 And opening up the webinar. All right, we're live. Welcome friends. We're going to get started in just a moment while we let folks fill up the room. Welcome everyone. So we do have chat available tonight and we do have closed captioning on. And if you don't want that, you can just click on the little CC button and it will disappear. Or you can choose to have it disappear, I should say. Welcome everyone welcome welcome. Okay, let's go ahead with the library announcements first off thank you all for being here tonight. And we are excited to have the wonderful shows away seagull and Nancy Wong. And so we do want to remind you that the San Francisco public library acknowledges that we occupy the unseeded and ancestral homeland of the Romulus Sholoni people who are the original habitants of the San Francisco peninsula. We want to understand that they are the rightful. inhabitants of this peninsula and we recognize that we benefit from living and working on their traditional homeland as uninvited guests we approve their sovereign rights as first peoples and wish to pay our respects to the elders, and ancestors of the Romulus community, and a shout out today to the Sigourte Land Trust and the city of Oakland for giving five acres back to the Romulus community, and led by Sigourte Land Trust who is a powerhouse of women run organization who work in the land back movement so check them out. And I will throw some links down in the chat here as we go. Just some other announcements coming up we have a lot of a lot of we're resuming some in person events if you haven't been to the main library in a while, come on down gorgeous as ever. This Saturday and we'll be talking about the WPA murals at the mother's building, and that's at 11am. We're also just announced not this program but on Sunday this Sunday. Cory Doctor will be there. It's a short last minute event so come check that out. 2pm. And then Wednesday we'll be streaming. It's a hybrid event that means you can either come in person or register on zoom. We'll be talking to William Riggs, as well as some big wigs from the MTA and road management in the city, and like if we actually opened our streets to not traffic, it'd be amazingly interesting. And this could be moderated by Alexis Madrigal so come check that out. Wednesday, 6pm. We're celebrating Viva right now Viva is Latinx Heritage Month, and it expands through mid September through mid October, and we also then will be celebrating Dia de las Muertos. Our artist for the month is Fernando Marti. And if you walk by our main library on Grove Street you will see giant banner of his work and I mean giant. It's the whole side of the building. And please keep that in mind we switch it up all the time. And it's often our featured artist who is a local artist in San Francisco. He's also an activist. And he will be talking about his work and his journey in art. Virtually October 5, 7pm. All right, our biggest literary campaign of the years. COVID has made year years now. One city one book it's the 17th one city one book in San Francisco. We're celebrating the work, Earl on Woods and Nigel for who have the well known podcast this is your hustle, and their book. We're celebrating your hustle about their journey into podcasting, but also some really deep and personal stories from folks inside. So with this campaign, we have the main event November 3 in combo with Piper Kerman from Netflix and the New Black, but we also get to have two months of programming that align with the book so programming about incarceration, social justice reform, abolition and reentry. Our library has a jail and reentry services department and they do like they do the work so they are just amazing humans and I'm excited to be able to host this outpost. You can get your book right now at any of our 28 locations. And just a quick shout out for the last thing tomorrow for Friday home, get on your meditation virtually. And this is a partnership with the SS and fast. All right, so I'm so excited tonight, as always, to bring. I love having shiz in the virtual library and in person coming up in October that will be exciting. She's such a supporter of other authors. So I'm really excited to have you're here tonight talking about her own work. And shiz is the force behind right now SF Bay, which is a writing group that has supported Bay area writers of colors through workshops and events and anthologies since 2015. And today, shiz is in conversation with Nancy Wang Wang of ethno tech. Got it. All right, I am going to stop sharing and turn it over to the two of them. Shiz and Nancy take it away. Okay. Thank you very much for that great introduction and Lisa. I have to say, the library folks behind the scenes library folks are so wonderful may work so hard. So thank you so much. This is a way seagull of right now SF Bay. And I'm with Nancy Wang of ethno tech. She and her husband, Robert Kikuchi in Goho have been groundbreaking internationally acclaimed storytellers for 40 years. She's one of my heroes, and I feel blessed to be talking with her today. Well, shiz, the feeling is mutual. We absolutely love your work as well. So I am honored to be here with you and to talk about your upcoming book. So your book I understand is your ancestral family is about your ancestral family, which is hard to write given our ancestors are gone. We cannot ask them anything. And I know what that's like, because I have written to them myself about my ancestors. Red Altar, which is my ancestors who came in 1850 and started the fishing industry in 1850. So definitely not an end to ask. And then the shadows and secrets, which is about my grandfather and his dad, and whether or not he was pushed or he slipped and died as he fell through and down the elevator shaft of his restaurant. 