Читать книгу Hawaii End of the Rainbow - Kazuo Miyamoto - Страница 20

THUS IN THE YEAR 1899, WE FIND CHIZU united with Torao in the Immigration Station and subsequently at the Yamashiro Hotel in Honolulu. They struck up an acquaintance with the Arata family of Kauai during their sojourn in Honolulu. From the Inter-Island wharf, Pier 13, they boarded the SS Mauna Kea. The men had come to see them off and as they stood on the wharf waiting for the side door to the steerage quarters to open they looked around with interest on the bustling scene that characterized the waterfront on a steamer day. There was a pungent odor of gunny sacks that were piled high at one corner awaiting loading. Boxes and crates of merchandise were pyramided high with ports of export printed on the sides--Hongkong, Yokohama, Kobe, Calcutta, New York, New Orleans, etc., and consigned to the big wholesale houses of Davies, Hackfield, etc. The excited mass of humanity on the scene was equally varied regarding their place of origin: Polynesians, Malayans, Orientals, and Caucasians.

As in all parting scenes at wharves, different from hurried farewells at railroad stations, there was a festive air mixed with a touch of sadness. There was a group talking in monotones; there was another group hilarious and back-slapping. There were numerous bows among the Orientals and much kissing among the whites and Hawaiians. To Chizu and no less to Torao, these sights were novel and exotic. Most queer and in a way beautiful were the garlands of flowers that friends hung about the necks of friends and travelers.

The most impressive of all was a scene enacted by two aged Hawaiians. They both must have been over sixty. One was traveling for he was bedecked with "leis" around his neck and on his hat. He was clad in a faded blue shirt, white linen pants, and wore no shoes. He only had a single friend to see him off--a friend similarly clad. Nobody paid any attention to this pair, for there was no distinguishing mark about them to set them apart from the ordinary natives on the streets and on the pier. But soon they began an old native singsong, undulating chant. There was an immediate hush and people crowded around this pair. The lei bedecked native was standing with bowed head and hat in hand raised to his breast. With the steamer as his background, his friend stood in front of him about seven feet away rendering this ancient chant to his friend who was on the brink of crossing an ocean infested with many sharks. Evidently such a chant was offered in ancient days to the maritime gods to propitiate any wrath and ensure a safe voyage in the days when the largest seagoing vessel was a double outrigger canoe.

Torao did not understand the language. Yet the chant almost half-wailing and half-beseeching possessed a deep element of the mysterious which was so akin to the utai of ancient Japan that he was spellbound and watched intently this scene which bespoke so much of male friendship. There were tears in the eyes of the two old men, and as the song ended the two approached each other and went into a tight embrace. Torao thought he saw nothing more moving than the friendship between these two of the old order of Hawaiian natives who were oblivious to surroundings and expressed their innermost feelings so beautifully and nobly.

The door to the steerage quarters was opened and each passenger carried his luggage into the hold. The Murayama's found a suitable nook where there would be no passing sailors stepping on the extended feet of reclining figures. Soon a Chinese man peddling mats came around and Torao procured two. The stench was overpowering. Chizu was a very poor sailor but luckily her husband was a very good one. She kept orange peelings in front of her nose to modify the odoriferous unpleasantness which assailed her and brought her repeatedly to the verge of vomiting.

The SS Mauna Kea began to roll and dip as soon as she got out of the harbor. Off Diamond Head the rolling became so pronounced that even Torao had to lie down for the moment. In the Molokai Channel the swells were larger and the motion of the ship became more regular and not so hard on the passengers. Toward evening the Chinese came around and took orders for evening meals. Twenty-five cents for a plate of stew or curried rice on a tin plate plus ten cents for a cup of coffee. Torao ordered the meal for himself only, for to his wife even the mere mention of food was nauseating.

It was a restless night. The steamer made many stops; Kaunakakai, Lahaina, Malae, Mahukona, and Kawaihae were touched before they got to Laupahoehoe, where they were to land.

The next day dawned when they came to the region off the wild coast between Kohala and Waipio. The green rugged countryside was broken into many sections of isolated, uninhabited woodland by deep ravines at the bottom of which many swift streams that came thundering to their terminus and entered the ocean from a height of five hundred feet or more. These beautiful waterfalls were arranged like ribbons of white against the green panorama.

After they sighted the village of Waipio where the pattern of rice fields cultivated by Chinese could be easily discerned even from the distance, they could see the sugar plantations of Kukuihaele and Honokaa and Torao was queerly moved when his eyes roved over the sugar cane fields toward the wooded section at the upper part of the plantation. There lay the site where he was captured in his ill-fated escape three years previously. What would have happened had he succeeded in his flight? It surely could not have been any better than now. It was a grueling three years that followed, no doubt, but he was rewarded for his silent uncomplaining acquiescence to the dictates of fate. He was now married, a status every respectable and honest woman or man covets.

