Interviews

1. Food growing up

2. Being on the outside

3. Working at the magazine

Wayne Shigeto Yokoyama

(b.1948) Nikkei from Southern California living in Japan.

Being on the outside

It was interesting to be in a place where all these Japanese were because all these Japanese names on the stores, sometimes written in English and then…yeah it was very interesting. And then…well, let’s say everybody was about the same height as I was in those days. Now that’s changed. I suppose I didn’t feel out of place. At the same time, I’m not really Japanese. So I’m not going to try to fit into Japanese society as a Japanese. My background is different, my language is different, my culture, my sense of values…so some things are difficult to change. Although I found that this is an interesting country. But there’s a great difference between…I could never really be on the inside track in this kind of society. So I’m always on the outside. Just like I was at the Buddhist Journal. I was never really accepted in as a member. So I was always on the outside. I kind of like it. I’m much freer because I have no real obligations. I don’t have to answer for a lot of things because I am on the outside.

culture Finding Home (film) identity

Date: November 13, 2003

Location: Kyoto, Japan

Interviewer: Art Nomura

Contributed by: Art Nomura, Finding Home.

Interviewee Bio

Wayne Shigeto Yokoyama was born in Hawaii in 1948. His parents were both Kibei Nisei, but they never insisted that he learn Japanese. He moved to East Los Angeles, CA at the age of seven. He graduated from Roosevelt High School, then started at the University of California at Berkeley. After a year, however, he returned to Southern California and attended California State College in Los Angeles.

Mr. Yokoyama never thought about going to Japan until he was 31 years old. At the time, the Vietnam War was still going on. He did not want to go into the U.S. Army, so he decided to study Buddhism in Japan. After he earned his master’s degree, he worked for an English Buddhist magazine called Eastern Buddhist for over 20 years until the magazine was absorbed into the University system. Since then, he has been conducting research and trying to publish his work. He married a Japanese woman and has one daughter and one son. He lives in Kyoto. (November 13, 2003)