Densho Digital Archive - Helen Mori Interview (denshovh-mhelen

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RP: And you also took some art classes while you were in camp.

HM: Oh, yes.

RP: With...

HM: Summertime they let us paint, after a while. I don't know if it was the final year or the year before, but not right away. But later on they started relaxing the rules and whatever so I took watercolor with Takamura sensei. What's his name? Kango Takamura? Yeah, he was wonderful. And then he turned out to be one of our family friends too so. He knew my parents, you know, my father. I think he knew my father... no, yeah I think he knew my father more than my mother because my father used to fix the biwa, you know, he used to tune up the biwas even after the war, he was the only one who did it so all the different biwa teachers would bring their biwas to our house and then he would take all the frets off and put new bamboo. He had bamboo. He would put new bamboo on and shave it down and then tune it, you know. And... but he did that in camp too.

RP: Tell us...

HM: And Mrs. Takamura did biwa so I think that's why.

RP: She played biwa or she, did she...

HM: She, she played biwa.

RP: Did she teach it too?

HM: No, no, no. There weren't that many teachers really, three, four maybe in Manzanar.

RP: Can you describe to us what a biwa is?

HM: A biwa is like a mandolin, only it's longer than a mandolin and it has a long neck and it was, I don't know how many frets. But it starts out you know where the round part of the thing is, it's longer and it gets narrow, narrow, narrow, narrow. So by the time where you tune it, it's narrow, very narrow. But he had a good ear I guess. He'd tune it, you know, and then, and then if it gets all out of tune again they'd bring it back again and then he'd put new fret on or just tune it, whatever. And then they'd use a bachi, it's not a hook like koto, it's a like that, like a paddle. And that's how they play it.

RP: How many strings...

HM: Beautiful sound.

RP: How many strings does the instrument have?

HM: They usually have four but the place where my father's from, it's Chikuzen in Fukuoka, and there's a five-string biwa and they call it the chikuzen biwa. Beautiful sound. Prettier than the shamisen, I think. But very few people play it now. It's a shame.

KP: Where did your father learn that skill do you think?

HM: Oh, I'm sure it was in Japan. His, his older brother was blind and he was famous in Japan. He was so famous that he came to, my father came to United States with his brother twice and toured the United States. They had, not concerts, but performances in various parts of the United States. And I'm sure his brother taught him. 'Cause he was one of the top three in Japan. His brother was considered one of the top three in Japan.

RP: So, the lessons, the classes you took with Mr. Takamura were, was that a personal lesson or a group of art...

HM: No, no. We all met in the firebreak. Yeah. And there must have been tables, like picnic tables. And then he'd pass out the paper and the paint and then we'd paint whatever. And then he'd come around and he'd tell us you should do this or you should do that, you know. I really enjoyed it. I liked, even to this day I like watercolor more than oils. I prefer watercolor.

RP: So that was your start in watercolor painting?

HM: Yes. Well, after that I haven't painted. Who has the time? I didn't have the time after that. But I enjoy watercolor, looking at watercolor.

RP: Helen, were you ever aware of the guard towers that surrounded the camp?

HM: Oh, I saw them but it was just one of those things. I didn't think one thing or another. We knew...

RP: Searchlights?

HM: We knew we had to stay inside the barbed wire, you know. And I was too young to think I'm losing my civil rights and constitutional rights or any of that kind of political thing. I just never thought about it. It was just there.