LAKE STEVENS – His mother told him stories in a little ravine called Japanese Gulch in Mukilteo a long time ago.
Mas Odoi, a son of Japanese immigrants, learned values from the stories and held onto them.
Time has turned him from a boy into an old man. He is now 85 years old.
This week, it was his turn to tell stories to children. Odoi entered the library at Lake Stevens Middle School where about 50 eighth-graders waited for him in the early morning.
| Mas Odoi’s story
Reporter Yoshiaki Nohara met Mas Odoi in Mukilteo in summer 2005. Nohara spent a year interviewing Odoi, his family and other people while researching the history of Japanese Gulch.Read Part 1 or Part 2 of Nohara’s story, published in The Herald Dec. 3 and Dec. 4, 2006 |
Teacher Heidi Lambert welcomed Odoi and his nephew, Steve Odoi.
“This is such a treat for us,” Lambert said to the crowd.
The students had never met Mas Odoi but already knew a lot about him and his family.
His life was featured in a series called “A Place of Happiness &Peace” in The Herald in December. Lambert had her students read the series in her social studies classes this year.
The students knew that Odoi’s parents immigrated in the early 20th century from Fukuyama, Japan, to Mukilteo. His father worked at a sawmill on the waterfront in town. His family lived in a village in Japanese Gulch near the sawmill.
The students knew how Odoi and his family were sent to a camp in Minidoka, Idaho, along with other Japanese immigrants and their families after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.
They knew how Odoi and his twin brother, Hiro, volunteered in the U.S. Army and fought in Italy to redeem Japanese- Americans.
The students peppered Odoi with questions Tuesday morning. How did he feel about Pearl Harbor? How did the war affect his life? Does he think that the U.S. government was justified in sending Japanese-Americans to camps during the war?
The Japanese attack in Pearl Harbor turned his life upside down, Odoi said to the crowd. Given prejudice toward Japanese-Americans on the West Coast, the U.S. government had to relocate them, Odoi said.
“The country made a mistake, but it was an understandable mistake,” he said.
The Minidoka Relocation Center provided his family a refuge, Odoi said, adding that it wasn’t an internment camp.
“It wasn’t a terrible place,” he said of the center. “Actually, when I went to the Army, I didn’t worry about my mother and others. They had a safe place.”
The war affected him psychologically for a long time, Odoi said. But the sacrifices that he and other Japanese-American soldiers made during the war helped combat prejudice against racial minorities, he said.
“We kept the faith,” he said. “When things are difficult, keep the faith. Things will work out.”
Students listened to Odoi and learned from his stories. Wendy Schultz, 14, said that Odoi helped her see and feel a part of local history.
“It touches home a lot because he is from here and he is still alive,” she said. “Maybe it’s a lot easier to be in his shoes.”
That’s what Lambert wanted to happen to her students. They can read about history in books, but they rarely engage in an honest conversation with those who have lived it.
“You answered a lot of questions,” she said to Odoi. “We can’t thank you enough for sharing your stories.”
Odoi, who moved from Renton to Everett this year, still has fond memories about his hometown, Mukilteo, where local residents and their Japanese neighbors got along despite their differences.
“Several years ago, we put a memorial in Mukilteo,” he said. “Maybe you heard about it.”
The students knew about the origami crane sculpture, dedicated by Odoi and others of the Mukilteo Historical Society in 2000. The sculpture in Centennial Park is to remember the lives and friendships that once existed in Japanese Gulch, where nobody lives now.
At the end of class Tuesday, students had a surprise for Odoi. Earlier this week, each of them folded a paper origami crane. They strung the colorful cranes – blue, orange, red, green – together.
They handed Odoi the gift; they clapped.
Odoi smiled.
Reporter Yoshiaki Nohara: 425-339-3029 or ynohara@heraldnet.com.
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