Off Paauhau Plantation there was loading of sugar going on at the landing. A cargo ship was anchored off shore and a large boat approached the platform built on the rocks at the base of the precipitous cliff. A cable car went up and down the cliffs bearing sacks of sugar and carrying supplies for the plantation. On the platform stood a stationary derrick which hoisted the bundles of sugar sacks and deposited them in the boats and unloaded the vessels of their sacks of fertilizer and lumber and merchandise crates. This landing was unique along the Hilo-Hamakua coast. Most plantations had a wire cable connecting the landing on top of the cliff with the cargo vessel's deck and the cargo was sent down or hauled up on this wire rope, the motive power being furnished by the cable hoist in the landing house on the land.

The sight of the Hamakua coast from the sea in the early hours of the morning, especially for those who know the country was always an exciting and picturesque scenery--the imposing massive mountain chain in the center, sometimes snowcapped and reflecting the morning rays of the sun--fringed around the base by a green forest belt that gave way to the greener acreage that constituted the cultivated portion of sugar cane. Here and there were areas of young sugar cane. At other places, yellow dried leaves of recently harvested fields altered the generally uniform green pattern of the plantations. Everything was green and refreshing. Even the deep gulches were not bare. The steep sides were forested with groves of yellowish-green kukui trees. The sea was always rough, especially off the Ookala coast, and the waves battering against the rocky shore broke up into fine sprays of white that glistened in the morning sun.

The port of Laupahoehoe was reached at about eleven o'clock in the morning and the S.S. Mauna Kea stopped her engines. She just drifted while a whaleboat was lowered to accommodate passengers and freight. Down the ladder went the passengers to board the boat. The little craft rose and fell with each of the waves that passed underneath. A huge native sailor held on to the ladder to keep the boat from drifting away from the mother ship while another sailor helped each passenger as he stepped from the ladder into the boat. Thus boarding was accomplished trickily when the boat rode on the crest of the wave and the distance between the two ships became opportune for the novice to step down. It was a precarious step to take for any landsman, and the sailor was there just for the purpose of lending a helping hand. This whaleboat was then rowed to the shore by four stalwart native seamen and there again was the precarious leap one had to make to jump onto the land when the boat rose with the incoming surf to the highest point. The landing place was situated in a little inlet, but the waves were high even in this cove. To the seasick Chizu this was a grueling experience and made her subsequently so sick of the sea that thereafter the mere sight of a steamer brought on a psychic reaction simulating mal-de-mer.

After gathering their luggage Torao decided to spend the day and night at a hostelry at the port rather than proceed immediately to the plantation, as his wife had had such a miserable experience coming over. They went to the Omon Hotel on the government highway to rest.

Mr. Omon combined his hotel business with fish peddling. To Wai-punalei he came with fish every time the fishing boat that went out of Laupahoehoe made port with a catch. This fish was of the lowly sort such as "akule" and "opelu," for the more expensive variety was beyond the purchasing power of his clientele and the fishermen specialized in the fish which were more abundant and easily caught in this section. Torao could ask him to take them out the next day to the plantation in case there was no other means of transportation in that direction.

There were quite a few lodgers at the hotel. These had been domiciled in Hawaii for some years and were men who detested work and chose to live by using their wits and nimble fingers. This parasitic class was considerable in number and even the remotest plantations were not overlooked in their systematic scheme of exploitation. On pay days they would swarm to the plantations and gather in the silvers from the laborers. There was a famous gangleader in Hilo, Funakoshi Tatsugoro by name, who had twenty or more henchmen to do the business in the different plantations on the Hamakua coast. The island of Hawaii was divided up into different spheres of interest among the gang leaders and gambling games could not be held unless sponsored by this gangster.

On the afternoon of the monthly pay day, in order not to be caught by the manager, the gamblers infiltrated into the camps by twos and threes. Wada was a representative of the gang at Waipunalei and towards evening, would open the game in his bunk and see to its orderly conduct. He was a gambler from Japan, and to attest to his former exploits his body was covered by a tattooed dragon. He was from Kobe and there was a rumor that he had escaped capture by the police after a murder case in which suspicion was directed his way. He had a year more of his contract to serve.

