Woman Records Oral Histories: Project Has Spanned 100 Biographies Expressly For Families of Elderly

By Mitsuhiko Watanabe, Daily Yoimuiri Online

November 28, 2009

Japan

When Kimiko Akiyama, 66, of Setagaya Ward, Tokyo, visited 88-year-old Kimi Hashimoto at her home in Osaka in May, one black-and-white photo was placed on a table. 

The photo showed Hashimoto's nine-member family in formal dress--Hashimoto as an infant, along with her parents and her brothers and sisters. "This is an important photo for me, taken to celebrate my father turning 60 in 1928," Hashimoto said. 

Hashimoto went on to recall her family memories. She talked about her mother, who died when Hashimoto was a child, and her eldest brother who took care of her instead, her arranged marriage and her life in former Manchuria (currently northeastern China). She moved there because of her husband's job. 
Akiyama listened quietly while Hashimoto spoke, occasionally interjecting with a question such as, "What did you do then?" When Hashimoto described the time her husband returned home from a detention camp in Siberia, she tearfully stammered, "I was so glad to have lived, awaiting his return." 

Three months after the interview, Akiyama sent Hashimoto a 48-page handmade booklet containing the oral history. The contents were Hashimoto's "life record," which Akiyama compiled from her tape recording of Hashimoto's recollections. The booklet also included the precious Hashimoto family photo. 
"This is the proof of how I lived with all my might. At last, I can tell my children and grandchildren about my life," Hashimoto said. 

Seven-and-a-half years have passed since Akiyama began visiting elderly people to listen to their recollections and present them with a booklet compiling the talks. The number of books Akiyama has made now exceeds 100. 
"All of these people are of my parents' generation. I think there are many things they can't discuss with their families as they tend to refrain from mentioning their sorrow and hardships," Akiyama said. 

Born in Omuta, Fukuoka Prefecture, Akiyama came to Tokyo to work in 1963, the year before the Tokyo Olympics. Her parents-in-law treated her as if she was their real daughter, as she was far from her hometown. 

Her father-in-law became bedridden with terminal cancer in 1996, while her mother-in-law started suffering from dementia. Although Akiyama took care of them full-time, she had to entrust care of her mother-in-law to a nursing facility when Akiyama herself became sick. On the morning her mother-in-law was being moved to the facility, her father-in-law murmured in bed, "I was with her for 67 years." He died four months later. 

At his funeral, one of her father-in-law's relatives said to Akiyama, "[He just] wanted someone to talk with." Akiyama was shocked to hear that because she remembered her parents-in-law, when they were in good health, saying, "Let's drink a cup of tea together" or "Let's talk." 

She could not accept their invitations as she had been busy taking care of her children and doing her part-time job. She regretted she had not understood their feelings. Akiyama then decided she would listen to the oral histories of elderly people. 

Akiyama took a course to learn how to compile people's autobiographical experiences into written form. She began her volunteer listening and note-taking activities around 2002, visiting a special elderly nursing home in her neighborhood and compiling people's memories into booklets. 

Akiyama's activities came to be known by word of mouth, and she received requests from people in their 50s and 60s who wanted her to listen to their parents' recollections. 

Akiyama pays her own transportation expenses and bookbinding costs. She does not mind, saying: "I want to listen to such recollections by people of my parents-in-law's generation, whose talks I had missed [late in their lives]." 
Akiyama sometimes receives unexpected feedback from families of elderly people who received one of her booklets. A woman in her 60s, who learned by means of the booklet where her father had proposed to her late mother, traveled with her father to the location by train. The woman said her father, now in his 80s, was in tears from watching the scenery and recalling his memories. 

Akiyama sends only one book to each family. "[Because] the book is not for general distribution, but rather exclusively for the person and [his or her] family," she said. Akiyama hopes the memories inscribed in the book will become a part of each family's history. 

When Akiyama meets elderly people, she sometimes sees traits of her parents-in-law in them. So whenever she leaves her house to meet elderly people, she prays in front of a Buddhist altar for her parents-in-law and tells them, "I'm going out to listen to elderly people's stories." 

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