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TI: So let's go to Cal, I'm sorry, to Berkeley now.

PJH: Berkeley. Okay, transferred to Berkeley, it's the first time that I am living away from home 'cause I was commuting to Hayward, Cal State Hayward, and so I was living in an apartment. I didn't do the route of living in the dorms. This is my junior year, trying to determine, again, what my major would be, so it was social science field major. I understand that they no longer have it because it's probably too easy to graduate out of, but I was able to select different social science classes or departments. Sociology, ethnic studies, and I believe, not anthropology... see, I can't even remember.

TI: And did you get very involved in the politics while you're at Berkeley?

PJH: Actually, it was after a lot of the strikes. Asian American Studies was already established. At that time it was the push, in Asian American Studies is not, there wasn't all that much information to be gained from books 'cause the books weren't written. A lot of speakers coming in to speak about certain experiences, but the whole platform for Asian American Studies was community work. So community work I got very much involved in. Again, it was kind of like the ripple effect from the Third World Strike, anti war service to community, so I was very interested with working with Issei and I felt that that would be a good place to be because I knew that I never knew my grandparents and I thought that would be a good way to reconnect. And at that time it was San Francisco State, Berkeley, San Jose, East Bay all together, students from all these campuses were working on the Issei Project, and that, again, kind of gained momentum, like wow, this network of people's just getting bigger and bigger. And so what we started off with, and I was getting credit for through Asian American Studies, was to service the Issei, and the first thing that we were thinking to do was to do, take them onto field trips, like maybe twice a month. And after twice a month, like maybe through the summer, the students would say, wait a minute, are we gonna be doing this forever, just taking them on field trips where their needs, there's definitely other needs, there're social services that are not being met. They don't even know what their rights are. They're not even receiving benefits. We have to also kind of erase their own perceptions of not wanting to receive benefits. So that was how, I think, the senior service projects started, with East Bay Japanese for Action, and that's where Roy and I reconnected after that computer class. And also at Hayward State his brother who had just come out of the army was also going to the center and that's how we started to get back to, well, actually, introduced into Roy's family, because his family became involved with the East Bay Japanese for Action, too.

TI: So during this time, who were your role models? Were there any role models that you saw as strong women in terms of, that you looked up to?

PJH: You know, I have to say that, I know these two incidences, well, there's Pat Sumi. Of course she was like really heavy, politically involved with being Maoist. These women that could articulate and kind of like walk the line, kind of, I thought, yeah, those were kind of role models. But it was actually seeing taiko by San Francisco Taiko Dojo and it was during these community get-togethers, like revolving, not only the Issei Project, but there was like, because of the network that we created, there were other community events happening all around the Bay Area. And San Francisco Nihonmachi, there was a cultural evening community gathering, San Francisco Taiko Dojo was playing on stage at the Buddhist temple, at the church, and that was the first time I felt the drums right there. People were just sitting in, at tables at this potluck and they're watching the program. You see mother and a daughter on stage playing taiko and all of a sudden it's like, wow, they're just playing as equals on that stage, and that was very empowering for me to see that. It's kind of like gender difference got totally erased and I could see myself, being a tomboy, that's what I want to do. I feel that. I feel that. I connect with that. So to see these women on stage kind of like, really was very empowering. That's one.

Another thing during that whole period was Chris and Joanne, Chris Iijima and Joanne Miyamoto, they were going through all these different communities and singing at events, and it was, it was the songs that they were singing that all of a sudden, they're singing my song. They're singing about me. They're talkin' about my Asian identity. I'd never heard this before, and I, I do remember feeling like, wow, this is a completely different medium to really call people together, bring people together. It's like, this is more powerful than any political rhetoric, 'cause I can feel that goin' through my body. The one thing that really hit me was their final dance and song, and they started to play Tanko Bushi on a guitar, but just whaling on the guitar with English phrases and had the entire audience get up in a circle and, and dance. It was really different. [Laughs] A different Tanko Bushi than I thought that I knew. But it was like, I looked around and I just remember feeling totally immersed and no timeframe at all, but just seeing people connecting in the circle, just dancing. And I go, wow, this really hit me. I remember, I can still feel the sweat comin' down, it lasted a good fifteen minutes or so, just dancing, and I was like, what was that all about? But those two, those two episodes kind of like informed me, something that needed to come out.

TI: And so how did you let that come out? What, did you actively do anything to start making that happen?

PJH: No. [Laughs] 'Cause all that was happening just, just right before graduating from Berkeley and when I graduated from Berkeley some other friends decided, two other women from other schools, decided to go to Japan and we decided to go to Japan. So this is the pre Alex Haley journey to discover roots, and also because my parents were in Saipan, I thought that would be a good way for me to check out what was happening in Saipan and then going to Japan.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.