<Begin Segment 9>

RB: So I guess, pivoting back then to some of the topics related to your own life here in Philadelphia once you returned to the region, had you already known about Shofuso, or was this something that you...

MM: This is pretty new to me, and it only came through as I started studying under Taeko Shervin in King of Prussia, and this is the Urasenke School of ocha-no-yu. And they were doing monthly demonstrations here from May to September. So we'd come and we'd whisk and we'd scrub bowls and we'd come serve and try to make sure... I had not been asked to demonstrate until just this past year. I'm going, "You know, there's a shelf life to doing tea ceremony, and it's your knees, it's your hands, and your mind, and memorizing steps, many steps, and learning how to put on a kimono, and YouTube's very helpful." [Laughs]

RB: Do you remember the first time that you heard about Shofuso?

MM: Oh, I think I knew about it vaguely, because Mom was putting arrangements in here. She was Ikenobo master, she demonstrated at the Philadelphia Flower Show, so I knew about it, but I hadn't gotten to the point of kind of knowing every nook and cranny and staff people.

RB: So she was involved in the ikebana community and did some of the arrangements here?

MM: Yeah, she was president of... there was an ikebana group, and then more precisely, the Ikenobo School. And she taught, she went to Japan several times to take more training.

RB: Do you know, was she involved in that throughout your childhood, or was that something that she did only...

MM: She started doing that, once the kids went off to college, kind of thing. So I remember coming back one summer, and she was taking ikebana lessons, so I went, and I don't know what I was doing. And I thought, okay, I'm not getting anywhere with this, because I don't know when that was, but the teacher was Nihonjin. And so her language to me was in Japanese, and you know, little clearer explanations.

RB: And I think you mentioned earlier that Tak had helped to pay for the roof restoration?

MM: Well, he was involved with the fundraising.

RB: Do you know to what extent? Were they involved with the, there was a group called the Friends of the Japanese House and Garden?

MM: Probably. I think there were quite a few Nisei involved with that. So I remember as we were sorting out my mother's final stuff, she had secretarial training, and she had all of her different groups that she had been involved with, their minutes were all in a book, and I think I just handed over whatever it was to Shofuso. My parents were connected.

RB: So you became involved, though, in the space when you started to do the tea ceremony? In your opinion, you described this space as having been a Japanese and Japanese American community space, or was it something different?

MM: Just a Japanese space. Because I haven't been as involved with Japanese American groups, just individuals, like friends and family friends. So I considered it, you're stepping into Japan as I would when I would enter the tea room.

RB: Aside from the tea school, have you been involve with other Japanese or Japanese American organizations?

MM: Uh-uh, I have not. I've been solicited, and my sister Kiyo goes. I don't know if Fred does at all or not. So my brother traveled there just for like two weeks as a tourist right after college. And then my middle sister, who lives in Moorestown, Kiyo, was in Japan for, I think a year abroad. And Chiyo, the youngest, also did a year abroad from Mount Holyoke, and then she went back and lived there for nine years with her family. So she has the most in-depth knowledge, the business world is what was, all the stuff they did bringing up the kids, but they were living in a very nice, nice area of Tokyo. So I guess I'm the only one of the four of us who's ever had this... I don't want to say deeper interest, but continuing involvement with tea with, Nihongo with wearing kimono, and I just inherited a bunch of stuff Vicky Marutani, which was, her daughter said, "Can you use any of this?" I go, "Yeah."

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2023 JACL Philadelphia. All Rights Reserved.