1924, there's no one to ask about these very mysterious circumstances around that time of his death. So I know what it takes to put a story like this together. And I know why I want to tell the stories of my ancestors. Could you tell us why you want to tell the stories of your ancestors? You know, what do you want your readers to come away with? What I love about art is there's no single one single takeaway stories are layered so each person hears a story in a different way. And I might hear it a different way every time they hear it take away something different every time. It's one of the things I love about layered writing. But I touch on some of my reasons for writing and some of my hopes for the reader in my introduction. In these times of uncertainty, I draw upon my ancestors for hope and courage. They were nobody's extraordinary extraordinary unknowns just trying to survive in America, trying to do right by themselves and those they touched. They were authentic. 100 years ago, they had no need for labels, icons or constructs. Their direct reality was complex, nuanced and unstudied. When my grandparents were alive, I didn't pay much attention. They were so darn ordinary. What was there to learn from them? So I buried my nose in books and watched movies. I'd longed to rub elbows with landed gentry or captains of industry, Tweety professors, anything but Japanese American truck farmers and innkeepers that I couldn't even talk to because I never bothered to learn Nihongo. I scorned them for not learning English. I longed for them to hug and kiss me and tell me they were proud of me like the people who claim they were the real Americans. Why couldn't my family explain things? Spoon feed me in visual verbal age appropriate doses like my teachers in school instead of expecting me to look and listen carefully to what they did. As they faded from my life, I ached with the void of their passing, fled with questions never asked, stories barely heard. I lead through photo albums and played back half remembered scenes. Slowly, the departed came to inhabit me, their collective wisdoms taking root deep within. My ancestors never questioned that the central point of living was to be good. How does one survive the bandits and beasts of light without becoming one? What to do when the tiger's breath is hot behind you and the only way forward leads over a cliff. Time and again, my ancestors took the leap of faith. The truth of their stories steadies me in uncertain times. Thank you Shisway, and yesterdays are very uncertain times still. And so you talk about the tiger's breath hot behind you. I know that story. So can you tell me why you chose it as a metaphor and that your title is the Tiger and the Cliff? The Tiger and the Cliff is a Buddhist parable about a traveler on a long journey. When he notices that a tiger is stalking him, he's terrified. He runs and runs until he comes to a steep cliff. Should he stay and get eaten or leaked to certain death? There are two versions of the story. In the Zen version, the man sees a vine grabs it and slings himself over the edge. As he begins to lower himself to safety, he sees another tiger waiting below and above their two mice nibbling away at the vine. When it breaks, he will fall to certain death. At that moment, he sees a strawberry and eats it. It's the most delicious he's ever tasted. In other words, when you're aware that you may die at any moment, every moment becomes precious. In the Jodo Shinshu version that my mother told me, there's no vine and the man sees jagged rocks at the base of the cliff. He leaps anyway because he has no choice. He entrusts himself to Amida Buddha, who carries him wherever he needs to be. Be it a ramble patch, a peaceful meadow, or the nirvana that awaits the faithful after death. As I wrote about my grandparents, I realized they lived both sides of that story. They savored the smallest things in life because they understood how easily they were lost. And a lot of times they were faced with no choices except to entrust themselves to the Buddha. By their example, I learned to do the same. I realized I actually have no control over my life or my creativity. So I try to find the lesson in each moment and trust the universe and the muse. It's often terrifying, but I don't have a choice. It was my parents actually who lost their trust. They sought security because they were young adults when Pearl Harbor turned their lives upside down and destroyed their belief that they could ever be safe. So they carried that, their whole lives, that yearning for stability, that need to sort of control. And so I always used to be like, why can't I be gentle like them? But my grandmother used to say, trade, skip a generation. And I realized through the writing that I'm not a model minority failure like my parents thought I was. I'm actually a pioneering risk taker like my grandparents have been. Right you are, she's right. So you've inherited your grand, their courage and their risk taking, certainly what is needed in order to leave one country and go to another country that is so different on their own. They just take a huge leap of faith that somehow you will survive and thrive or not. But if you don't survive, that's the end of the story. But obviously you have a story. So tell us more about your book. Is it a novel or is it a memory? It's actually a hybrid. I started out writing a memoir from a child's point of view about growing up with my parents and my grandparents and struggling with my own identity. But whenever I, you know, read parts of it, shared parts of it, people would ask about my ancestors, they want to know more about them. So I decided to begin with their stories. And since the facts alone can be a bit dry, I had to add setting character and emotion. So the first in my mom's family to take a leap of faith was her father, Taro Tsuruda. And I