We are pleased to begin Asian Heritage Month with a poem inspired by the Indigenous writer Richard Wagamese by W.B. Akeroyd, which details his musings on his background as a Hapa man growing up in British Columbia.
My mother’s people arrived on these shores around 1900
Leaving their lives in Hiroshima, Land of the Rising Sun
for the communities of Strathcona and Steveston, across the Big Water
My father escaped the little town of Mirfield, a Yorkshireman was He
From the Empire on which it was said The Sun Never Set (It did)
by way of South Africa and Rhodesia, courtesy of the British Army
to God’s Country as he used to call Canada, a poor man’s paradise
*
And then there’s me, and my brother, and all my cousins and kin
A regular Hapa nation, a result of 90 percent intermarriage among the Nisei
whose own families, blown like so many seeds by the winds of racism
rooted themselves in towns and cities and far off places, across this land
And me/we grew up not really knowing who the person was that stared
back at us when we looked in the mirror, a CaucAsian is what we saw
And I loved hockey, I played ball, I was a Boy Scout, I loved my country, too
But, we were different, and people weren’t afraid to tell us so
*
As the title of an animated short by Jeff Chiba Stearns documents so well
The question was always: What are You, Anyways? So often asked
that I had a ready story at hand that went like this: Well, my mother is….
And all my life until I turned fifty or so, who I was I didn’t really know
I remember when I first realized I didn’t know much about my past
In a history class, when the question was asked: Should the Canadians
of Japanese descent be compensated for their imprisonment and loss of
liberty and land, and exiled from the Coast? What? I didn’t really know
*
And so I read and pondered and questioned who and what I was
and what I did discover was that I was, in fact, like all of Us
When I was among my First Nation, East Indian, Italian, or New Canadian
friends or teammates or coworkers, I was just a guy, like a relation
But among strangers, in certain places and situations
I was brown, someone to be feared, until I proved myself
to be acceptable, presentable, relatable, just like one of Them
Insider, Outsider, and Freedom Writer, all of those are Me
*
And what was so long a heavy weight, a puzzle with pieces missing
Slowly, inexorably, came together to form what I have come to be
Gifted with a unique voice, my own, to share the tales of We
From the time I didn’t think I had a choice of what Others thought of me
To now a proud Hapa, a shapeshifter, a cultural communicator
a bridge across the waters of misperception, disconnection, that
often characterizes relations in Canada, our home on Native Land
Mine is not to create dissent, foster discontent, for that there is enough
*
Mine is a voice to re-evaluate and reveal our not-so-distant past
To retell the stories of all of Us I’ve learned, not just the famous and
infamous for We have heard and learned about those that mask
the facts behind the myth of the National Dream, told to one and all
That here was a vast country, empty, waiting to be filled with farmers
and factories, leaving behind fur traders and fishers who came and went
Inhabited only by Indians, uncivilized, and wasting Mother Nature’s gifts
When, in fact, as time has told, that story was far from the truth
*
So, this is the beginning of my Freedom now at fifty-five
A little wiser, ready to share what has been shared with me
through books I’ve read, programs of study I have been fortunate
to attend, teachers of all manner to whom I’ve been exposed
From these and the people I’ve met, places I’ve lived, and trips I’ve taken
abroad and across this land, and the stories gathered along the way
I have been given the most precious gift: Understanding
And in the words and reflections that follow, I hope to share them all
All My Relations,
Bradford (Uyede) Akeroyd
William Bradford (Uyede) Akeroyd in his own words: I am a fourth generation descendant of my Japanese great-grandparents, who immigrated to Canada from Hiroshima, Japan, around 1900, and my British father, who immigrated from a small town called Mirfield, near the city of York, in England, in the 1950s. I grew up in what used to be the small municipality of Surrey. After attending Douglas and Langara College, I completed a General Studies degree at S.F.U., before becoming a certified teacher. I have been teaching adults and youth for the past twenty years. My writing inspiration comes from both my life experiences as a teacher, but also from being a student of life. Living as a Hapa man has been a struggle at times, but it has also connected me to communities and worldviews that has enriched and enlightened me. I share my writing in hopes that the blessing I have received will be passed onto others.
Photograph by William Tham