"Whoa, I think I'm in love," Steamboat announced.
"I am a married woman," Jade Moon demurred. "But this one is single." And she mischievously pointed out Beauty, standing shyly nearby.
Beauty blushed in mortification and tried to hide behind me, but Panama's eyes lit up. "Now, now, don't go hiding your bushel under a tisket," which made even Beauty, who didn't fully grasp the absurdity of what he'd said, giggle.
The one named Paoa seemed quiet and unassuming, but now I noticed that although his brother called him Paoa, the other beachboys referred to him as "Duke." This was also not lost on Wise Pearl's ten-year-old son, John, who approached him and asked in a hushed tone, "Are you the Duke?"
"Well," Tarball's brother said, "my father was also named Duke. He'll al ways be `the' Duke to me. That's why my brothers started calling me Paoa, to distinguish me from my dad."
"But you're the one who went to the Olympics, right?"
Duke nodded modestly. Jae-sun and I looked at each other with surprise. That Duke?
"Are your medals really made of gold?" John asked in awe.
"Sure thing. But let me show you something." The great Duke Kahanamoku-Olympic medalist, world champion swimmer, legendary surfer-took in the dazzling sweep of the ocean and told John, "This is worth your weight in gold. And it's all ours."
For the next few hours we all ate and joked and talked as if we were old friends. Steamboat strummed a ukulele and Panama showed Beauty's daughter, Mary, how to make a coconut hat. "Why do they call you Panama?" Mary asked.
He pointed to the big gap between his front teeth. "You heard of the Panama Canal? Looks kine like this." He took a big gulp of drinking water, then blew it out through the toothless gap in a gusher. Mary squealed in delight; Beauty laughed, too. Panama may not have been the handsomest of the beachboys, but I could tell Beauty was smitten.
Tarball, whose real name was Bill, took Harry out for another ride on his board and Duke offered to do the same for Grace-who backed away in horror at the idea. I explained Grace's fear of the water and Duke just nodded thoughtfully, then excused himself and headed back down the beach to the Moana Hotel.
When he returned a few minutes later, it was with one of the glass boxes that guests of the Moana used to view reef fish-the precursor to today's snorkeling masks. He asked Grace, "Have you ever seen how people throw coins off the big cruise ships when they come into the harbor?"
"They do?"
"Yeah, sure, all the time. Young boys go diving down looking for them, but they don't always find them all. I happen to know for a fact there's a quarter buried in the sand around here somewhere. You want to try look?"
He started her searching on the dry sand and just when she was starting to get bored, I saw him slip a coin out of his pocket and bury it into the sand. When Grace found it a few minutes later, she cried out, "Look! A dime!"
"Well, that's swell," Duke said with feigned frustration, "but I know there's a quarter a little farther out."
He showed her how to use the glass box to view the sandy bottom of the shallows, pointing out frightened little puffer fish burying their heads in the sand and tiny sand crabs skittering sideways like tipsy spiders. Grace began to brave the deeper water without even realizing she was doing it. Duke turned her toward a school of silvery needlefish, slanting below the surface like a torrent of silver rain. When the water grew too deep for Grace to wade in, Duke picked her up in his big hands and gently floated her on the surface. She peered through her glass box at the schools of yellow tangs, blue-green unicorn fish, and black-and-white butterfly fish swarming around the pink coral heads. Grace was so entranced by this colorful undersea world that it didn't even occur to her to be afraid. And Duke didn't forget, as they came ashore again, to have her look again for that quarter in the sand-which, of course, she triumphantly discovered.
Grace was never afraid of the ocean again, and from that day on, Duke Kahanamoku was as much royalty to me as Lili'uokalani had been.