should say here, because one of my cousins is here, I changed everybody's name so that just in case I reveal anything that they don't want people to know, they can always say, Oh no, that's not my family. It's like, she's not my cousin. She doesn't have the same name. She, you know, she doesn't have the family name. So anyway, so anyway, I named my grandfather in the book, Taro Tsuruda. I never met him because he died in 1934. But he was alive in my mother's heart and mind. She never stopped talking about him. And I pieced together his life from the known facts and pouring through tattered family albums just looking at all the pictures. And then I got to visit his own village in Japan. So who was he? Why did he leave Japan? And what did it take for him to succeed in California? Sometimes his life unreals in my head like a movie. So this chapter is called Taro Leaves Home 1905. Taro, let's go. Time to go. Hearing his cousins whisper outside, Taro glanced at his sleeping mother. She did not stir. He mowed the silent goodbye and slid out of their tiny home into the night, raising a finger to his lips. He led his cousins away from the tight cluster of thatched homes before whispering, I told Tatchan I'd be helping your father tonight until late tonight. Jiro Sakamoto, his cousin, and his younger brother Saburo nodded. They were expendable second and third sons. While Taro was their aunt Mika's only child, she liked to keep him close. When are you going to tell your mother what worked? Jiro began his eyebrows rising like worried parentheses. Taro cut him off with a smile. We need more information first. Mrs. Sato said we should talk to old man Watanabe. That woman, she sticks her nose in everybody's business, Jiro Scott. She's a go-between, Taro said. It's her job to know everybody so she can make good matches. He punched Jiro's arm in grin. I haven't heard you complain about your new bride. Jiro blushed. Okay, Sato-san knows what she's doing. Younger brother Sab yawned. So you get us up before dawn to walk 15 miles to see some stranger? This better be good. At 17, he was three years younger than Taro and Jiro. He was not ready to grow up quite yet. Jiro scolded. Lots of people get to America but few return. This is our chance to find out as much as we can and share screen for a minute. This is my grandparents' village in 2002. I don't think it's changed all that much since my grandfather lived there. It's a long walk. So let's go, Taro said. They lengthened their stride as they passed rice fields ribboned along the creek. The three acres subsistence farms in this volcanic hill country could barely feed a family of five or six. They wanted families of their own. Young men had to leave home. A few miles, steep bamboo-choked hills pressed in from both sides and the path turned rough and slippery along a stream that roared down broken basalt slabs. It feels like ghosts and goblins are watching from the trees. The men trotted faster until the path rounded a hill and opened out into another small valley and then another and then another. Finally, as light began to fill the sky, they dropped into the broad plain around Yamaga. Taro's lungs expanded in the spacious landscape. He felt taller amid the green trees that rolled out in lush waves and pushed away the enclosing hills. This is what I want, he said to himself, something like this. He drew the expansive vision into himself like a prayer and a promise. Old man Watanabe was sweeping his yard when they arrived. He was forty-ish and nearly bald. He moved stiffly as if his hips were worn out from years of stoop labor. Ah, so you're the boys that Sato-san told me about. Come in, come in. Taro and his cousins tried not to gape at his American curiosities. But Watanabe waved towards the fancy clock, the stereopticon, the photo albums, and well-thumbed books. Don't be house cashier. You came to learn about America. Poke around my things. Get a good look. Watanabe made Taro lead through photos of logging camps and fields and Japanese people in western clothes. Watanabe lost himself in the 1100-page Sears Robot catalogue where it seemed the entire western world was on order. Stoves and furniture and every tool you could imagine. Saab was awed by the stereopticon's 3D images of giant buildings, bridges and waterfalls. It feels like this train is coming right at me. Watanabe served them 100 black tea and flowery porcelain cups with matching saucers. So many people go to America without a clue. Don't make the mistakes I made. Stay clear of labor contractors that promise you ships passage and guaranteed work. That passage isn't free. They take it out of your pay and make you sign a two or three-year contract. You could end up in a fish cannery or a logging camp or railroad yard in the middle of nowhere. He softened his tone when he noticed Saab's eyes were wide with alarm. Antonio, it's not so bad if you plan ahead. Pay your own passage. Bring enough cash to live on while you look around. Don't grab the first job that you find because you're desperate. If you can, writing down names. These folks in Kumamoto City will help you get passports and visas, steamship tickets and American dollars. And when you get to San Francisco, go straight to Nihonjin Machi and stay at this hotel. Be careful. Plenty of people will see you as chickens ripe for plucking. But if you have a pure heart, they'll find good people to help you. They talked some more and Watanabe said, looks like you have almost enough money. It can take months to get the paperwork. So it's time to tell your parents. Taro and his cousins had so many questions. It was late afternoon by the time they began their long walk home. Taro's mother, Nika was waiting for him. She served him the Nihidi and grilled vegetables she saved for him. And watched him eat with his usual gusto. Her