ClickOkinawa.com - Oral Histories

Higa Takejiro
published Oct 12, 2018

An Oral History

Takejiro Higa's interview courtesy of the Center for Oral History.
Photographs courtesy of Takejiro Higa.
The Hawaii Nisei Project © 2006

[I’m wondering, what were your family’s feeling toward that policy? Your mother, and your uncle, and grandparents.]
Oh, I don’t think they had anything in particular, attitude. No. They just say, “Well, it’s a school, you just have to follow school policy.” That’s about it, I think. I cannot tell you, really, how they felt because we never discussed how they feel.
[And then in the school, how much did you learn about the Japanese emperor or . . .]
Oh, it’s . . .
[. . . meanings of patriotism, or whatever . . . ]
Oh, it’s being brainwashed throughout your school year. In fact, as a kid. . . . See, in school, there’s a special dome-like thing here they store the emperor’s picture. When you pass in front, you’re not supposed to look, you just bow your head and then go through. The only time you have an emperor’s picture is some kind of ceremony in the school, and the picture is displayed in the front. Every student line up, you know, and they sing [the national anthem of Japan] Kimigayo, yeah. And then service goes on. That’s the only time you see the picture straight, you can see straight. Otherwise, even when you pass in front of the storage, what you might call, just storage shell like. It’s a nice concrete building. Stone structure, yeah. Inside there is permanently kept the pictures of emperor and empress. And the only time they take out is ceremonial purpose. And so as I say, when you pass over there, you’re not supposed to look into that. Pass over there, just bow your head and go through. That was that strict. Brainwashed. (Chuckles)
[And how were the teachers when it came to teaching you the language, the reading, the writing, the speaking of Japanese?]
I can’t think of anything special. Just ordinary teaching, I guess. They don’t tell you why you have to study. Just keep reading the textbook, whatever textbook says, and teach you the kanji [Chinese characters used in Japanese writing] and whatnot. They don’t tell you - they don’t try to brainwash you, it’s part of the. . . . In Japan, they have a course known as shüshin [ethics, morals], yeah. I think it’s a part of a propaganda course, I think. Teach you ways of life, yeah. What you’re supposed to do as a human being. Be respectful to your elders, authority, and anybody above you, yeah. Or treat your people below you. So I don’t know how you say in English, that shüshin. More cultural teaching, yeah. As a human being. And in that, of course, they stress the fact, imperial system.
[I think they call that “morals.”]
Moral, yeah, I guess. Moral teaching, maybe. Shüshin, they call ’em in Japan.
[And I don’t know how much you remember, but how were your marks in school?]
I tell you, I was pretty good.
(Laughter)
I was pretty good. There were two of us, always competing one or second. But that’s why. . . . See, in Japan, in those days, either very early April or late April, every year, next to the principal’s office, there’s a bulletin board. Little bit high ground. They record those who took examinations to high school, name come out. Every time I look at that, I used to be real envious. Because my family, being poor, I couldn’t afford to go to high school. And I felt that if I took that test, I have self-confidence I can pass it. Because those written-down names, I was above them in class every year. So I used to be real envious of seeing the names of my fellow students written up, yeah. There’s one section for high school girls and one section for boys, eh. Jogakkö and shögakkö, eh. I used to be very envious.
[And, you know, like you said that your family was poor. What was their livelihood in those days? ]
Well, farm just enough to survive, yeah. Subsistence farming. Not even profitable business farming. Just enough to survive. So main product was, of course, potato. And your own vegetable. And my grandfather was so-called — what you shall say — unofficial butcher-like. He used to go to a slaughterhouse, slaughter place, pick up the pig, portion out pork, and they used to retail. So sometimes he get leftover and we have a chance to eat meat. And Okinawa, as a general rule, of farm, general rule, just about every farmer has a pig, yeah. Domestic animal. Pig and goat, usually.
Pig — I don’t know if I should say this to you, but it’s a dirty place. In Okinawa, in the olden days, (coughs) they used to have a pig and human waste, pig used to eat ’em. Yeah. Anyway, raise the pig, that plus regular food. And at the end of the year, many families slaughtered the pig for one year’s supply of meat. (Coughs) They’d slaughter the pig, salt ’em up. Fatty portion, they’d make into oil. And the leftover from oil — aburakasu, they call ’em — we’d keep ’em in a separate jar. And every now and then, take a few pieces and put ’em in the miso [soybean paste] soup, floating. Was quite a treat in those days (chuckles). Vegetable, we have enough because we raise our own vegetable. Meat items, very rare. Especially in the countryside, yeah.
And, of course, fish is very rare. Unless you catch yourself, your own (coughs) fish from the pond or the river. They call funa [a carp], yeah. It’s a small fish, funa. It’s a small fish. But even then, once in a while, you can catch ’em and you can make into soup. That’s about the gochisö [delicacy] you can think of.
[And, you know, like you said, you folks have pig, and vegetables, potatoes. What kind of chores did you have as a child?]
Hmm?
[What kind of chores . . .]
Toys?
[Chores. Chores. What did you do to help out your family?]
Oh. After school, go to farm. Either bring back — you know, potato leaves. Before you harvest, you’ve got to cut the leaves, yeah. You bring that leaves to feed the goat, domestic goat. That’s a perfect feed for goat, see.
And in my house, we had a big horse because my uncle was formerly a cavalry man. You know, in those days, all the young men have to serve military. I think was three years, I believe, yeah. Everybody. Healthy guys, yeah, have to serve three years in the army. My youngest uncle was a socalled discharged cavalry man. And because of that, my grandfather was so proud of him, we had the big horse. And Okinawa had two kinds of horse. Regular, small pony; and one big one, like a regular American horse. It’s a tall, regular, big horse. It’s good for real hard work. So my grandfather had a bigger horse because of my uncle. And he used to be very proud of showing that horse to everybody. And I remember, as a child, whenever my uncle takes the horse to the pond to wash, I used to ride on that horse. And my uncle takes me to the pond, yeah. And then wash the horse and come back. And sort of, what, smoothing out the skin before putting ’em in the corral.
And for feeding that, I used to go in the morning, cut the grass. Before I even go to school, many times I used to go out and cut grass and come home and then go to school. And same thing with the potato leaves. And in the afternoon, after school, go to the field and dig potato. Daily ration. You don’t dig the whole place and store like American potato. Just you dig as much as you need.
[You had a lot to do then.]
TH: Oh, yeah. But all those things turned out to be a good lesson to me, I think. (Chuckles)