On the matted floor, the players sat cross-legged in a circle. Two dice were placed in a smooth tea cup without a handle, and after jiggling, the cup was placed face down on the floor. The dice were thus covered and betting followed. The winner was the one who guessed the sum total of the face on the dice. The game was fast and stakes could reach enormous figures. Wada had a wooden box which was padlocked and had a hole big enough to admit a silver dollar. This was the "kitty" and went to Funakoshi of Hilo, a tribute he exacted from the sporting element of plantation workers. Such games might continue for several nights on a plantation and the intervening idle days between pay days in different plantations were spent by the professionals at a neutral zone such as Laupahoehoe or Hilo, where they lived peacefully in hotels away from the capitalistic scrutiny of plantation policemen.

Torao knew some of them who came to Waipunalei regularly. Since they traveled a great deal, they were up-to-date concerning inside information about any development on the island of Hawaii. He asked them about the new industrial project at Olaa of which he had heard in Honolulu. He learned in the city that there was considerable clearing of virgin forests at Olaa with the idea of planting coffee. Some capitalists wanted Olaa to be a second Kona. He got further news from one of them that there was a hostelry in Olaa, which the owner, a Mr. Uyeda, wanted to sell to a suitable buyer. The gambler added that in addition to the money that would be spent by these laborers working on the clearing project, there was a steady source of business income to be derived from travelers who were crossing from Hilo to Kau, a distance of sixty miles, and he knew the proprietor well because he not only was a frequent lodger there, but he was from the same village in the old country. Torao got Mr. Uyeda's address and thanked the gambler for the information. Some scheme was brewing in his mind. The next day he took his bride to the Douglas Plantation at Waipunalei.

Women were employed at thirty-five cents a day in the fields hoeing weeds in the young cane. There were about two dozen women who were in this "wahine gang." It was a pity, Torao thought, that his wife should be working in the hot sun. Of course she did not mind the work because she had worked in the fields while in Japan, but to him it did not seem right that his wife should be working so hard. So while he was in Honolulu, he was interested in the news that was circulating and discussed around Aala Park.

The Dillingham interests which had been singularly successful in the construction and maintenance of the Oahu Railway were interested in opening up the Hilo Railroad and forming a sugar plantation in the region of Olaa among the lava fields that had served only as grazing ground for cattle. It was talked about in town that thousands of people would be employed and the pay would be immensely better than on the sugar plantations. One gang boss by the name of Onome Bunichiro was given the job of recruiting and supervising labor in the clearing of this vast acreage of land. In a pioneering work of that sort there would be chances for profit a lot more substantial than the paltry sum paid on the sugar estates.

Now that Torao was married, he had to plan for the future which would involve a family. Some bold attempt to break away from the path of the common laborer must be made or else he could visualize himself a graying man with back-breaking toil to perform every day, burdened with half-dozen children, with no prospect of ever giving them a decent education and chance in life, and no hope of ever returning to his native village with something to be proud of. His future did not seem too bright. At Waipunalei, with the prevailing system of tenure, there was no chance whatever of going into contract work. At some plantation, contract work was let out to enterprising men who would care for the growing cane until harvest. He had heard that such a system of contract work would be adopted at Olaa.

The chance encounter at the hotel at Laupahoehoe that resulted in the information about a hotel at Olaa being on sale was a stroke of luck. If he and Chizu could make some money at this sort of vocation, then she need not toil in the fields exposed to the elements ten hours a day. Even if he could not purchase this hostelry, writing to this Mr. Uyeda would not be for naught for thereby he would be able to learn more specific facts about the development scheme of that particular region.

There was an answer to his inquiry immediately and he was asked if he could not come to Olaa, as such a negotiation ought to be done and could be done much more profitably and smoothly by the two parties coming face to face. He saw the point and at once decided to make the trip. After getting permission from the head overseer on the pretext of going to see a cousin in Hilo who was desperately ill and on the verge of death, he departed and legged the fifty miles to Olaa.

It took him two days to get to Hilo. The roads were poor and muddy when it rained. At certain stretches there were unsavory and fearful rumors. For instance at the Maalua Gulch, Puerto Ricans were said to ambush pedestrians and strip them naked. Such sites were better negotiated in the day time. As he approached Hilo, he was stopped on the bridge of Wainaku by a Japanese who was fat and tanned like a native. He wore a mustache, a khaki uniform, and a pair of leather putties. He showed Torao a tin badge and announced that he was a representative of the Tax Office. Asked what he wanted, Torao was ordered to show his poll tax receipt. Torao had been told that such a testimony was necessary in boarding an inter-island ship, but did not think it necessary to carry it on his person on an overland travel. He had, therefore, nothing to show that he had paid his annual poll tax of five dollars.

"Then you have to work it off."

"How?"

"By working ten days on a farm where such delinquency is made up by actual labor. At fifty cents a day, you will work it out in ten days."

