<Begin Segment 8>

KN: You love your job, and as an architect, you mentioned that your wife's a schoolteacher. Would you mind describing how you folks met? That's two different professions. Were you folks introduced?

[Interruption]

MY: Well, actually we had a friend. When I say "we," my roommates and I, Alvin Tanaka and this guy Dennis Isa, okay, we rented a place and we had Dennis Isa go to a Japanese evening class to meet girls. And there he met this girl whose friend happened to be Jeanie, and that's how I got to meet her. So Dennis did a good job. [Laughs]

KN: Going to Japanese school for the rest of you folks.

MY: For us, just so we could meet good girls.

KN: I hate to say this, that strategy is still going on right now.

MY: Really? I thought we were original.

KN: Well, you folks may have been the groundbreakers, but I guarantee, there are young male students who specifically go to Japanese class, yeah.

MY: And one thing about Jeanie, I got to, so-called, give her credit, from a professional career, although we were, I had down times, she never told me to quit and get a real job. And like I say, she always was encouraging and she had her teaching job, which brought food to the table. Whereas mine was just up and down. But she never told me to quit. So that's where I got to be thankful, very supportive.

KN: And you folks have two children. Can you describe their names and something about them?

MY: Oh, good you mentioned because they always say, "Hey, Dad, we have names, you know." [Laughs] Anyway, Aaron... we have two, Aaron and Aolani. They're really, really good kids. Aaron, he did what he totally enjoys, he became a filmmaker and he went to Cal State Northridge. As soon as he came back, he had a short film -- not short film, a regular film, Blood of the Samurai, and it won a HIFF award.

KN: Hawaii International Film Festival.

MY: Right. And it sort of encouraged him to continue, and right now he's got projects going. He did Ninja EX, and he's been to Hong Kong, Japan, and he's got a lot of connections. I mean, very low key guy and a fun-loving guy. I wish I was like him, he can talk. I cannot talk. He's articulate. But anyway, my daughter, Aolani, of course, she got her master's degree from University of Washington in planning and landscape architecture. So I'm very happy that she got into a field that I'm in. So that means I was in...

KN: Do you folks work together?

MY: She's got her own company.

KN: Okay.

MY: Yeah, we work together, close together. And somehow she's smarter than I am. I'm more experienced, but yeah, nowadays, kids, they're smart. She's got two kids, Haley and Mia, and my son's got Lia and Sophie. Four grandchildren, great.

KN: So what is the best qualities that you love about your family members? You speak so highly of them. What is something that maybe you want to say to them?

MY: Keep their sense of humor. They really have got good sense of humor. I mean, somehow I'm always at the end of the what do you call?

KN: The butt of the joke?

MY: Yeah, right, right. [Laughs] But they keep things light and they love to have fun.

KN: How is it being a grandparent?

MY: I always kid her, I said, gee, if I knew there was such a thing as grandchildren, I wouldn't have children." Only joking. [Laughs] No, because grandchildren are a lot of fun. I mean, you don't have to discipline them, just do things, like if the parents tell you, "Don't give 'em chocolate," you can sneak them a chocolate.

KN: So it's the best thing because you can spoil them and you don't have to discipline them.

MY: That's right. And they're so loving. And right now, I don't know if I can say this, but my daughter and her family lives two doors away from us, so we're close. Two bedroom doors. Two bedroom doors, we live in the same house. So we get to see our two, Haley and Mia every morning, and they make my day.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright &copy; 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.