March 21, 2011

Across Oceans of Time...Reunited at Last...

Above...My mother at her 1958 high school prom...in Japanese yukata (clothes)

Recently, I pieced together the reason for my mother’s international attitudes...Back in the late 1950’s, the abbot of her all girls Catholic high school in Detroit asked for volunteers to write to students of a Catholic school in Kobe, Japan...guess who volunteered... ;-)

My mother was “pal’ed up with Kenichiro Tada. I can only guess the excitement of a teenage girl in that era receiving her first letter from Japan. Their exchanges were rich, but always on a polite and respectful level, according to my mother. Kenichiro and my mother corresponded for about 3 years during high school...then they lost contact as so many pen pals do...

...But she never forgot him. Often, she would mention him while I was growing up. She saved all of his letters and photos and would bring them out once in a while for me an my brothers to see...

Maybe because that, I too, wondered what things were like in other parts of the world...at the age of 14 I would find myself in the teaming streets of Mexico City...and I find my own pen pal from Bogota, Colombia...Liliana ;-)

Fast forward a few years, I am now in Seoul, Korea...with a life-line back home via Skype...still wondering what might have become of Kenichiro...

Earlier this year, my mother mentioned to me that she was going to visit Malaysia with her friend...so, I connected her with Emil’s mother and also figured if she might be able to stop by Japan as well...

...maybe she could find her long lost pen pal...

This past summer, I was privileged be part of a workshop at the Seoul World Design Fair at Kookmin University. There were faculty and students from all over the world...it was fantastic...everyone was so talented...one Japanese student stood out...Hiroki Hoshida...quite a talented person...

...I figured he could do anything...even find Kenichiro...even though 53 years had past...I didn’t keep my hopes up, but I thought it was worth a try...

So, I Facebooked Hiroki to see if he could help...and he was more than willing.

I had my father scan in a few photos of Kenichiro and send his school address. Which I forwarded them on to Hiroki who graciously took on the daunting task of locating Kenichiro...

Within a few weeks Hiroki had found him...and Kenichiro wasted no time putting out an invitation visit his home...

...then disaster struck......but spite of the devastation, my parents were determined to visit Kenichiro.

...and Kenichiro he had become mythic figure in our household throughout the years...I was not about to let them go without me!

It was quite an event...and was one of the greatest experiences that I have ever had with my parents.
...the day started out with a pickup from Yasunobu, Kenichiro’s cool younger brother...in his Mercedes CLS...

For the hour drive to the house, Yosunobo tried to fill us in on 53 years of life...apparently, Kenichiro was quite a successful executive at Nissan Motors...

My mother and Kenichiro meeting for the first time...he was close to 6 feet tall!
Their first meeting after such a long time must have seemed surreal...bringing back all sorts of teenage memories...in the blink of an eye...53 years later...
First greetings Kenichiro’s wife, Sachiko (right) and sister-in-law, Sumiko

All of the letters and memorabilia that she had saved...


Letter from Kenichiro, November 30, 1958...commenting on her beautiful prom picture!

A typhoon hitting Japan...drawn by Kenichiro, 1958...(click to enlarge)
Drawing by Kenichiro...before Manga...(click to enlarge)

Kenichiro was quite happy, as were we all...

Kenichiro had saved his mail after all!
The excitement of the exchange...everyone lost track of time...
My mother had carved a baseball bat and made this little trinket...you can see Kenichiro’s writing on it...
Sharing is what life is all about...
Sharing is especially great when the the bubbly starts flowing!

...symbolic armor for his son, Junichiro.
Check this out!!!  5,000 years old...from under his house!!! Apparently, archeologists found a treasure trove of artifacts when Kenichiro built his home...

The clay shards Kenichiro kept were over 5,000 years old...
The archeologists said they could find 10,000 year old artifacts if they kept digging...but enough is enough...

Just when we had forgotten about the reality that surrounded us, a 6.1 earthquake shook the Tada family’s 3 story poured cement home like an airplane caught in some very nasty turbulence...it really, really shook for almost 25 seconds...it scared the #@$% out of us!

Then it dawned on me that we were a long way from home...yet it felt like we were at “home.”
After the shock, we still talked for hours...
Kenichiro’s daughter Midori (left) arrived just in time...
She brought two beautiful dolls handcrafted by the Tada’s, a gift to my mother...
After all the commotion and good eating, my dad was ready for a snooze...just like home...

Oh...this little guy traveled back to Japan just to see where he came from...
Saki, the grand daughter, got a look into the past...maybe she might like a pen pal, Austin... ;-)

I have come to realize that my father never got in the way of who my mother was...nor did she of him...together they set out not to change the world, but to always help others in need...no matter who...no matter why...

...No matter what.

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