H15U, Colin Novick ‘00, Teruko Satō, Neighbor, 1904, Kanagawa: Hayama-machi, Hokkaidō, Korea, Australia
On November 14, 1998, I spoke with Mrs Teruko Satō, who turned 94 years old on August 23rd. She now lives in Hayama with her niece. Her life has been very interesting and probably not the life of an average Japanese woman of her generation. She is a Meiji woman, and she is very strong, mentally and spiritually. She prefers to be called “Tel-Sensei.”
She was born in Hokkaidō. Her father owned a mine. Her mother came from an old samurai family. Both her mother and her father believed strongly in education, even for women. She graduated from Nihon University and in addition studied English translation and typing. Her father hired a private tutor for her, who was very strict, but as a result she had an excellent English education. She has no problem with her L’s and R’s, and she thinks that the reason that Japanese people do have that problem now is that their English teachers cannot teach, and they do not want to learn. She did not have to study for entrance examinations when she was young, so the English that she was taught was very practical. She also thinks that her Japanese language education was much better and more elegant than what students receive today. She does not like the Japanese educational system, which she thinks ignores children’s spirit and character. At the same time, she also thinks that today’s Japanese children are not very courteous and tend to treat their parents like servants. She thinks that is wrong, and that it is wrong that their parents let them behave like this.
Her real love is mountain climbing. She cannot climb now, and because of difficulties with her knees, she even has trouble walking. However, she still loves the mountains. She grew up near the mountains and often went climbing with her father. She was the first woman to climb Mount Fuji in the winter. There was no suitable clothing for women climbers, so she designed her own. She climbed mountains until she was 82 years old.
She is a Christian. She was baptized when she was 17 years old. At one time she was very active in the Japanese YWCA, where she met and worked with the leader of the movement at that time, Michiko Kawai, who had attended Bryn Mawr College. Michiko Kawai later founded Keisen Jogakuen, a private girls’ secondary school. She still visits the Isehara campus of the school for their “Play Day,” held on the last Saturday in May. It is through Keisen, where my mother teaches, that I met Tel-Sensei. Her Christianity has helped develop her sense of voluntarism, an attribute she fears is lacking in most Japanese people.
She was a “career woman” during the Taishō era and early Shōwa. Her father left her mother when she was a young girl. The family ran a boarding house, but it was not enough to support the family; therefore, she went to work for the Ford Motor Company. Then, as now, women were usually paid less and not allowed to do much “important” work. She told them that she had a family to support, and they agreed to pay her the same salary as a male graduate from Tōkyō University. She received 350 yen a year, which she thinks would be equivalent to about four million yen a year today. It was also more than what prostitutes earned! She was an English typist, a translator, and a stenographer. She supported her family, and she was able to buy houses for her mother and sisters. She is very proud of the fact that she never served tea to the men. In fact, during the Meiji and Taishō periods, young boys served tea to the higher level workers. She thinks that young women today working for Japanese companies do not have a strong sense of responsibility for themselves and their work. Of course, she also thinks that Japanese companies do not expect much from them.
She fell in love when she was 17, but she had to wait 15 years to get married, in order to make sure her family was taken care of. She thinks it is very difficult to work and be married at the same time. She herself quit her job once she got married. She and her husband never had any children. She believed that having a Christian home was more important than working, and so she devoted herself to being a housewife after her marriage.
They lived in Pusan, Korea, where her husband worked for Mitsubishi Heavy Industries until after the war. During part of that time, however, she returned to Japan to look after her bedridden mother-in-law. She hated being separated from her husband. She thinks that the system of separating a husband from his wife (tanshin-funin) is terrible, and that families should not accept it. She thinks that her husband’s company should have allowed him to return to Japan with her, especially since it was his mother for whom she was caring. She did not want to talk about her experiences in Korea.
After the war, they returned to Japan. Her husband had no job, so she went back to work and supported the family by working for the American Occupation. She translated textbooks and worked as a stenographer. She feels that the American Occupation (1945-1952) did many good things, but also it was not very fair to ordinary Japanese people. She also thinks that the Occupation lasted too long. She has met many Americans and founded the Shōnan International Wives Association, which has an equal number of Japanese members and American members, mostly from the Yokosuka Naval Base. It meets once a month although she rarely attends now.
After the war, she also started her own company, Tel Trading Company, to sell products to the Americans living in Japan. She also worked for Lovable company, an American underwear manufacturer, and helped to sell its products in Japan. She attended the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City to help prepare herself for this.
When she was 80, she became very tired of living in Japan, so she decided to move to Glenelg, near Adelaide, Australia. For two years, she ran a house for foreign students in Australia. Then she moved into the Ramada Hotel, in a residential apartment. She stayed there until three years ago, when she returned to Japan because of her difficulties walking. She loved Australia and helped arrange a sister-city arrangement between Glenelg and Hayama.
Tel-Sensei was a very impressive person. She sat very straight throughout our entire talk, and her mind was very clear and alert. She was very firm in her opinions. I don’t think they make women like her anymore, and I am glad I got to meet her.