dear boy seemed tired, but different somehow. After he finished his last grain of rice, he put his hands together. Let's all sum up. Thank you for this food. Then he placed his palms flat on the floor and bowed his head until it touched the tatami. Zembu aigatai, he said to his mother. Thank you for everything. I care for you deeply, but I have to go. We only have enough land to feed the two of us. I need to earn enough money to support you and your old age and have a family of my own. His tone was so final that Nika's heart tore in half like a piece of rotten cloth. But her touch on the back of his head was as gentle as a bird. I know you must leave to be free of the stain I created. There's no obligation to be a good son to a bad mother. She bent her own head as she always did when passing through the village. Then she retrieved a tiny sack of money from behind the rice crop. Here, I've been saving for your journey too. Taro's eyes rimmed with tears. You have never been a bad mother. You have always surrounded me with love and the spirit of Amida. Taro took the little sack and placed it in front of the tiny Buddhist shrine. Tomorrow, I'll give this money to our relative, Shinjo, and ask him to keep an eye on you. And I'll start sending money as soon as I get work in America. Nika sat down in front of the opu-tsudan, lit a stick of incense, and picked up her ojizu. Come pray with me. Namandab, namandab, namandab. In the flickering lantern light, the shadows of mother and son blended on the wall behind them. Nice. She's home. I could see it. Your vivid descriptions just brought me right into the story. Where do you find this wealth of detail in your writing? Well, I'm 76 years old. So I've had a lot. Younger, younger. And I've been nosy my whole life. So, and I grew up in the television, pre-television era. So I paid attention to real people and how their environments shaped them. As an Army brat, I had to make sense of many, many different communities. I lived in Japan when it was still recovering from war. I earned my first dollar picking strawberries with my grandparents in a California sharecropping camp. My father's mother ran a Skid Row hotel in Stockton. These environments are gone, but I was immersed in them. And I grew up on Japanese, on some of my movies and Japanese art. And as a teenager, I went to Buddhist conferences where I heard people, you know, normally stoic, quiet people would come to these conferences and just sob and talk openly about their deepest struggles, you know, looking for the faith, you know, and understanding to go on. It was really moving. And later, much later, I got a crash course in Japanese American history when I worked for the National Japanese American Historical Society. By that time, it was in the late 90s. Many Issei were gone, and the second generation, Nisei, who had been quiet their whole lives, were starting to talk. You know, they were starting to want to tell their stories. So I read a lot of fun. I did interviews and oral histories and I read tons of books and I got a real sense of the legal and political forces that erode human rights, even today. It's like there are people who stay up at night to take away our rights. And are we paying attention? Often we're not paying enough attention. So with years and years, 76 years of pouring this stuff inside of you, you really have quite a lot of treasure boxes within you to draw from. So there's also secrets. And we talked earlier about, you know, that sometimes there are secrets. And if there are people out there in our audience who actually are thinking about writing about their families, but there are secrets that are important to the story. Let me put it in if it's going to offend somebody. So how did you deal with these secrets? I know you changed their names, but what else? So did you deal with your secrets that you discovered as you pulled up all your family stuff? Well, I tried not to sugarcoat or suppress facts, as I understood them. And I always have the sense that, you know, what I know is just a small part of it. The whole reality is much larger and different people are going to have different viewpoints. So I understand that. I don't say, this is the way it was. You know, I say, this is the way that certain people slide. And then I try to represent everyone with compassion, even the people I didn't agree with. And there are some people in, you know, in my story, you know, but I try to show what their motivations could have been because, you know, no, very few people. And, you know, just go, I'm just going to be a bad guy and I'm going to be mean to everybody. I mean, that happens to people and we need to have some compassion for, you know, how those things happen and what the pressures are. Because, you know, it's, it's not easy to resist temptation a lot of times. Yeah, it's not easy being good. And I mean, we live in a society where it's sort of assumed and expected that everybody is greedy and everybody is competitive and blah, blah, blah, but that's not the community I was raised in. You know, most people were extremely honest, hardworking, compassionate. And, you know, by writing these stories, I wanted to sort of convey that sense of even though it had its drawbacks. You know, I have to be honest, there's a lot of things, you know, the sexism and, you know, other things that weren't so great, but there was a sense of community, a sense of humility of helping each other. And then the other thing is, you know, my aunties were sort of like the pillars of the community and, and, and then as they started to age, my goodness, in the last couple of years of their lives, almost every single one of them started telling me all of these secrets and it's like changing my perception of, oh, you mean like my father was like that. Oh, you mean, that's why my father