Norm Masaji Ibuki

“Certain events can have a major impact that will last a lifetime. The forced removal of the Japanese Canadian - my family was among them - from the west coast into the British Columbia (BC) interior in 1942 is one of those events. My troubled feelings regarding this disordered time have remained unfaded along with my ambivalent attitude towards being Canadian of Japanese origin.”

— Artist Norman Takeuchi

As we launch into the new “Canadian Nikkei Artist” series, I wanted to start with artist Norman Takeuchi who was born in 1937 in Vancouver, which means, of course, that he was a victim of ...

What does being Japanese Canadian (JC) mean to you? And, how was the world of your own family broken by the experience of internment?

That answer differs with each one of us. Pondering upon my own answer, I would list factors like my family’s lost histories in BC, internment, forced labour on a Manitoba sugar beet farm, the so-called dispersal ‘east of the Rockies’, settling into tumultuous new lives and careers in Ontario, young families, getting back into contact with old JC friends and establishing JC communities all over again like brand new immigrants. The Issei and Nisei didn ...

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Can you tell us a bit about each of the sign sites? What was the local community support like?

It began on October 2017 at Tashme Internment Camp - located beside Sunshine Valley Tashme Museum with a stop of interest sign about thirteen km outside Hope on Highway 3.

On May 2018, a stop of interest sign was installed for the Lillooet self-supporting sites: Bridge River, Minto, McGillvray Falls, East Lillooet, Taylor Lake with East Lillooet.

Our committee partnered with the District of Lillooet (town government) to make the Japanese Canadian Internment Memorial Garden where the sign is ...

Certainly one of the most important Japanese Canadian projects that was completed in 2018 was the Highway Legacy Sign Project in British Columbia (BC), Canada. The ambitious eight site project included important reminders that Nisei and Issei men worked as forced labour to build highways in some of the most remote and dangerous areas of BC and Alberta.

In September 2018, the Ontario JC heritage marker program was launched. The first one highlighted a little-known chapter of Japanese Canadian history in Mitchell’s Bay in the Chatham-Kent area where Japanese Canadian families from BC were sent as farm labourers during ...

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What does being Nikkei mean to you today?

Being Nikkei today means being aware of who I am regarding my personal history, and being aware of what continues to inspire me as a writer.

Is this something that you are passing on to your kids? If so, how and why? What is their reaction to these stories and their connection to Japan?

Am I passing this on to my kids? I have tried my best to expose my children to life in Japan, for example, and by having them take Japanese language classes, but ultimately, as adults ...