Biography Hawaiʻi; Koji Ariyoshi; Interview with Davianna McGregor 9/01/04 #2

second hand, and they were like, you know, he'd type out how Joe and Lai couldn't, or Masi-Tun couldn't do with some dance, I forgot, Fox Trot or something. Yeah. What kind of dance? Yeah. What kind of dance? Each other. I can't think of that. So, um, I'll ask you. Okay. So, if you could just tell us a little bit, um, I understand that he was a, uh, Koji was a big champion of oral history. Yes. Um, that's how I got to work closely with Koji, because I wasn't involved with Japanese class, but he was very committed to, um, establishing an oral history center. And, um, there was an existence, a history and humanity center, and they were supposed to be doing oral histories, but they weren't really, um, as effective as, uh, they should have been, and they weren't really trying to do a broad reach to all the, uh, working

people and, you know, all the different islands and all the different ethnic groups. And, um, uh, Koji had a vision for doing oral history to go out and tell the story of the plantation workers. I think one of the first oral history projects was the Hanapapi massacre, and what happened to the Filipinos who were killed in the Hanapapi massacre, and what is it that led up to, to that strike in the first place, and, uh, and to tell the story, you know, of, uh, the Hawaiian farmers and YPO, and, uh, but, um, and the 46 strikes. So he really thought it was important to, um, challenge the interpretation of history that had come down to us, which was the big five view of history, with the story through, the actual interviews and, and memories and experiences of, you know, various working people, and, um, by, by that way, to begin to, um, put together, uh, a working people's history of, of the multi-ethnic races in Hawaii, and not just, you know, the dominant white,

Halei elite, who were the plantation, um, managers, and, and portraying them as the ones who had built Hawaii. Well, how did they build Hawaii? They never worked a day in the, in the fields. It wasn't the plantation manager who built the plantation, it was all the laborers who, uh, you know, planted the cane, and weeded it, and harvested, and hollana, and, and then they, they, you know, cut it and, and shipped it off. So, uh, we have to begin to portray, uh, the other side of that story that, um, we were limited to hearing and reading about in the books up until that point. The only way you could do it is to get people to tell their history, and, and, and, because it wasn't in the books, how can you write the history, unless you can get the people to tell their story, and write their story, and then it's available to future generations to read about, and to write about, and scholars to then go and use this information to weave it into another history with, uh, perspective of the people themselves.

That's what, I, my, I'm writing a, well, I'm going to publish a book, which is based on oral histories in the 1920s and 60, people who lived in the 20s and 30, I mean, yeah, their life story in the 20s and 30s, but oral histories that I did in that Mary Kavanaugh and Pukui had done in the 60s, she did in the 60s and I did in the 70s and 80s, but trying to tell the story of, um, the people who were farmers and fishermen in the rural areas. Great. Are you really interested in talking to about that? Well, is there anything, um, you want to tell us about, um, Cochia that we have in the 60s? Is there anything you'd like to say about, you know, that? Hmm.

Well, you know, there was, remember, we, we had a lot of controversy over ethnic studies at the time. There was a lot of always different political struggles we were going through over the direction of ethnic studies, and we were young people and we always looked to him and we wanted him to just take over and tell us what to do, but he never would, and he just wanted us to figure it out for ourselves what was the best route to do in the direction to take. But he also said that, um, we should not plant young trees in the wind. And in other words, that while we were dealing with these struggles among ourselves as faculty and staff of the ethnic studies department, that we had to keep our students protected from these kinds of political issues and keep focused on our work, you know, to teach the history of, you know, Hawaii's people and not let the little political struggles that we were dealing with among our internal political struggles somehow spill into the classroom or affect the students, which I think was very wise, you know, because our students were

there because they were seeking their identity and trying to understand, you know, all these broader forces that work, and if we had somehow, you know, try to involve them in whatever personal politics were going on, it would have been really disastrous, and he had the experience in the wisdom to guide us through some very difficult internal political struggles at the time. But that's always the one thing I remember is saying about, you never plant young trees in the wind. It's always a struggle to know how do we best train the next generation to take on the responsibilities that we've, you know, carried on all these years and we want them to be strong and learn the hardship that's, and sacrifices that are necessary, but at the same time, we have to also give them their time to grow on their own and into strong young

individuals too. Other departments of the university not mentioning the other names, you still don't have that philosophy. Exactly. Okay, well, great. I don't do have any questions. Try to know, maybe I'll let you know about anyone at the China. Oh, yeah. Why do you have any idea of why he was chosen to go back to China before Nixon? Do you think that's significant? Well, my understanding is that the Chinese were interested in establishing relations people to people, and that they understood, of course, that you'd have to establish relations government to government, but the U.S.-China People's Friendship Association was trying

to get below the governments and whatever struggles they might have to go through and try to build this friendship across the ocean. The Chinese also understood there are a lot of overseas Chinese that they wanted to reconnect with in order to get support for their economy, their people, and then also for their political recognition. So that was, you know, their idea was what was important was the people-to-people relationship more so than what was going on at the governmental level. And they thought that by establishing, you know, the part among the people that the government policy would ultimately be influenced by that. So do you think they invited Koji because they remembered him as a friend? Yes.

Definitely. They knew Koji was a friend, but I don't actually know much more than that. I guess it. I don't know. I guess it. I think God of the invitation to God there, but not sure. So. Maybe lots of people are following me. Oh, yeah. Did you know him and his when he was ill? Oh, no, I didn't. No. Okay. Thank you so much. That was great.