is so, you know, anyway, so it was, it was fascinating and yeah. So I wanted to write the story in such a way that that these things sort of come out gradually because I didn't, I didn't know all the whole story of some of these things until much later. So I wrote partly to understand on the facade that you know, the keeping face, and then what was the reality behind that, you know, sometimes it was different and then what were the other pressures were people having to have the two sides. To me, the older generation were very private too. So the reason that this book has been so long and coming is I had to wait for my parents to die, tell you the truth. They would not have been happy. They're rumbling up there in heaven. But you know, now that my father's not alive to be embarrassed, he might have a little more distance. You know, I'm hoping. But anyway, you know, in the story, I didn't spell out why Mika thought she was a bad mother. I'm going to share a screen. Oops. Oh my goodness. I, I forgot I was going to share these. Anyway, so these are some of the pictures that I looked through the albums and just, you know, you look at the faces and you see the people evolve over time. And you look at the children, and you realize that some of them died and, you know, other people. So this is the same, my grandparents in three different decades and in those days, the quality of photos was really crisp. So I would spend hours just looking at their faces and, and I felt like they were telling me stories, I could get a sense of who they were and what they felt. And then there were the daily life. This is my mother washing clothes in a farm yard in the 30s. And when I was growing up on that sharecropping camp in the 50s. It was not too much different. So I sort of, I feel lucky that I got sort of the felt experience of things of living on a farm living in the country, living without a lot of money. But anyway, I was going on to talk about Mika. I didn't spell out in the story that I read why Mika thought she was a bad mother, but I imagine some of you guessed what the reason she thought she was bad. Anyway, this is what I learned in 2020 when I went to Japan to look for my grandfather's home village. And that was a leap of faith of my own. I didn't speak hardly any Japanese, and my mother only knew the names of the village and one nearby town. So I got to the Kumamoto train station, and there was a tourist bureau all excited about they're going to help me and they said, Oh no, they've changed the names of all the villages so unfortunately we can't tell you where where your, your ancestral village was. So that evening I was feeling really discouraged I said what the heck, I'm going to go to a bar and have a drink. I never drink. I never, you know, it's like if I have one drink a year, you know, so but on this occasion, I went into a bar. And this bar happened to be closed for band practice. And the guys that ran it were hakoji white guys from England and Australia who had come to study swordsmanship. They also played rock and roll music, and their Japanese bass player was also a property lawyer who knew the modern name of the village, because his wife had grown up nearby. So he went to his car, and he got a map went to a color copy place at 10 o'clock at night, got the map copied for us. And then he even supplied the bus numbers said okay you have to transfer in Yamaga, you know, and take this other bus. And he said the bus would stop right in front of the town hall, where I could order a Koseki, which is the official documentation of my family line. So, I couldn't believe my luck, you know, we get off the bus. And, and so that whole description of my grandfather's walk from Yamaga, I wrote the bus backwards. And so I saw all these little villages and I saw the creeks, you know, and you know I'm cleaning my neck from the bus, I'm going oh my God, you know, this is where my grandfather used to live. So, anyway, so we got to the town hall. They say, Oh, you want your family Koseki. Okay, 1500 yen. It's about 15 bucks right. It will take us about 10 minutes to find it in the computers and print it out so come back. So, my, my partner Ben and I went for a walk, just to kind of absorb a sense of place. And, you know, I didn't think I would find the house or anything, you know, just walk around right. So we need an old man. I just wanted to know, you know, what we're doing there. I said, Oh, my G John used to live here. And, and it turns out he knew my grandfather's mother, Mika. He said, Oh, to that. I know that's Mika. She, she used to live down there. She lived to be very, very old. He said she used to live in that house over there. So, um, yeah, just walk down that way. And meanwhile, I'll take my motorbike and I'll ride on ahead and warn the family that you're coming. So, we walked over there. And the family was out there. They're happy to see us. They invite us inside. Mika's portrait is hanging prominently in their living room. Um, Tato had given them his family's small piece of land, and he sent them money regularly so they could care for Mika until the end of her life. So the Koseki showed a blank space where Tato's father's name should have been. So when I got home, I asked my, my aunt who had been born in Tokyo, what it meant. She said, Oh, the blank means he was illegitimate. She says, you know, in Japan, you always check the family's Koseki before you marry in. So before I married your uncle, I took the train 700 miles to check the Koseki. It was 1947 right after the war. It was not easy to travel. But I had to find out. So I, I saw the blank, but there were no other problems with the family. So I married your uncle. I never told him. I never told my family what I found. And don't you tell my children. This was 2002. I still felt embarrassed. So I kept her secret