Having no friends in Hilo to put up the five dollars, he had to follow what this officer told him to do. Used to following orders of uniformed men without questioning since boyhood, he was docile and was led up toward the mountain where clearing of forest lands was in progress. There was a man by the name of Hieda who ran this place. There were two men already there and Torao had to share the bunk house with them.

Their work consisted of hoeing hono-hono, the green prolific wandering-Jew, and burying this grass in a hole dug in the ground. In the days when chemical spray was not in use this was the only way to rid the fields of this pest because it rained every day. There was not enough sunshine to kill off this plant even when the root was severed and uprooted. Even from a cut stem, roots emerged to survive and multiply.

The food was atrocious but they did not complain—realizing the fact that they were prisoners and working off their indebtedness to the government. The tax office man had told Torao that if he produced this year's receipt later on, the work he had to do now would be credited to the following year's tax payment. It seemed rational and as he had a wholesome respect for the law, he complied without a murmur, because this was better than being locked up. The truth was bared later however when he went to Olaa and related this experience.

Mr. Uyeda said, "The whole setup is a racket. That tax office man Nakata is in 'cahoots' with Hieda and is getting innocent workers to work on that land near Hilo for nothing. He gets ten days' labor out of the men and the receipt he issues is a phony. There have been dozens of men passing here to Kau that have been so victimized."

"Well, of all the low-down tricks this takes the cake! Who would ever suspect that a fellow countryman in this distant land would be so mean and heartless as to actually indenture another man underhandedly Something ought to be done about it."

"Certainly, something ought to be done about it. It is a most stinking racket and the talk of the town. But who has the nerve to openly tackle it? Like all other big business it is under the protection of the gambler Funakoshi, and today he is the lord of the Japanese community of Hilo until better days arrive when the good people can raise their voice. For the time being we must remain dumb and watch the evil men have their fling at soft and easy living. But you know the old proverb, The boisterous, bragging one does not last long.' Our turn will soon come around, sooner than you think."

The epilogue to this little incident did come around soon. A huge amount of dynamite was being used in the pioneering work of railroad construction and clearing of jungle land at Olaa. To store these dangerous explosives, the basement of Hieda's house was rented by the contractor for storage. Two hundred of these cases were stored under the house. In this rainy region houses were built about ten feet above the ground, and the basements were spacious enough to hang washing. One night when his wife and children had left for Hilo to take in an itinerant show, there was a terrific explosion that sent the entire establishment into a thousand pieces. Only fragments of the avaricious Hieda could be gathered in the charred wreckage. There was not a clue to be found to unravel the probable perpetrator of the crime. It pointed toward an incendiary act and he had created so many enemies that even a cat could not survive their wrath.

Because he had not been on very good terms with his sister-in-law, his brother was taken into custody for questioning. The police had to do something and picked on this man who was the epitome of good behavior. Because he was such a good man, it troubled him greatly. To be even suspected of killing his own brother was such a shock to him, he could not possibly explain the thing to his parents and friends even though he was sure to be proved innocent. At the end of a week of brooding he could stand the strain no longer and hanged himself in the detention cell. The police did not act further. The case was closed.

The meeting with Mr. Uyeda progressed very smoothly. The elder man took an instant liking to the youngster who was not spoiled by city life and had the straightforwardness that was characteristic of the men of his prefecture. Incidentally, Mr. Uyeda himself hailed from the same province. Torao told him that he wanted to build up something for himself and his prospective family and that he had come to the conclusion that such a thing could not be accomplished by mere toiling on a plantation, and, frankly, he had not much cash to offer him for the hotel.

Sometimes it happens that business is conducted purely on the basis of mutual liking and trust. It is conducted between men on a plane above the usual considerations attendant upon such transactions. Such a feeling prevailed when the two discussed the transaction over a glass of beer. Mrs. Uyeda suffered from an intractable asthma and the principal cause of her paroxysms seemed to lie in the atmospheric condition—wet and pollen-laden—for she was completely free of the attacks when she visited Honolulu where it was dry. Therefore, to the Uyedas, it was not a matter of making a profit by this sale. A business that they two had begun and fostered over a period of years was an institution symbolizing their joint effort and they would rather see it in the hands of a person who was agreeable rather than transfer it only for a higher bid.

Torao remained there for two days and inspected the influx of new men from the old country, as well as the amount of traffic over the volcano way to the districts of Kau and Kona. At best, it was a country hostelry and unimposing, and with his meager capital and total lack of experience, he could not hope for much. At least, here was something that he could engage in as his own and not be subject to the whims of other men and be forced to curry their favor. The prospects for the future seemed much brighter and more enticing here in this young community. He decided to chance buying this hotel.