Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer (Trailblazing Canadians)

Written by Haley Healey

Illustrated by Kimiko Fraser

Heritage House

978-1-77203-431-8

32 pp.

Ages 4-8

May 2023

 

It's Asian Heritage Month and I am pleased to present this picture book about Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer whose story of courage, resilience, and determination, along with a ganbaru spirit, propelled her to make a good life for herself, her family, and others.

From Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer by Haley Healey, illus. by Kimiko Fraser

Kimiko Murakami was born in a coastal village outside of Vancouver and moved with her family to Salt Spring Island when she was five. There the family fished and then farmed, raising chickens and fruits and vegetables. When she married, she and her husband and children continued to work on the farm. That is, until World War II came, and all people of Japanese heritage were removed from their homes and interned at various camps both in BC and in Alberta.

From Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer by Haley Healey, illus. by Kimiko Fraser

These times were difficult for Kimiko and her family, yet she never gave up, determined to be guided by the Japanese word "ganbaru" which means "to push through hard times and never give up." Through horrible living conditions and hard work and multiple relocations, Kimiko kept up her ganbaru spirit. 

Once WWII ended and they were still not allowed to return home, Kimiko's family opened a restaurant in Alberta, determined to save their money and return to Salt Spring Island. It took 12 years since they'd left to finally return, but return they did. Still, their land and belongs were gone, long ago sold, and racism was widespread. Nevertheless, Kimiko kept her ganbaru spirit while she and her family rebuilt the life that had been taken from them.

From Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer by Haley Healey, illus. by Kimiko Fraser

While this is essentially an illustrated biography, Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer goes beyond the facts of Kimiko Murakami's life. Haley Healey may include a historical timeline from Kimiko's birth in 1904 to her death in 1997 but the author delves deeper, focusing on Kimiko's spirit and what enabled her to endure the hardships involved with the detention of Japanese Canadians. In fact, Kimiko and her family didn't just endure. They persevered and rose above the injustice of discrimination and maltreatment to regain the life they had earned and lost. Moreover, they remembered. And with those memories came a fundamental need to help others who also struggled. BC's Haley Healey tells us Kimiko's story but, more than that, she tells us about her.

BC artist Kimiko Fraser, who uses a variety of media in her work including watercolour, digital, ink and tea, was inspired by original images of the Murakami family from archives and museums. But her artwork goes beyond photorealism, as she depicts the heart of a family as they face uncertainty and persecution and still show strength and ganbaru. It's there in the faces and the way they hold themselves. So, Kimiko Fraser could emphasize the greys and browns of a challenging life of work and struggle, but she also gives the story colour with a hopeful branch of cherry blossoms, fruits and vegetables, and peonies. As Haley Healey does with her words, Kimiko Fraser does with her art, going beyond the worst and including the best.

I suspect that Kimiko Murakami's story is better known on Salt Spring Island and in BC than other parts of Canada but, with Kimiko Murakami: A Japanese-Canadian Pioneer, her story can be appreciated far and wide for Asian Heritage Month and always.

kā-āciwīkicik / The Move

Written by Doris George and Don K. Philpot

Illustrated by Alyssa Koski

Heritage House

978-1-77203-409-7

48 pp.

Ages 4-8

May 2022

The story of kā-āciwīkicik or The Move, a dual-language picture book, begins with an elderly Cree couple looking out from their new house in a rocky barren land, having moved from their old place beside a river close to a lake, land covered with trees, and brush and meadows. As upset as the old woman is in having to leave so much behind, her husband tells her that "There's nothing we can do to change things".  But he's wrong.

 

From kā-āciwīkicik / The Move by Doris George and Don K. Philpot, illus. by Alyssa Koski

Recalling the belief of her grandmother, a diviner, that the spirits would extend help when asked, the old woman first wishes for some trees so that she might have wood to smoke her fish and moose hides. With that, a group of black ash appear and root themselves in the yard. Consequently, the old man gathers some old wood and, in addition to making a smudge, starts a fire for his wife's drying racks.

From kā-āciwīkicik / The Move by Doris George and Don K. Philpot, illus. by Alyssa Koski

When the couple's daughter and two grandchildren come to visit, they reminisce about the old songs, and their activities like making maple sugar candy and weaving baskets from birch bark. With a wish, maple and birch trees then appear, along with spruce, and the elderly couple get to work tapping the trees and boiling sap, as well as cutting strips of bark and gathering roots for baskets. Moreover they can now share with their grandchildren the skills of those springtime activities.