about my grandfather's illegitimacy until after she died. And when I finally told my cousins, they just laughed. They said, Oh, she had such old country. Wow. Wow, that's quite a journey to what circumstances that you along the way just met like it meant to be. That's that's wonderful. So, so your aunt took still a quite a risk to marry and even though so this is the aunt who married the illegitimate. She married my mother's younger brother. So, and this was in post war Japan. Okay. So, but my grandmother occupable risk as well. Yes, yes. And so I know they were during the war before after the war, there were a lot of pictor brides was she going to put to right. Let's see. My grandmother, let's see, they got married in 1912. And she always insisted that she was not a picture bride. So they're right even before. Yeah, like a matching. Yeah, yeah, it was quite, you know, back in the 19 early 1900s. Men would oftentimes come by themselves. And, you know, they left Japan because they were poor. So they didn't feel they could afford to marry until they had some money. And then once they had some money, they would send back home to their parents and they'd say, can you go check, you know, don't go talk to the local by shakuni the go between and see if you can find a nice eligible girl for me. So that was the way that a lot of marriages happened in those days. And my grandmother always took pride in the fact that she was technically not a picture bride, because she had met Taro before he left Japan. As you'll see from this story. So, and let me share screen so that you can see what they look like. Okay, did I get distracted and not show you Mika's picture. Yeah, you did. Okay, so that's Mika. That's the mom of Taro. Yeah, she was the one that had the illegitimate child and who knows what the reason was. You know, we'll never know, you know, was she raped, you know, did she fall in love with a married man, did the man leave for America or to find work in the city and never come back. And you know, we don't know the story. But anyway, this is my grandfather Taro, and this is my grandmother Aki. And this story I'm going to tell is going to be from the point of view of Aki's mother. Aki's betrothal, 1910. The widow Shinobu Urabe didn't care for the suitors looks the broad flat nose, the low forehead, a mouth too full of teeth. Her hands look stiff and awkward. She replaced the photograph carefully on the worn tatami floor. She avoided looking at her daughter's daughter Aki's tight, expected face. Instead, she said to Mrs. Sato, the go between. America, America. Why are all the young people so obsessed with it. They're not exactly marrying a stranger, Sato-san weadled. Taro Teruda grew up in the next village. I've known him since he was little. He's smart and hardworking and good hearted. Aki could do a lot worse. Mrs. Sato turned toward 19 year old Aki and brightened her voice as if talking to a child. Taro had a festival before he left for America. He certainly remembered you for seven years. He asked for you specifically. Aki looked at the floor, her full cheeks glowing like ripe peaches. Shinobu was scandalized. Although Aki was now a marriageable 19, seven years ago she was only 12. How could he think of marrying such a young girl? And with his background, Shinobu sputtered. But Mrs. Sato cut her off. Taro remembered her because she has always been so mature and level-headed. He writes that she was smart and thoughtful and asked really good questions about America. She nudged Shinobu's shoulder. She takes after her father. Remember, he was one of the first from this area to go work in Hawaii. And you went with him. That was different. We were already married. And the wife must follow the husband. Shinobu shuddered at the memory. Plantation work was brutal. I was so glad to get back home. Aki was born in Hawaii. And she inherited her father's wanderlust. Sato-san pulled out more photos. Taro is doing very well, yo. Look. When Shinobu saw the glossy 8x10s, she knew she had lost. He could rent a cheap suit and get his portrait taken in a fancy chair in front of a painted backdrop. But the immensity of the California landscape in these photos could not be faked. In the first picture, that low brown Taro was plowing a field with a horse-drawn plow. The broad, flat valley was like the land around Yamaga. It went on and on towards grassy open hills. The next photo showed two horse-drawn wagons. Look, said Mrs. Sato. Five horses and the wagons are piled with produce for the market. And Aki will have company, too. Jiro Sakamoto's wife is already there. Sato-san pointed to a Japanese woman in an American style fitted jacket. Her hair swooped up in a Gibson girl poop topped by a large flowered hat. In the background, an elevated wooden irrigation system carried water to the fields. Mrs. Sato's voice rose and fell as she explained to Aki that wood was plentiful in California and came from giant trees called redwoods. As she talked and talked, Shinobu's eyes slid past her towards the familiar green of the rice fields outside. How could her only daughter want to leave this peaceful and predictable place where season followed season in majestic progression? Would she never see her daughter mature from the vibrant green of youth to ripe fullness, heavy with seed? Will she never see grandchildren? Shinobu sighed. Picking up the suitors' photo, she saw a calm determination in his eyes that matched Aki's. He was clearly a man with the grit to turn dreams into reality. Aki was silent, but Shinobu could read her words of last night in the stubborn set of her jaw. At this risk, she had said to her mother, nothing is certain except one day we will die. I want to see the world first. Shinobu's shoulders slumped ever so slightly. We could only be what we are, she thought. Oto san mitai