<Begin Segment 6>

MA: And what, when you were growing up, what religion did your family practice?

IN: Oh, Buddhist. Buddhism.

MA: And can you tell me about the Buddhist church in your town and what it looked like? And there's a story, it's quite a well-known church, and if you could tell me a little bit a about that.

IN: It was named Emanji. But before the actual church was built, there was a minister that came from Japan. And you know, I remember his name, it was Mr., Reverend Goto. And it was done more or less in an ordinary looking house. Then eventually, during the Chicago Exposition, they decided, the Japanese community decided to purchase the pavilion. So it was then a Japanese pavilion at the Chicago Fair. And so when they purchased it, it was carefully taken apart and shipped to a city called Sebastopol, which is the town that the church was. And there were very few Japanese knowledgeable enough to put it together. So it was my father's project -- [coughs] excuse me -- to put it together and build it. And he more or less was the one who did most of the work, the putting it together, getting the plan together, and the carpentry. And it became a very well-known church in Northern California called Emanji. And "Ema" is "heaven."

MA: And it sounds like your father had a really big role in making that happen.

IN: Oh, yes.

MA: And what are some of the activities that were held in the, in the Emanji?

IN: Well, I think it's like any church. They had the Women's Club. And the Men's Club. And they had a staff, and the important people of the church. They didn't have as many children's activities as the Christian church has. But what it would do, is, on Sunday, there would be a meeting of the church, and it was done because it was a minister from Japan, it was all in Japanese. But we were required to go and sit. It was very difficult, and to listen to the chanting and the sermon, but we didn't understand any of it. But we were required to sit there, hour and a half, two hours.

MA: And you were telling me about the movies that they would show. The Japanese films?

IN: Oh, yeah, well, that was at a hall.

MA: Oh, that was at a hall. Okay.

IN: That was another, and what it was was more or less, it was called, Nipponji. I'm not sure on that. But it was a hall in the same town, but I'd say about five, ten miles away. And it was a community hall. And once in a while, they would have fundraising events there. And of course, one of the primary fundraising events was to make money for the church, to get money for the church. So what they would do is they'd request a benshi. Benshi was a person that made the rounds of the different Japanese communities in California. And he would bring a movie, and interpret the movie. But he would make the rounds, and the community would go. And of course, it was donation, so all the members of the church and the community would donate money. And the money that was donated would be written in Japanese on a sheet of paper and strung on like a laundry line, and how much you donated. Of course, my father always had to be one of the prime donors. [Laughs]

MA: This benshi, so you said he traveled kind of around California showing these movies. And so they were silent movies, is that it?

IN: Correct.

MA: And he would kind of portray the characters in the movie?

IN: Oh, yeah. He would take on their voices. I guess it was memorizing a lot of the line. But he would take on all the characters: the women, the children, the men. And so, you know, it was quite something that you would never, never see today.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.