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SY: Tell us a little bit about your grandparents.

GN: Well, my grandfather was the one, of course, that went to Hawaii in the late 1800s, and I believe that he had stayed there for a year or two and then would return to Hiroshima and then go back again. How many times he did that I don't know, but given that my father was born in 1906, Father was in Hawaii... he also got involved in negotiating with the plantation owner to build the Buddhist temple in Papaikou. And physically that Buddhist church is not at the exact same location but in the same area, the church that you see today in Papaikou. The origin was back in, what, 1907, thereabout, is, I guess, when they start raising money for it.

SY: So he was rather prominent in, both in Japan and in Hawaii? Or you think he came to Hawaii to make his fortune?

GN: I think like most Japanese who went to Hawaii at that time, they went there to save money. I don't think the economic condition in Japan was very good at that time, and it was for that reason that many people decided to leave Japan to make money.

SY: And he eventually went back, and did he become successful in Japan with the money he made here?

GN: I think he, I don't, I won't say he's successful, but I think they were able to survive. And they had a farm in Japan.

SY: So your family really were farmers by, they go back a long time as farmers.

GN: They became farmers when Meiji era began. Prior to that they were samurai.

SY: Wow, so that goes back. So tell us a little bit about how you found out about your ancestors, your family in Japan.

GN: I heard, first I heard it from my father. He talked about it, and he also talked about what our name was prior to Meiji, in 1869, I think it was, and the family name was Kusenji at that time. And he also mentioned to me that we had two generations of Buddhist monks, and at that time the last name was Botenji, and then prior to that it was Kusenji.

SY: And how do those name changes occur? Do you know why that happens or how it happens?

GN: Well, when the feudal system ended in 1869, there were people who changed their name from the samurai name that they had to another name, and how they picked that another name I think depended on the person. And my ancestors, in their case, they had a small castle, they had a place called Nakanomura, and they took the first part of that name and took on the name Nakano.

SY: Wow. So, and you don't ever refer back to your old family name, do you?

GN: No, I use that for my email address. [Laughs]

SY: [Laughs] That's good. Now people will know your email address. So, now tell, let's talk a little bit about your mother's family. Do you know very much about them?

GN: Not as much as my father's side. There's, I think they were farmers too, as of 1869.

SY: And going, I mean, how did you, I'm curious about that, finding out more about your family history on your father's side. Can you...

GN: Initially it was through conversations with my father, and then subsequent to that what happened was the, all the family members decided to give up their share of that land to the youngest son since he's the one that's been taking care of the grandfather.

SY: And this is your grandfather's property?

GN: Yes. And so once he took over the land, there was a developer in Hiroshima that proposed to him to develop at least one side of that farmland because it was adjacent to a major corridor, and to build shops and then condominium and apartments on the second floor. And so he agreed to do that and became very, fairly wealthy as a result, and so he decided to use that money to find out about the family background. And so I think he had hired some linguist that could read the old Japanese kanji, and they backtracked from temple to temple to get, gain access to the family record and eventually they were able to put together a scroll that's written in the old Japanese kanji that, I guess it goes back to 1221, as far as the written record that they have, but there is some reference in there that goes back to 800 AD.

SY: Wow. Amazing. And how were you able to...

GN: Well, and so here we have is this scroll that no one can really translate it because unless you are a linguist that has a specialty in, where you're able to read the old Japanese kanji, you can't translate it. And so what happened was finally I saw the advertisement in Rafu Shimpo about finding out about your family record, and so I decided that I'll give Rafu Shimpo a call, and the person I talked to I indicated that I already have the record but it's written in the old Japanese kanji and we need to get somebody to translate that into modern Japanese. And so I said, "I'm willing to pay to have that done," and so she said that if they get the written scroll they could email that to Japan and they have a special linguist that could translate that. So that's what was done, and so they translated it into modern Japanese and then the staff at Rafu Shimpo, I guess a group of them did the translation into English.

SY: Wow. And are you the person who then read the whole thing and...

GN: Yes, and then they even provided me with a DVD, the translation from the old Japanese to the modern Japanese and then also into English. So I passed, made copies of those DVDs, or the CD, rather, and gave it to my two brothers and my sister.

SY: So it traces it back to the samurai period. Anything very fascinating about that whole period from then to --

GN: Well, it goes back, one of the things that caught my eyes was that in 1800 one of my ancestors became a retainer for the Asano clan. Asano is the family that was involved with, you know the Forty-seven Samurai, and I know that Asano had to seppuku in 1700, but this took place in 1800 where one of my ancestors went to work as a retainer for the Asano clan. So I thought the Asano clan has totally, was disbanded --

SY: By that point.

GN: -- and so I thought, that didn't make sense to me. Well, when I got on the internet, turns out that the younger brother, because they were, the public sentiment was so strong and supported the Asano, that the shogun allowed the younger brother to maintain the family name and he was able to have a small castle.

SY: I see. And he --

GN: So that kind of stood out.

SY: Yeah. I, you'll have to explain to me the Asano clan, though, what, it was a, just one clan in this, in, I mean, it was obviously a very big one, right?

GN: Yes, yes.

SY: And a retainer is someone who sort of...

GN: A retainer would be a samurai that would be employed by that particular clan.

SY: I see, so works basically for this, this son of the Asano clan. Wow, that's amazing.

GN: It was a younger brother.

SY: Oh, the younger brother. I'm sorry, wasn't the son. Okay. So that stood out. Are there any other things that kind of were, piqued your interest?

GN: We also had an ancestor that went to Korea during the Toyotomi Hideyoshi period, and he lost his life in Korea so there isn't a continuation of that lineage, but there were other siblings that kept the family name.

SY: Wow. That's amazing.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.