Misadventures of Stash

I

've been talking about my memories of J-Town for almost two weeks now, and it is a memory that is close to the heart. I will continue later about my adolescence and early adulthood as well--the memories are clearer and perhaps a bit quirkier. But for today, another story.

M's green card mess is getting more expensive. We go to see the immigration judge next week and so we went to see the lawyers on Thursday. On the way there we were talking about lawyers and accidents and I remembered an accident I was in when I was 17, my band years.

For those of you who haven't read my previous posts--like eating grass--I used to be in a band called, appropriately enough, Stash. It was the early 70s and experimentation was the thing. Yes, we inhaled. And we had a grand old time doing it. But getting high had its hazzards.

After one gig, we returned our equipment to Diddly's garage and started tokin' a bit. And our lead singer, Vos, was really getting loaded, although we weren't really sure at the time. Someone suggested we go to the beach or something and Dragon (organ), El, and DK got into Bazooka's yellow Plymouth 340 Duster, while Jo, Di and I piled into Vos's little Volkwagon bug. We headed west on the Pomona Freeway and switched to the Santa Monica near dowtown LA. We were singing and talking about how well the gig went, when around the Western Blvd. exit Bazooka--our manager--drove up next to us and told us to pull over. Vos was too high and was weaving like a mother fucker. He was definitely going to get into an accident and Bazooka yelled that I should drive. Jo--Vos's girlfriend--agreed wholeheartedly and Vos reluctantly started to pull over toward the right shoulder.

In the back seat, I looked through the windshield between the two front seats and saw something approaching us really fast on the shoulder.

"Watch out! There's a car!"

But it was too late. No sooner had I blurted out the warning, we rammed into a car parked on the shoulder.

"O-man, your glasses! Did they break?" Di asked worried. She was so cute, and so way out of my league, but it was nice to think that she cared.

"I'm okay. You guys okay in front?"

"Vos, Vos!" Jo screamed, but Vos was groggy with his head resting on the steering wheel

Suddenly from outside, I heard Dragon's voice. "Shit! You guy's okay? What the fuck happened?"

"Fuck. You guys okay?" Bazooka yelled over the din of the passing cars.

"The car didn't have any lights on or anything. We didn't see it until it was too late," Jo whined in defense of her boyfriend.

"Hey, you guys alright?"

We all looked up at the strange voice. Standing next to Dragon was a relatively thin black dude looking into our little Beetle.

"Woah, where did you come from?" asked Dragon.

"Man, I was in that car you hit, man."

"Shit, are YOU okay?"

"Yeah, I was having some engine trouble."

"Then why didn't you have some flairs or something," Dragon asked, but the guy had gone to Bazooka's car.

"What the shit is his story?" we all thought, when suddenly the two girls riding with Bazooka and Dragon, El and DK, appeared. "What are you guys doing here?" Dragon asked.

"That guy stuck his head in the window was asking all kinds of questions and we got scared so we came over here," El explained.

When we all looked back to see where the guy was, we were just in time to see him pull away from the shoulder and drive off in Bazooka's yellow Duster westbound on the Santa Monica Freeway.

Cont'd tomorrow...

Growing up J-Town #JT-061

D

ad suggested a hamburger but my eye caught something I had never heard of before.

"What's a clubhouse sandwich?" I asked. Menus back then rarely gave a description of an item.

Dad ignored me, and Mom just shrugged her shoulders, since she came from Japan and wouldn't know anything about real American food. So I looked expectantly at John.

"It's a sandwich with turkey, bacon, lettuce and tomato on three slices of toast," he explained.

"Three slices? Why three? And why on toast?" I asked incredulously.

John just laughed. "There's too much stuff to keep on just two slices, so they use three. And the best thing is that they put avocado in the club sandwiches here."

"Avocado?" I knew what avocados were. My friend Rickey lived down the block and he had an avocado tree in his back yard. His mom would occasionally let us eat them when I played over there. I knew that anything with avocado in it had to be good.

"Mom, I wanna clubhouse sandwich," I declared, half wondering if Dad would just flat out say, No, too expensive. I didn't know if it was expensive, but it had to cost more than the hamburger. It had avocados in it. But surprisingly, Dad didn't say anything to me. He said something in Japanese to Mom and John that I didn't understand, but the net result was that I got to eat a clubhouse if I was willing to share a bite with my sister.

"Okay," I said rather reluctantly. "Can I get some French fries, too?"

But Dad ignored me again. John told me that the sandwich came with potato chips, and for me that was just as good. We never had potato chips at home.

John ordered for everyone, as I turned my attention back to the juke box. A nickel for one play. A dime for three plays. A quarter for eight plays.

"Isn't two nickels the same as a dime? Why are the prices different?" This must have been my thirty-seventh question since entering the restaurant.

