Densho Digital Archive - Hope Omachi Kawashima Interview (denshovh-khope-01-0031)

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KL: You've lived a lot of places, you and Mas together. Would you just tell us the places that you've lived during your adult life? And also I'm curious if you ever talked about your experiences during the camp years in any of those different settings where people might not have been as familiar.

HK: Yes, well, right after we got married (at) San Francisco Seminary, then we had our honeymoon in Yosemite, and then we drove down to Pasadena, California, where he had a job waiting for him. So he served as, actually, (the) Japanese-speaking minister for the Pasadena Presbyterian Church, and I served as the choir director and organist there. And then the church had this old house, farmhouse on acreage of land, that was our first house that we lived in. It was a real old house that we had. Our first daughter was (born), I remember when we brought her home to live with us, from the hospital, then at night I'd wake up and I (realized) all these cockroaches came out. [Laughs] So full of cockroaches and then also mice. But anyway, it was an old house, but it was our first home. And then when the church had to move from the other location -- a freeway was going through, so that's why they had to rebuild the church. So then they tore down the house, so we had to live in a rental house in Altadena, California. So when we were in Pasadena, I think we, first (...) lived in a small apartment, when we were first married, and then we lived in that old house -- 'cause someone else was living in it before -- and then we lived in Altadena in a rental house on Crosby Street. And so we decided, "Oh, we're tired of moving around so much," so there was a house that was foreclosing in Pasadena that we could buy, I think it was eighteen thousand or twenty thousand dollars (for a) two-story house in a nice section of Pasadena, so we decided that we would buy it. So we moved to this house on Mountain Street, near Lake Avenue. It's still there; we go by and see it. So we bought that house, and then we were only living there (...) just a short time, I think only a couple of years, and then the Methodist church inducted my husband. They said, "We need you, you can't be doing Japanese ministry all your life. You need to do bilingual ministry so you can preach in English too." So they (appointed) us to move to (...) Ontario, Oregon, (eastern Oregon). So we were in Pasadena about eight years and then we went to Ontario, Oregon, and we lived there for about eight years. And then --

KL: What was your church there?

HK: Ontario Community Methodist Church.

KL: And then? I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you.

HK: And then the bishop -- now we were under the bishop's orders, so the bishop said there was an opening in New York City, the church there, because the pastor was ill and the church, (...) needed a bilingual minister. So then we moved, we got a rental truck and moved all our stuff to New York City.

KL: What was the church in New York City?

HK: It was the Japanese United Methodist Church.

KL: That's a big move.

HK: Yes. It was actually a cultural shock for us.

KL: I'm sure. And Ontario, of course, has its history of Japanese American farming in World War II, and there was even, I think there was a labor camp close by there, wasn't there?

HK: Yes. Actually, a lot of the families, Japanese families never went to camp because they were inland far enough, so they didn't have to go to camp. So some other people came from California and Hood River, other areas, to settle in Ontario. But, actually, the Japanese were highly regarded in that area 'cause they built up that area with planting, row crops they call, corn and sugar beets and potatoes and onions. (...) When you'd walk into a store they'd welcome you. That's the first time I ever had that. They'd welcome you with open arms. But anyway, we moved from there to New York City in 1980. We took this big Ryder truck, a twenty-five foot Ryder truck, and our church was on Manhattan and Seventh Avenue and we parked the truck in front of the church, and everybody was surprised to see this huge truck. [Laughs] Because the farmers in Ontario taught my husband how to drive a truck, so he drove the truck all the way across the country. That's when we stopped in Omaha, Nebraska, to visit my sister and stayed there. It's a good thing, because the truck was having trouble leaking oil, so it had to be repaired. I think we had to be there five days or something.

KL: Helps to have a relative in the Great Plains.

HK: Yes.

KL: And then you were back in West Los Angeles, is that right?

HK: That's right. And then --

KL: What church was he attached to there?

HK: So we went from New York City, in 1988 (...) to West L.A.

KL: The United Methodist Church?

HK: Right.

KL: Wow. And that church is closely connected to Manzanar.

HK: Oh yes. Yes, a lot of the members went to Manzanar, right. And then at that time my father and mother were in a very bad car accident, and my mother had a bad head injury. She began to lose her memory. And so then my father (...) got sick in 1980, and then he passed away in 1990 -- no... (in) 1990 he got sick, so he passed away in (1992). But my mother couldn't remember that he passed away and kept looking for him. So she couldn't be left by herself. She'd walk around in the middle of the night looking for him. So then, since we dropped our daughter off for college at Cornell University in New York, 'cause she wanted to go there (since) her classmates were all going there, and then we drove to West L.A. But then my parents needed help. So then I had a job working for this piano store, this music academy, I started a music academy there for all the TV and movie people, so we had all these amazing students. Like Alex Trebek was one of my students. And then Gail Getty, from the Getty family, was one of my students, and then she asked me to play for her daughter's wedding, which was in their huge house. And so they had this huge house that looked like a church, it had a stained glass window, a huge living room, and so I played piano for the wedding and then also for the reception. When I was playing for the reception, I heard this voice saying, "You're doing a good job." I said, "Joan Rivers?" Joan Rivers was right behind me. And then my husband was turning pages for me, he says, "I think I see Superman over there. And I think I see..." he'd name all the characters. He didn't know the actors' and actresses' names. But it was real fun (when) we met all these Hollywood people.