As the sun slid below the horizon our new friends invited us over to the gazebo at the end of the three-hundred-foot Moana Pier, where they were joined by Hiram Anahu, another beachboy as well as a talented painter and composer of popular songs. In the limelight of the newly risen moon the beachboys played ukulele and steel guitar, and sang both traditional Hawaiian standards like "Kalena Kai" and hapa-haole songs like "Honolulu Moon." Their voices were the sweetest I had ever heard, falsettos blending together in angelic harmony. This was a Sunday night tradition I would be lucky enough to experience again over the years-but I will never forget that first night out on the pier, listening to songs of moonlight and romance, and to the sigh of the tide as the moon tugged on it, its light scattering like daydreams on the waves breaking across the reef. I rested with my head on Jae-sun's shoulder; Beauty gazed adoringly at Panama, strumming his ukulele; Jade Moon cradled her youngest child in her lap as she looked up at the stars, sprinkled like sugar across the black bowl of the sky. These young men with their music and their magical voices were the very embodiment of aloha, of the spirit of the islands; but the true measure of their magic was that as we listened to them, we were not so much transported as transformed. Because for as long as we listened, reflected in the sweet light of their songs, we were all, every one of us, Hawaiian.
undays were always over too soon. The next morning Jae-sun would be up before dawn to make his daily pilgrimage to the O'ahu Fish Market, where limp stacks of bonito, skipjack, yellowtail, and ono, all fresh off the fishing boats, were piled high for inspection. Battalions of restaurant owners and chefs swarmed over the mounds of dead fish, checking for color and texture, hefting for weight and size. I went only once with Jaesun. The place reeked of brine and seaweed, and the sight of so many deceased fish staring at me with open eyes reminded me unpleasantly of the butcher shop next door to Aunt Obedience's. Jae-sun was always frustrated that he could never find anything resembling mudfish-small minnows that live in the muddy mouths of rivers in Korea. These fish were but three or four inches in length, thin as pencils and usually dark with ingested sediment. Jae-sun knew an old recipe for a soup with stuffed tubu-soybean curd-that called for mudfish. First, he said, you placed the fish in brine, which made them-let's say "eject"-the mud, after which they shined like newly minted coins. They were then tossed live into a heated skillet filled with tabu-where, in an effort to escape the heat, the poor things would dive into the soybean curd, obligingly providing a stuffing for the tubu before expiring.
I never wished to see this in practice, much less partake of it, but Jae-sun had a yen to cook it and none of the local fish markets bothered to stock something as small and unprofitable as a minnow.
Then one day he came home triumphant from his morning pilgrimage, proudly showing me not only twenty pounds of fresh skipjack, but a large bottle filled with water and teeming with tiny live minnows. "Look!" he cried out. "They are not mudfish, but they will do."
"Did you find these at the fish market?"
"No, I finally used my head. I went down to the docks yesterday looking for a fisherman who would sell his catch to me directly, at a lower cost. I found a man with a small boat who said he'd be willing, if I committed to buy a certain amount each week." He opened the brown butcher paper covering a three-pound bonito. "This is of excellent quality, as you see."
"And you asked him to catch you some minnows?"
"He uses them for bait, so he gave me a jarful with his compliments. I can't wait to cook these up for a luncheon treat!" He took out a large skillet, which would shortly become the instrument of doom for the tiny wriggling fish.
"Ah," I said, "as it happens, I am having lunch with Beauty today." This was a lie, of course, but one I could make true easily enough.
"But this is a rare delicacy, and delicious!"
I slipped out of the kitchen before the butter greased the skillet.
While Jae-sun feasted on bait, Beauty was happy to share some fried rice with me at Sai Fu's Chop Sui House on Ho
tel Street. Panama Dave had swept her off her feet with his wit, romantic soul, and gentleness toward Mary, and she had fallen quickly and hopelessly in love with him. I was happy for her-Heaven knew she deserved some romance and laughter in her life-but when she began telling us at kye meetings about what "they" would do once they were married, Wise Pearl tactfully inquired whether Panama had actually asked for her hand.
"Not yet," Beauty admitted, "but I'm sure he will."
Now, months later, Beauty was fretting that the proposal still was not forthcoming. I suggested, as gently as I could, that perhaps Panama was simply not the "marrying kind."
"Oh no, you don't know him, he's so sweet," she protested.