"They're trying to give you a bargain," John explained. "You get more songs if you pay more at once.

"Oh," I said, feigning comprehension.

"It's a way to make you spend more money," Dad said succinctly, an explanation I understood more readily.

I knew a quarter was out of the question, so I asked for a dime.

"To hear a song? We have records and a hi-fi. You can listen to music at home."

"But... but..." I stammered.

"What do you want to listen to?" asked John.

I didn't know what to say. I had heard a bunch of songs on TV, but I didn't no any of the titles.

"See, he doesn't know any songs anyway," said Dad.

"I like the song I hear on TV. Something like, 'run, run, run, run'?"

"Oh, I know that one," John said and he proceeded to flip through the pages. "Here it is. 'Runaway', right?" He put a nickel in the machine and pushed some random numbers and letters. A few seconds later, the familiar intro of the song started playing, and Del Shannon started singing.

"As I walk along I wonder, what went wrong with our love, a love that was so strong."

At which point the waitress brought out food. My eyes bugged out, but probably not as much as Dad's.

"Are you going to eat all of that?"

"Uh-huh," I smiled.

In front of me was a plate of four triangles, a triple deck club house sandwich cut into quarters. It was completely different from what I had imagined. When John explained that they needed three slices of bread to hold all the contents, I thought there were two slices at the bottom--a firm foundation--upon which was layered the turkey and bacon and tomato and lettuce, and then all this was topped with a single slice. I had no idea that the turkey and lettuce would be on one layer, and the bacon and tomato and avocado would be on a different layer. It looked like two sandwiches stacked on top of each other. I had never seen such an awesome site.

"And I wonder, I wah-wah-wah-wah-wonder..."

Indeed, it was truly a wonder. But, of course, as I had been made to promise, I shared my sandwich with the others, although I must admit that I tried to eat the potato chips quickly in an attempt to share as little as possible. I was such a selfish kid.

Having eaten something wonderful and new like a clubhouse sandwich, and listening to a song I wanted to hear, I had never felt so satisfied. Unfortunately, I went to the Sugar Bowl Cafe only once or twice more before it closed shop. It was replaced by Ichiban Cafe, which served standard Japanese fare--noodles, rice bowls, tempura. I would not longer get to taste the other world, the world that was more American than Japanese. The world for which I would long for most of my pre-adult life.

Growing up J-Town #JT-060

T

he Sugar Bowl Cafe was on San Pedro inside the Taul Building. It was owned and operated by Japanese but the fare was mostly American. I only went there a couple of times so my memory may not be that accurate, but I have recalled this place in my dreams and daydreams more than just a few times. In my memories, it was a place that resembled what I would see on TV, a place where girls wore bobby socks and ribbons in their hair, and boys with crew cuts sported two-tone bowling shirts. And there was the occasional guy with his hair slicked back. In other words, it was a place where Japanese Americans didn't belong.

Yet it was full of JAs. Young JAs.

And Dad was pretty old. He had married late and had me when he was 42 years old. So by the time I first went to The Sugar Bowl when I was around eight or nine, he was already 50--not too different from my current age when I think about it. We went there with some of his friends from church, members of Maryknoll's Kibei Club. Kibei (kee-bay) were Japanese born in America but raised and educated in Japan. Except for their citizenship, there was very little that distinguished them from first generation Japanese. Since they grew up in Japan, they followed Japanese customs and their language of choice was Japanese; most of them spoke very little English, Dad among them. There was, however, one major distinction between Dad and the others. The club members were born in the 1930s and were sent to Japan mostly because of the start of WWII. I guess their parents figured they'd be safer in Japan. In any case, they were in their late twenties in the early 1960s, a good twenty years--one generation--younger than Dad.

So when any of them went with us to J-Town, he or she would sometimes suggest that we go to a place where the younger crowd hung out. At 8 years old, I considered myself part of the younger crowd too, so when John, one of the younger Kibei club members, recommended we eat lunch at the Sugar Bowl, I agreed enthusiastically. I figured he would know all the cool places, unlike Dad.

My first visit inspired awe. On the walls around the restaurant were renderings of the available fare: hamburgers with the burger and lettuce protruding out, French fries spilling over the plate, shakes in colors to that aroused the flavors of strawberry and chocolate, and an ice cold Coca Cola in a glass sweating beads of dew. Each picture was designed to make you want to taste it and I couldn't wait to order. As we walked toward our booth, we walked by a long lunch counter, with soda dispensers and rows of Coca Cola glasses and sundae dishes in front of a mirror.

Just like in American places, I thought.

There were six of us--Dad, Mom, little sister and brother, John and me. As we reached our booth, I noticed the red vinyl benches with white trim and a red Formica table. There was a mini juke box against the wall. Well, it really wasn't a juke box. It was connected to the juke box near the entrance, but you could put in your money and choose what songs you wanted to hear with out leaving the table! I marveled at technology. I looked around and saw and even larger table in the back corner. The bench was huge and curved to fit in the corner. I had never seen anything like it, even on TV.

