Professional Documents
Culture Documents
In tokyo, japan.
In, tokyo japan? And then um. Can you tell me how life - or how long did you live in japan?
On and off until I was about 4.
Do you remember anything/, Like how it was over there?
Hm hmm.
Oh can you tell me a little bit about it?
* Frances eating a japanese bun*
Totally different from the U.S
Okay, if you could pick 3 major things that are different what would those be?
*Frances eating a japanese bun*
Food, housing, daily living. People. Its just different
Yeah just like different customs that people have?
But. you have to remember my mom was a widowed uh military widow. She got really sick for 2
months and she went back to her family.And so i had 12 adults were there taking care of a
child . so then she went back to the united states, so I started school. I didnt speak english but
my mom spoke a little bit. And basically we had to move into a country that was all asian to a
country that was racist to asians.
Yeah.
There was only one apartment where japanese live in. it was still discriminatory housing back
then. And I came to being of multi family to a single parent home. So it was a big shift.
Yeah, hmm ok. And then when you were my age did you live here?
Hm hmm.
Can you tell me when you were my age what did you want to be when you were older?
When I was 16?
Hm hmm.
When i was a junior?
Hmm.
I wanted to be a dancer. I wanted to dance with alber eivy or someone like that. Because I knew
no white ballet company would take me , I look too different. But my father was really smart,
both my parents. What they did is that they showed me , they gave me a list of a dancers salary
compared to other salaries and musicians and dancers were the lowest two on the scale . So i
was like oh ok. They said ok you could do it but , you wouldn't be able to make such a living
off of it.
Oh wow , so did you ever think of going to juilliard or something like that?
You know I think because my parents were really bent on an academic program probably didn't
see it that way as well. And then I think the other thing too is being a kid born in another
country , whose mom is not familiar with the diversity and opportunity in america and the
american education. I don't think those were ya know, looking back on it and saying , why didn't
i do that?. At that time those weren't the things that I thought of as options for me. Culturally is
just wasnt on my radar.
Yeah.
And most asian parents think - oh and I also played the piano , and asian parents think of things
as a hobby and not a
Do you feel like growing up the whole racial aspect was a really big thing? And do you ever feel
like that kind of held you back from doing certain things? And then how so?
Well, when I was growing up it was a lot more racist. Especially around the 6th, pearl harbor day
people, were always going to blame me for pearl harbor at school, LIke sure i'm personally
responsible for pearl harbor. I think when you are- especially also asian female or asian mixed
female there was a lot more sexual harassment and preconceived notion about asian females
and such . so you get a lot of harassment. And it still continues all the way through . In fact Ill sit
down with asian women or asian mixed women and we will all crack up about the jokes and
same things that men say to us , and we'll all kind of laugh and say did you get this, did you get
that . Because we all had some of the same experiences. But also in some places I was the
only asian mixed child or only asian child in some of the places. For instance In new mexico it
was 2 and i was one of them. And then in kentucky and lexington there was maybe 10 , but at
my school i would sometimes i would be the only one.
I feel like that happens a lot with minorities in general where its like Im the only person in here
kind of thing. After college what was your first line of action. What did you first start doing?
So I went to undergraduate then I went to graduate , then to law school . So I attended law
school for a year and a half and I hated it , and i was lucky because i had always wanted to go
into mental health law. So i was lucky that my friends worked for the county they worked in the
conservers office which is the mental health board and so I got called and offered a job so I got
to work there.
How long did you stay within that?
I stayed in adult mental health services for about 7 years or so. Then I stayed for another 18.
Other than living in hawaii and running on the beach with my dogs. Ya know, Yeah i had/ have a
really rich life. And it's been more than health and mental health I've been able to open
businesses in mexico and puerto vallarta . Down there i own ice companies ,restaurants, ya
know salsa clubs and i've done the mental health peices and i've done consulting. And i think
just having that fundamental solid basic general arts liberal arts education plus and a passion if
you find your joy. You can try and put that time in its served me well all these years
Thats really cool. And then my last question is if you could change any aspect of your life what
would it be and why?
Id probably want to be a philanthropist
And why would you want to do that?
Because ya know, i think that falls into wanting to be a healthy person and helping people .
Because there's so many things you would want to do and i think that the thing that keeps you
fresh and young thinking is when you can think of things that you want to do and things that you
would like to have the opportunity to do . And give and certainly have the financial resources so
you have the money to put together to do those things.