ne, like your father, through and through. Go ahead then. But Mrs. Sato was not satisfied. Children deserve their parents' wholehearted support. Otherwise, the past becomes a slow leak in the heart, not a good foundation for the ever-widening present. Shinobu gently. Girls are never yours to keep. Once they marry, their duty is to their husband's family. When the bird is ready to fly, you must open the cage. Besides, you have your son Shinjiro to look after you. That's enough, said Shinobu. Aki may do what she wants. She always does. She turned away to refill the teapot so the others would not see that her eyes were already glazing with tears. Oh my god, you're really going to America? Aki's 14-year-old brother, Shinjiro, burst in. He had been hovering outside, eavesdropping. Right me every day, he urged. Tell me everything you see. Do you think Taro has a big house? Does he sleep in a bed or on the floor? Does he wear shoes inside the house? Over the next few weeks, Aki made her preparations styleably. In spite of her brother's excitement, she saw no point in imagining what life in America would be like. She would find out soon enough. Did she like what she found? Yes, apparently, she and Taro were a great match. They were equal partners working the fields and making joint decisions. Within a few years, they were leasing their own farm. 140 acres, the biggest in Pismo Beach, right on the ocean on the coastal bluff north of Shell Beach. Today, it's a gated community. It's a gated community of multimillion-dollar homes just north of Pismo Beach. In pre-colonial days, it had been a Chumash site, and our family treasured the arrowheads and stone knives that my grandfather's plow turned up to ask forgiveness of the spirits of the people who made them. They asked the Shinto priest to come from San Francisco and perform a ceremony of unity and gratitude. My grandparents lived in harmony with nature, but in the early 1900s, before they leased the land for farming, the site was briefly used for another purpose. Oil was discovered on the central coast in the early 1900s, and London and San Francisco investors spent $1.5 million to build a refinery on that same piece of land that could process 8,000 barrels of oil a day. It took two years and 500 men to build this complex that included a 2,200-foot pier to ship oil to Canada, Japan, and beyond. There's the pier. On December 10, 1907, just two weeks after the refinery opened, it was battered by a huge storm that damaged the facility and wiped out half the pier. Over the next 10 years, the local paper, the Daily Telegraph, reported many attempts to reopen the refinery before it was finally dismantled and sold, parts sold off for peanuts in 1918. There was lots of coverage on the white investors and even on the white dismantler, but nothing about my grandparents when they leased the acreage in 1918 and transformed it into a prosperous farm that lasted until 1942. So in those days, there was quite a bit of animosity towards the Japanese. A lot of white folks thought that they were taking over. So there was a legislation in 1924 to ban, you know, the Chinese immigrants had been banned in the 1880s. In 1924, they stopped immigration from Japan. So before the Immigration Act, Taro and Aki hired Japanese immigrants to help them farm. During the growing season, they had about 20 people working for them and they grew peas and beans and broccoli, lettuce, cabbage, all vegetables that thrived in the moist sea air. And then after the Immigration Act, they hired Filipino workers. They did so well that in 1927, they bought a half block of property in San Luis Obispo near the Buddhist Church. Today, the Buddhist Church is underneath the freeway. The church site is underneath the freeway and Japan Town is just a whisper of memory. As an Asian immigrant, Taro was ineligible for citizenship. He couldn't buy property because of the alien land laws, but he found a workaround. According to my mom, he paid $30,000 cash for the Japan Town property in 1927. And an American born Nisei put his name on the deed. Taro invested, put out the cash and this other guy put his name on the deed and held it for him. In 1931, Taro invested another $25,000 into upgrading the property and the tenants held a big party. This is what the property looked like in after the war. But of course, they lost the property during the war. They lost the ranch during the war. Taro had turned 21 in early 1941 and she took title to this property, but it was lost after Pearl Harbor. So the Japanese families lost their property, lost everything in business. So did your family then end up doing World War II, not only losing the property, but they did. They lost the lease on the farm and they lost this Japan Town property. And it's kind of a long story. I don't have time to get into too many details tonight, but I wanted to give kind of a flavor of the emotional impact by telling a story about my mother. So in December 1942, Helen Tsuruda was looking forward to going home for Christmas. She was almost finished with her third semester at Ms. Hasmore School of Fashion in Los Angeles. Oh, yeah. This was some of her homework. Her mother Aki's dream was for Helen to open a dressmaking shop in the San Luis Epispo Japan Town. And her brother Hank would run a pharmacy and brother Pete would run the filling station. So on December 7, Helen decided she would wear, oops, sorry. Helen decided that she would wear a newly made daydress to church. She smoothed on a precious pair of nylons, slipped on her good heels, and turned to the mirror to admire the crisp glide of linen over her trim hips. Not bad, she said to herself. The oba-sans would approve her craftsmanship. The young ladies might envy the style, and some of the young men might even notice her slim calves. Church was always a comfort, but