"Can't we sit over there?" I asked.

"You have to have at least seven or eight people to sit there," John said. He knew this, I was convinced, because he was young and came to places like this on a regular basis.

Oh well, they don't have one of those mini juke boxes anyway, I thought. The machine had staggered nibs protruding from the top. I fiddled with one and was surprised when a page inside the glass case of the machine moved. I push these to flip through the pages of lists of song, I realized. Look at all these songs! I wonder how much it cost to play one.

Dad must have sensed something as he told me to pay attention to the menu.

Oh yeah, food...

Growing up J-Town #JT-050

C

onfections were not the only thing Dad got for his meetings. On special occasions, he would get box lunches, usually sushi at a small place called Matsuno Sushi. It was nothing like today's sushi shops--raw fish was not easily had back them. There was a short counter, which I suppose might resemble today's sushi bar, but there was no refrigerated case on top. The sushi was standard fare, at least by JA standards: inari-zushi, futomaki, shime saba. Of course, we had our own names.

Inari-zushi is fried tofu skin stuff with sushi rice, but we called them "footballs" because of their shape and the fox-brown color. An ex-girlfriend once referred to them as "pillows" because of the way they were stuffed. Futomaki was sushi rice and fillings of kanpyo (re-hydrated gourd), egg, spinach, and this sweet pink stuff that I still haven't figured out, spread out onto a large sheet of nori (dried seaweed) and rolled up into a long roll. This was then cut into three-quarter inch pieces. We referred to these as "tires". But Mom could make these two types of sushi at home so they were no big deal to me. What I really enjoyed was the shime saba. This is a pickled mackerel very similar to the pickled herring eaten by northern Europeans. A filet of mackerel was pickled then placed on top of a long mound of sushi rice then pressed into a bar shape. Man, I could eat this everyday and never get tired of it. Dad had a name for it that sounded like "batter up" so that's what I used to call it. I later learned the word was battera, another name for the same thing. I guess this would be similar to a sandwich called a poor boy, hero, or grinder, depending on where you're from. Of course, despite my love for "batter up", I could not eat more than one at his senryu meetings as they were reserved for the adults. I swore that I would buy my own when I could afford it, but unfortunately Matsuno Sushi closed shop by the time I was old enough to earn my own bread.

One place that was open since my childhood and closed only after the last major earthquake in LA was Far East Cafe. After special occasions at church--like First Communion or someone's birthday--Dad would take us there for lunch after church. It was a Chinese restaurant right in the middle of J-Town. The front glass was painted a pale green so no one could look in. When you entered the front door, a juke box greeted you in the small waiting area. On the right were the cash register and a glass counter filled with sweet and salted dried plums--something I always begged Dad to buy, but never got. Behind the juke box was a wooden partition, with seating down two aisles on either side. Indeed, the entire restaurant was separated by partitions about six feet high making small enclosed eating spaces. Some had two tables for two small parties, but if you had five or more in your party you usually got your own space.

Now, Far East Cafe was not a fancy place by any means. They did not serve some of the food that I have come to expect from the newer Chinese restaurants. Hong Kong Flower Lounge in Milpitas and NBC in Monterey Park serve some of the best sea food I have ever had. I love the sun-dried abalone--it's so much better than fresh abalone to me--sauteed with Chinese greens like chingensai. Steamed any-kind-of fish is as good as it gets. But Far East Cafe was a modest place that offered old-school fare like pi-chayu (sauteed snow peas with chicken, water chestnuts and bean sprouts), pakkai (subuta or sweet and sour pork), char shu (barbeque pork), fried wonton and the best pan fried chow mein.

While we waited for our food, I often went to the back of the restaurant. I'd tell the folks that I needed to go to the bathroom, which was an adventure in itself. The place was not necessarily dirty, but it was dingy, dark and dank. You walked in and had to turn the light on by pulling a string hanging from the ceiling. After taking care of business and washing my hands, I got to wipe my hands on the cloth towels that dangled from a dispenser that you had to pull for a fresh swatch of linen. I used to think that it was a short strip of cloth that was used over and over but somehow ironed straight inside the dispenser. After leaving the bathroom which was right next to the kitchen, I would stop to breathe in the smell of the kitchen. they would usually tell me to go back to my table, that I was in the way. Or at least I think that's what they said because I didn't understand a word they were saying--I always assumed that they were speaking Cantonese--but it always seemed to me that they were angry. Why were they always yelling? I thought. But it didn't matter. They always made the best Chinese food I could imagine back then.

Far East Cafe was perhaps the most popular non-Japanese restaurant in J-Town, but for me, the best place was the Sugar Bowl Cafe...