When summer comes and the old woman remembers picking saskatoon berries for bannock and winter storage, she laments how far away they are from the berries now. With a clap of thunder and a heave of the ground, a trail appears and saskatoon berries materialize everywhere. It is finally then that the old woman looks out over their new home and land, and recognizes that, "It's good here."

From kā-āciwīkicik / The Move by Doris George and Don K. Philpot, illus. by Alyssa Koski

Though there are supernatural elements to Doris George and Don K. Philpot's story, it is a story rooted in reality and history. Their "Authors' Note" recalls the building of a dam in northern Manitoba in the early 1960s and the relocation of the Chemawawin Cree Nation from ancestral lands. It's the contrast of the old with the new but also the establishment of a new familiarity that is significant. What the Cree couple leave behind is tradition, family, culture and home. But, they are able to re-establish all, with a little spiritual assistance, to continue providing for themselves and others and build a new life. While the disruption caused by forced relocations is very real, authors Doris George and Don K. Philpot emphasize that the quality of life travels with the couple. With their resilience, they make it work.  

Alyssa Koski of Kainai Nation transitions the couple from the greyness of their stark new land to its promise. She gives us contemplation in the old woman's face, purpose in their activities, and hope in the lushness of the new greenness. By juxtaposing the real with the unreal, Alyssa Koski takes us into Doris George and Don K. Philpot's First Nation experience story of ancestry, upheaval and survival and, with colour and shape, shows us the continuity that inspires and reassures.

Aggie and Mudgy: The Journey of Two Kaska Dena Childen

 

Written by Wendy Proverbs

Wandering Fox (Heritage House)

978-1-77203-375-5

144 pp.

Ages 8-12

November 2021

They were lost in a void, 

not understanding where they would end up. (pg. 99)

While there are an increasing number of middle-grade books about residential schools, few discuss the journeys that Indigenous children were forced to take from their home to get to those residential schools. Aggie and Mudgy is one such story. But it's also a tale of loss: of family, of names, of culture. And it is as painful as their journey.

 

In contemporary Vancouver, eight-year-old Maddy has found an old photo in her Nan's desk and begs her grandmother to tell her the story of the two little girls. And so Nan does, recounting the story of two young sisters from Daylu, a Kasha Dena community on the BC-Yukon border. As history has shown us, the arrival of those of the Catholic church brought much change, as it did in Daylu, where the First Nations people were first forcibly assimilated by being renamed. 

When we name something, it gives us a kind of ownership, doesn't it? (pg. 96)

Sisters Mac-kinnay and Beep were renamed Agnes and Martha but they called themselves Aggie and Mudgy. Then two years later, the young sisters, only 6 and 8, were taken away by Father Allard to go to school far away. How far away they could not have known.

Though leaving their home would have been frightening, the beginning of their journey starts with some comfort and familiarity as the priest employs two Indigenous brothers to transport them down the Liard River. The landscape, the food and the language are still their own. But after 300 km, their journey after Dease Lake becomes one of newness. As the priest and the girls travel six weeks by mail truck, paddle wheeler boat, steamship and train to the Lejac Residential School at Fraser Lake in central BC, the girls soon realized that their old ways would not be tolerated. Not the language they spoke, not the way they looked, nor the joys they savoured in the outdoors. And if Priest Allard and the nuns who aided them in their journey were not pleased, the children were shamed and beaten.

They couldn't respect different people and cultures, and if the children didn't obey, some priests and nuns could be very cruel. (pg. 47)

The girls' journey with Father Allard was just over 1600 km but it was just the beginning of the inevitable trauma that would be their residency at the Lejac school. Wendy Proverbs could have walked us into that school with Aggie and Mudgy but she knew that the journey of these two Kaska Dena children was important enough to be highlighted. Still, the story is told to enlighten and to acknowledge, not traumatize-it doesn't, though it could have– and by revealing her own personal connection (see "Author's Note" and "Acknowledgements" in Aggie and Mudgy), and giving Nan one as well, Wendy Proverbs has made the sisters' story both restrained and profound. Don't be surprised if a tear is shed.

Because Aggie and Mudgy tells a story within a story, with fiction embracing history, Wendy Proverbs, herself of Kaska Dena descent, has honoured her heritage and her ancestors. In fact, a nod of appreciation should be given to her as she does to others in her acknowledgements for sharing Aggie and Mudgy and purposefully shaking up the universe with truth.

Final appreciation to all of our ancestors who led the way for future generations to speak, dance, create, and indeed disturb the universe. (pg. 130)