to go to the, to get to the Buddhist church, she had to take a streetcar across a desert of whiteness. Helen's token clinked into the fare box, and she scanned the streetcar for a place to sit. She saw closed faces, sausage flies at Kimbo, fat shopping bags taking up the space and a half, two spaces, and cold eyes, bearing her to try to squeeze in. As the car lurched into motion, she headed towards the back, staggering on short legs from one upright to the next, the overhead strap swinging just out of reach. She found a spot on the long bench behind the rear doors to avoid the icicle stairs opposite. She claimed her neck to look out the window behind her. As they reached the commercial strip at Sautel Avenue, a man ran out into the street, waving his arms and fraud sweeping strokes like a semaphore. Oahu bombed by Japanese planes. I just heard it on the shortwave radio. It's war. The streetcar erupted in a babel of voices. Those backstabbing yellow bastards. We should have never let them into this country. It wasn't us, she tried to say. We're American. But the words froze in her throat. Heart pounding, she leapt off the bus at the next stop and scurried down the street to the church, shoulders hunched, not looking left or right until she was safely inside the otera. The crumbling body collapsed against the wall for a long moment and then relaxed into the ancient call for prayer, the impact of log on bronze. The heavy scent of chrysanthemum and the upward swirl of incense enveloped her for a moment in something like calm. The calm didn't last long, of course, there's a lot more to that story. You want to kind of run out of time. So tell, for one last thing you'd like to tell us about when, like, like, is the book finished, when you finished, what else is in there? When do you, you know, what, when can people buy it? Well, I'm, I am probably about 70, 80% finished. I did some research this spring that have sort of changed a few things. So I have to go back and, and do that. But the, it's an intergenerational story. It's not just my grandparents, it continues on with my, with my mother and my father and their experiences in camp and afterwards. And, and then after I'm born, then the story continues from my point of view as a child watching my elders trying to reconcile Japanese and American values. And the climax is in my teenage years. When I make my own leap out of the model minority and into the unknown of an independent life. So, I can't tell you when it, when it, it'll come out. I've published little bits and pieces of it here and there. So, it's a long process as a book writing, you know, because you've got to absorb it and things change and then you read it again and you see something else that can go into it. But we all look forward to it. It's a very exciting, very important book. I like you said, ordinary people who have greatly contributed to the lives that we all in the world experience now, especially, you know, here in America. So, I don't know if there are any questions in the chat. I don't know anyone wants to say anything. I don't know if that's possible. What would you like to do? Do you want to just sign off or see what else is available? Let's see. There's a lot of lively chat in the audience. I'm definitely willing to take we can put questions in the chat, or if somebody would like to raise their hand I can unmute them as well. I think there's a lot of shizzes supporters out here which is lovely to see. I see a lot of familiar names. I do, too, as library, you know, people who come in and read and yeah, I love this community when it's so supportive like this. Oh, Terita McKell is here. Oh, thank you, Terita. And lots of Bona folks and my cousin Steve. Yeah, so thank you so much for coming. Yeah, if there were any questions, although I don't want to keep you too late. It's okay, it's okay. It's an eight o'clock mark, so. I also see, I guess we could do little shout outs. I also see Salma. Arestu in the crowd, too. Is there an author? Yeah, this is like a who's who crowd shizz. Yeah, well, some of them are going to be in the upcoming fifth anthology that right now is producing. And we're having another event at the main library next month. So I throw that in the chat one more time, too. And that's going to be a nice big event with lots of folks. Like I said, shizz is such a supporter of other folks so definitely. Okay, so I'm not so happy that she's you're taking this time for yourself. Thank you so much. I wanted to actually give you some time Nancy because you do so many amazing things and you so generally said, just generously said, No, this is your time take it so I really appreciate that. This is, this is the event that's coming up Sunday, October 23 for two to 4pm at the San Francisco main library correct auditorium live will all be able to see each other. And it's a nice big auditorium so we can social distance and be safe and also still enjoy each other's company and these are the folks that I'm that said they're going to read and show their artwork that night. That day, Adrienne Arias, the Peruvian artist Avacha, Salma, Arastu, Lorraine Bonner, the African American Sculptor, Carla Brundage, Sike Itamura, Tamina Khan, to Rita Miquel who's here tonight. Jose Rojas, brilliant muralist Kim Shack, poet Laureate Emerita, Kim Suvioka, poet Laureate of Alameda. Oops, we lost you, Shiz. Elizabeth Travels Light and Andrea Lamont Wilson. Star said it, Shiz, we lost your, we lost your voice. She still talks. You're muted. Something happened. Yeah, she is muted. I see. Oh, well, that must be a sign to say goodbye. Say goodbye. Thank you, Shiz, away, Shiz, away, Segal. Nancy Wong, I appreciate you being moderating and hope to get you in soon. And Shiz, thank you so much. Library community, always a thank you. Thank you, Library. Yay, Pacific.