<Begin Segment 19>

VY: You mentioned Servas. Do you want to talk about that?

MM: Oh, yes. You know, when I was married, I was married to a man from Stanford, and his aunt gave us ten thousand dollars to get, have a trip around the world. That was in 1958. No, 1961, sorry. And so we decided to go to Australia. So we sent in our application for a visa, and they said, "He can go, but you can't, because you're Asian. We don't allow any Asians to visit Australia in 1961." So we said, "All right, let's go to Europe." So I went to Europe, and we went on the train to Denmark. And in the train station, it says, "Meet the Danes." Anybody on the train could go meet the Danes? I mean, that's as opposite of Australia as you can get. So we said yes, and we signed up, and they come to your hotel, they pick you up and take you into their house, and it looks like you've gone to a Danish store, furniture store, they have all Danish furniture. But, of course, we don't think of, when we go to a store, people lived like that really. So when we have a talk, we learned that they pay over fifty percent for taxes. "Of course we do. We have to talk care of the children all the way to the, as in the aged. That's our social responsibility." And I said, "Oh, my goodness, can you believe that?" So that experience, having dinner with somebody, just one evening, changed my mind. I said, "I need to learn more about people."

So I traveled around the world, because my husband had a sabbatical and we went around the world for six months. And when we went, were in India, we said, "You have anything like the Meet the Danes program?" He said no, but, "I'm head of the transportation. Let me see if I can get the groom to invite you to the wedding." Did I know it was a cast of thousands, (so it) wouldn't make any difference if a stranger came in or not. But since we were the guests of the groom, we were treated very nicely. We went down and saw the poet read his poem, and they were all drinking Teacher's Scotch. And we thought that was very, very interesting. It was all men except me, because I thought, well, hey, what am I going to talk, I can't even talk to the women. So I was down there, and then I saw the (Indian) Secretary of Agriculture put Teacher's Scotch in his Coke bottle with a straw and go out in public. And I thought to myself, in order to get into India and drink any alcohol, we had to claim we were alcoholics, and yet this goes on. Like everybody there knew that alcohol was forbidden but they were doing it, downstairs and with this chit-chat and everything. So that was like, he introduced us to another version of Meet the Danes by going to this wedding see how weddings were handled. They had closed off a street. I saw that he rode on a white horse with an umbrella carried over him and all this kind of thing, so many people that he couldn't know all these people. So when we went to dinner, there were two types of dinner rooms. One for those who were wearing all this gold jewelry and gold (woven into) their saris and so on, and then there were the other people. So if they had chicken, they (threw the chicken bones) on top of these white tablecloths, (...) on the table. In the next room, these people would take (food), and then there would be special water for washing their hands, (those were the) ones with all the gold on it. And I saw there was a class distinction with all of these things going on. And I said, "Oh, this is so wonderful that I can learn that way."

And I was looking for a program where people could enable you to see what prejudice or misinformation you have. Well, I had a cousin coming with Servas, cousin from Austria. And she and her husband stayed with us, and then there were four other people in the car. They were all related in one way or another, friend or mother and son, husband and wife. Anyway, they'd go and stay two nights with Servas, two nights with this Servas couple, two nights with this Servas couple, they get back in their car, say what they learned, and they would say, "This is what America is about," by sharing these experiences. And I said, "Oh, I want (to join) that organization," and that's how I found Servas. And it was more than I ever expected because it's organized since 1949. Because after the war, there was all this "Hate the Germans," "Hate the Japanese," "Hate the Italians," "Hate the Jews," some group was doing some hating, and there was no public transportation, so everybody was hitchhiking. So the founder of (Servas) organization was Bob Luitweiler. He was a conscientious objector, and he just didn't fit in his family. His family were upscale New York banker society, and he had this ecological understanding of different people and so on. (As a conscientious objector, he) was put in the prison. The prison superintendent doesn't know what to do with conscientious objectors, people who refused to fight. Most of the people in there, for doing some bad stuff, fighting. He didn't know what to do, so he said to all the conscientious objectors, "Here. You have this room, three hours a morning, three hours in the afternoon, fight it out." So (Bob) had an opportunity to meet people who were conscientious objectors. But each conscientious objector doesn't come fully formed as believing in one thing or another, there were different reasons. So he found these Black nationalists who had never talked to a white person. And after a month, they said, "Are there more people like you?" because he's the kind of person who gets up close in your face, and wants to know everything. And he realized that by talking to people, you could change their hearts and minds because they hated white people, that's why they weren't going in the military. "Why should I fight for white people?" And they never talked to a white person before, especially like that. So (Bob) said, "Well, we can change the hearts and minds of people by just meeting them and talking."

(Bob) went up to Denmark and there he met a German girl that was hitchhiking up there. And he said, "Oh, what do you think of the Jews?" (...)  And she says, "Oh, everybody knows the Jews were this, that and the other thing." He said, "Well, you're just prejudiced." She says, "I'm not." She says, "How many Jews do you know?" "I don't know any. But you know, I know what we've heard about all of them." He said, "Would you be willing to stay with somebody?" And they said, "Yes." "All right, would you come back and tell me how it was?" So he arranged a (two-night) stay with these people, she comes back, "How was it?" "They were wonderful. But you could tell they weren't Jews." "Oh." So he arranges for another two nights, goes away, comes back, "How were they?" "They were living historians. They were just wonderful. They had all these things that the Jews use for candles and feasts and they explained it all to me. They were just wonderful." Goes off on a third one, comes back, and she says, "I get it, I get it, they're just people." And then he said, "If the conversation of two nights can make that much of a difference, let's have an organization that has this as its philosophy for people to meet during the day or two nights," and that's (how) he started with Servas.

Now, he started in Europe, but after the war, there's all these anti-war groups. What do you they do with their lists? So he gets a list from them that's how (Servas) was built. And then he'd go to England, get their lists, and expand it to Africa, on his trip to Africa and Japan and so on, so it's all over the world. And they're a hundred and fifteen countries, but (Servas countries get Servas) voting rights, you have ten functional Servas members with identifiable contracts, ability to respond a national (group), if there's going to be an international conference and so on. So I've been involved with this group, and I find it just amazing, and I have learned so much. From my parents' household opening up to all (different) people, I now open up to Servas. But I also (host when) the U.S. government brings over five thousand foreign people each year that work in or with consulates, (are) recommended by consulates. They were (first) sent out by Eisenhower, he felt that people in other countries didn't know America. So he (wanted to) give mid-management people a tour for three to four weeks in this country. Either with their own national group, or (with a group with) the same interests. Like 2000, (I hosted) all superintendents or heads of state, education department. What's education in the 2000s going to be like?

<End Segment 19> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.