"A man can be sweet and loving and still not be interested in marriage."
"He loves Mary. You see how good he is with her. He loves children."
"He has a childlike spirit, it's true," I said delicately, "and I'm sure he cares for Mary. But that does not necessarily mean he wants to be a father, or husband."
Beauty fell into a sullen pout and I elected to change the subject.
I returned to the cafe, where my husband was extolling the savory flavor of his tubu soup. He had saved me some, and I had to admit that it was tasty, as was the other fish he had purchased. We served it spiced and barbecued for bulgogi or grilled in a miso sauce. Thus began a long, fruitful business relationship, with our weekly order increasing steadily. After perhaps six weeks, Jae-sun came home with thirty pounds of bonito, yellowtail, and albacore, and with a certain diffidence he told me, "I've invited our supplier to the restaurant with his family. He only purchased this boat last year and I believe they struggle to make ends meet. I thought they might appreciate a taste of the fruit of his labors."
"We should prepare them something special, then."
"I was thinking perhaps misoyaki," he said with studied casualness. "They are Japanese."
I was more than mildly surprised, but said only, "Perhaps some mochi for dessert?"
"Yes, good."
"When will they be coming?"
"Tomorrow evening at six o'clock."
We spoke no more of it until the following evening at six, when a spindly Japanese man in a threadbare suit entered the restaurant with his wife and four children in tow. I was not looking at them but at him-there was an earnest grace to the way he bowed to me, smiled and said, "Hello. We have table. I am Taizo."
I bowed in return. "Konicha wa, Taizo-san. I am honored to meet you. My name is Jin-my husband has told me much about you."
"And he speaks of you with great fondness. This is my wife, Tamiko."
I looked at the woman standing behind him, holding an infant child, and surely betrayed my surprise at seeing my old friend from the Nippon Maru.
Tamiko smiled and bowed, then said, as if we were meeting for the first time: "I am pleased to meet you, Jin-san. This is my daughter Sugi, my sons Hiroshi and Jiro, and our newest child, who is also named Jin. Is that not a coincidence?" Her eyes glittered with amusement. "In Japanese it means `tenderness.' "
Jae-sun appeared from the kitchen, greeting Taizo with evident warmth as he escorted the family to a table. As Tamiko and I followed behind our husbands we exchanged wordless smiles. But Jiro was regarding me uncertainly, perhaps with a faint memory of crackseed on his tongue. "I know you," he said at last.
"Of course you do," I said, pulling a chair out for him. "We are all going to be great friends."
s these ties were renewed, so were others. At the start of the Christian New Year of 1924, I had received a letter from my elder brother, informing me that Blossom, now sixteen years old, had made another attempt to flee the Pak home. The weariness in which he couched this news made me think that perhaps the time was finally right to again broach a sore subject. What's more, the following month would see the start of the Korean Year of the Rat. It had been the Year of the Rat twelve years ago, when Blossom first came to our home in Pojogae, and I took this as an auspicious omen. After consulting with Jae-sun, I wrote to Joyful Day:
It sounds as if little sister-in-law is becoming increasingly troublesome. Someone who so obviously hates where she is will hardly make for a pliant and dutiful wife. Would it not be better for all concerned if she were to come here to Hawaii instead?
My husband and fare prepared to offeryou the sum of one hundred dollars-two hundred yen-to dissolve Blossom's obligation to the clan. We will also pay for her steamer fare to Hawaii. You need do nothing but apply for the proper papers. If Father will not consider sister-in-law's well-being, perhaps he will consider what two hundred yen might do for his clan's.
The reply, which arrived a month later, was brief and to the point:
Little Sister.
Father has given due consideration to your generous offer and wishes me to tell you that he agrees to your terms.
Please advise us on how you wish to proceed.
Your elder brother
I was ecstatic and wrote back to request they begin the process of applying for Blossom's passport and visa. Once they had obtained these, we would send them a steamship ticket and either mail or wire them the hundred dollars.