Growing up J-Town #JT-040

M

y first memories of J-Town are indeed of Nisei Week. Well, they aren't really memories or recollections. They are more like flashes of memories interwoven with old photos and the conversations I have had with my mom. She would dress my sister and me in yukata, the cotton, summer, casual version of a kimono, and took us to Nisei Week to see the parade. We were about four and five and all I remember are the feet and the sticky pavement. We were small, and wearing unfamiliar geta (wooden clogs), I had to concentrate on my steps, so I walked along looking down at the concrete sidewalk stained black from all the spilled soft drinks and snow cones. My dad lifted me up once to see over the crowd but I still could see much, and my dad--not the strongest man--didn't hold me up for more than three minutes. But there were a lot of people at the festival. J-Town got this crowded during Nisei Week because most JAs felt it was their community. It was a place to visit on a regular basis, not just special occasions.

Our family usually went on Sundays after church. We were members of Maryknoll Church, a Catholic mission operating a K-8 elementary school for children of Japanese descent. They stipulated--if I remember correctly--that a child had to be at least one-quarter Japanese to be eligible for admission. I don't remember if there was any specific law passed, but sometime in the 80s it became clear that the school could no longer discriminate based on race and they began accepting all races. As a Catholic Mission, Maryknoll attracted Hispanics from nearby areas, but as the enrollment of non-Japanese went up, the number of Japanese American families went down. In the end, it closed its doors as an elementary school in the mid 90s due to lack of enrollment. It continues today as a community center, the Maryknoll Japanese Catholic Center.

But back then, Maryknoll was segregated. It sounds awful by today's social standards, but it was also a blessing of sorts for Japanese in the beginning. It was established in the early 20th century when racism and the "yellow peril" mentality was still a part of mainstream society. It provided a place where Japanese nationals in America could worship in peace in a language they understood and study without fear of prejudice. The Catholic mission is located about three blocks from J-Town, and unlike the current Lil' Tokyo, J-Town back then was a place where many of the Japanese community lived. There were a few houses, but most rented long-term hotel rooms--some are still there above the stores and restaurants on the north side of 1st Street across from JVP and Koyasan Temple. (My dad used to live there as well.) The kids could then walk to Maryknoll for their education. During my time, the school was still a haven for me. I was born ten years after WWII, a couple of years after the Korean War and was a student there for nine years during the Vietnam War. On the street, away from Maryknoll, I was called a Jap, a Chink, and a Gook. Maryknoll provided me with a place I could study and play without fear of random and malicious harassment, and sometimes violence--I have been beaten up for being "Japanese". While I wouldn't go so far as to claim that Maryknoll empowered me, it did allow me to grow without restraint and, in a way, innocently. Unfortunately, it also cultivated that attitude of being special to the detriment of others; by segregating others, we ultimately segregated ourselves.

In any event, every Sunday after Mass, we went to J-Town to do our weekly shopping of Japanese goods. Back then, soy sauce or short grain rice was not available at the local supermarket, so we went to J-Town to do our shopping. We usually went to Modern Food on San Pedro, and when my dad felt especially philanthropic, he would by a pound of maguro tuna for sashimi dinner that night.

We would also make a number of other stops. As one of the founders of the senryu salon, it was his responsibility to provide some of the refreshments. And he did so with what looked to me to be a scam of sorts. He published a monthly magazine that he distributed amongst those interested in senryu poetry. He had somehow talked the proprietors of the local Japanese confectionaries to donate a couple dozen rice cakes a month in exchange for advertising in his magazine, which had a circulation that included the salon members and whoever would accept the magazine he handed out for free at church and other community functions.

Anyway, he held his senryu-kai once a month and it was a treat to tag along with him on those Sundays. These confectionaries not only sold Japanese sweets, but an assortment of American candies as well, and I would get the chance to "guilt" my dad into buying me something. He was so into "face" that there was no way he could say "no" in front of other people to a kid who was asking for a measly 5-cent pack of baseball cards or five penny strips of candied dots. While there were two stores he visited, it was an unwritten code that I could only do this at one store, and I usually did it at Mikawaya since they had a better selection of candies than Fugetsudo. But I guess it must have frustrated him at times. I was so good at this "poor me" routine that my dad would try to send me to another store with mom.

"Go to Ueda Department with your mother."

"Why?"

"Don't you want to look at the toys?"

"Yeah, but..."

"Maybe there'll be something good."

"Okay!" I said, hoping that he would actually buy me something.

Of course, it was merely a ploy, and so when he showed up at Ueda's and I led him to the toy I wanted, he simply said, "Maybe, Christmas."

Try as he might, this ploy never worked on me again. In fact, I distinctly remember finagling a pack of baseball cards AND five strips of the candied dots on our next visit to Mikawaya and Fugetsudo.