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BY: A couple of other conceptual kinds of things. So even though Sansei did not live through the incarceration themselves, there are many people who believe in this idea of intergenerational trauma that gets on from generation to generation, and it can manifest itself in things like drug and alcohol abuse, violence, mental issues. So what do you think of that idea?

CH: Oh, totally am with it. Satsuki Ina's work for years in starting Tsuru for Solidarity, I signed up to be a healing facilitator and went through all the training to do that and actually will be leading for the "Past is Not the Present" that Densho is presenting, I'm one of the healing facilitators for that. I believe that it's genetic, it's in our DNA. Not only the brilliance and the creativity, but the hurt and the healing that needs to happen. It can't really separate it. Yeah, definitely believe in that, though.

BY: And what do you think of the "model minority myth"?

CH: Oh, I think it's a way to separate and not deal with the history of Asian Americans in America. It's another way to separate people of color in America from each other, from understanding each other. So I don't believe it. I think it's something somebody made up. [Laughs]

BY: Okay. And do you have any final thoughts that you would like to share about your career or your, what you hope gets passed on to your children and grandchildren, any other thoughts?

CH: When my mother passed away, she had moved to Portland eight days before.

BY: Wow.

CH: She had passed in the night, and the next day, I found her, and happened to be that my daughter was away, so it was just my mom and I. And I had an experience that has really shaped a lot of who I am and how I continue. I had an experience of being surrounded by love, and it just came to me in that moment that really, when it gets to everything, that love is all that matters. And it's an unconditional love, and so I realized at that moment that she loved me unconditionally. That this was, there may have been a lot of rules, but the bottom line is unconditional love for her child. And so it's a lesson that I try to do and keep in the work that I create or in the way that I exchange with my family that gets frustrating sometimes when the way the world is, it's not necessarily framed on unconditional love. It's an important way to go, important understanding. And the other thing that I learned, both of these from my mother, was when I didn't talk to her for about a year -- I didn't talk to my parents for about a year -- it was because I was so mad of not learning Japanese.

BY: About when was this?

CH: When I was at U of O. I'm like, "How could you? How could you not teach me? Why?" And she said, she said, "Well, I guess every generation just does the best they can, and I'm so sorry." And I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, the power of apology, the power of true honest apology." Because I was like, "It's okay." [Laughs] "It's okay if I don't speak Japanese." She could have said a lot of things. She could have defended herself, I mean, the fact that she said, "I'm sorry," and, "Every generation does the best they know how to do." I think it's pretty simple but it's pretty profound, too.

BY: That's really beautiful. Okay, thank you very much for doing the interview.

CH: Thank you.

<End Segment 20> - Copyright © 2023 Densho. All Rights Reserved.