about what I have been doing if I still stayed in Hammond — would I continue my dad’s tofu, would I would have been able to go to university?
Because there was a large prejudice. We couldn’t do a lot of things in British Columbia because of the prejudice situation there. And so therefore, you know, we do owe a great deal of thanks to our parents. And so to me we benefited and therefore, you know, these stories that you are gathering are so good.
Because what happens and you heard the stories this morning that the sansei and yonsei don’t know stories because they didn’t talk about it. It is now starting to loosen up a bit because of redress, because people are now starting to get interested in capturing those stories. You can do that because you have now got video cameras. So easy to do. And so these are things that are great things in this workshop and that’s why I came out from Toronto to attend this.