But in order for Blossom to enter the country, she had to be engaged to marry a man in the United States. I discreetly inquired of several young men of our acquaintance whether they would be willing to lend their names to the fiction of an arranged marriage. Ronald Yun, the twenty-year-old son of a neighbor, agreed to assist in this bit of subterfuge-even to marry Blossom if there was no other way to get her into the country, a marriage that would later be annulled.
To lend credibility to the sham, I had Mr. Yun send Blossom fifty dollars in "earnest money," which we provided.
My brother reported no trouble obtaining a passport for Blossom. I then had him apply for a visa on her behalf as the fiancee of an American-born man named Ronald Yun in Honolulu. Hundreds of women still entered the country this way, and I believed it would be only a question of how long we had to wait for the American embassy in Seoul to approve Blossom's visa.
But though my timing had been right in approaching Father, in another respect it could not have been worse.
oreans were not alone, it seemed, in their antipathy toward the Japanese. Apparently many on the American mainland, including prominent members of Congress, were looking at the number of Japanese immigrants in Hawai'i-and other parts of the western United States-with mounting alarm about something they called "Oriental colonization." It was not a matter of race, they claimed, but of culture: Orientals, they said, were too alien in their values, and simply would not assimilate into American society. America's culture and values had to be preserved against this invasion from outside its borders.
The 1920 Japanese labor action against O'ahu plantations only fueled Americans' suspicions that the Japanese were out to undermine their economy and way of life. Immigration from China had been restricted before the turn of the century, and a so-called Gentleman's Agreement between the United States and Japan in 1907 stopped any further immigration from the Japanese Empire, including Korea. The only exceptions to this had been for students studying abroad and for "picture brides" like myself. But now, it appeared, we had committed an unpardonable crime: We were reproducing.
Birth rates among Japanese and Koreans in the United States had soared in recent years as laborers married, settled down, and raised families. We were apparently doing it too well relative to the birth rate of Americans in general, and white Americans in particular.
I was pathetically ignorant of all this as I began excitedly preparing for Blossom's arrival. We had purchased a two-tiered "bunk bed" for Harold and Charlie to sleep in, thus freeing up valuable floor space in our one-room apartment, in which we put the daybed that was to belong to my sister-inlaw. Even though Blossom's arrival was still months away, I began excitedly cleaning house, making room in the closet, and clearing space for another family member.
But then, in December 1924, word came from my brother that Blossom's visa to
the United States had been denied.
At first I thought it was some sort of mistake, but a visit to the passport office here in Honolulu revealed the appalling truth.
That summer, the United States Congress had passed-and President Coolidge signed into law-the immigration Act of 1924, or as it was sometimes called, the Oriental Exclusion Act. Against the fear of a "Japanese conspiracy," it closed the door on any further Japanese immigration, including and especially the importation of picture brides.
It closed the door on Blossom.
The only exceptions now were temporary visas for students entering "an accredited school, college, academy, seminary, or university ... and who shall voluntarily depart from the United States upon the completion of such course of study." Desperately I attempted to enroll Blossom in the Korean Girls' Seminary in Honolulu, but as she had never received a formal education of any kind in Korea, she was judged by the American Embassy not a "qualified" applicant and a student visa was also denied her.
It was our last hope, cruelly dashed.
I blamed not Congress but myself: If only I had thought to do this a year ago! I wept bitterly, feeling the greatest loss and grief since the death of my first child; and in a way, this was a kind of death, the death of a dream long held. Jae-sun tried to comfort me, but I would not be consoled. During the day, with Harold and Grace at school and Jae-sun at work, I would look at the daybed we had bought for my little sister and I would burst into tearsalarming Charlie, who hardly understood grief and would never know what he was missing by Blossom's absence in our home.
Just as I was beginning to reconcile myself to a life without her, I received another letter from Joyful Day-this one informing me that Blossom had once again run away. But this time she had done so bearing an Imperial Japanese passport. She could not travel to the United States with this docu ment, but she might have been able to use it to escape to Japan or China. Despite their best attempts, my family was unable to locate her.