A major problem was language. I could speak enough Japanese to get a hot bath, to find out when the next train left, or to agree that the scenery was out of this world—but this was a long way from being able to discuss technical phases of boatbuilding. I began to enlist help from among my Japanese friends, and before long had built up a working team, which we called the “four-man parlay.”
Man No. 1 was Yasuda-san (“san” is a suffix meaning Mr., Mrs., or Miss). Yasuda-san was a teacher in the local high school; his knowledge of English was excellent but he knew nothing whatever about boats.
Man No. 2 was Takemura-san, key member of the Hiroshima University Yacht Club. He was a former officer in the Japanese Navy, an expert navigator, and a keen sailor of small boats, though not a deep-sea yachtsman. His interest in the venture was as a potential member of the crew. He spoke not one word of English.
Man No. 3, whom we called the catalyst, was Niichi Mikami, a fellow employee at the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission. Nick (as he quickly became known) spoke fair English and had a good understanding of “how to get along with Americans.” He was also a fine small-boat sailor and a member of the local yacht club. He filled in the gaps in the chain of communication.
Man No. 4 was myself, who thought I knew what I wanted but was hard put, at times, to get it.
Whenever the team could be assembled, we toured the boatyards of the surrounding areas, but without success. The builders either refused outright, or quoted such a fantastically high price that there was no point in dickering, or—more in character—were so devious in their discussion that this amounted, in Japanese terms, to a refusal. Not until the search was widened well beyond Hiroshima, to the region near Miya Jima, did I find my man. One cold, wet morning in December, our four-man team set out for Miya Jima Guchi, thirty minutes by standing-room-only train from Hiroshima. From here a short walk took us to the small shipyard of Mr. Yotsuda.
As we approached we could see Yotsuda-san himself, silhouetted against the terraced rice fields of an adjoining hillside. His kimono waving briskly in the breeze, he was repairing his roof—and judging from the looks of it, none too soon. At a hail, he scrambled down, and I bowed through the rituals of introduction, via Yasuda-san, via Takemura-san, with help from Nick.
Yotsuda-san impressed me favorably when I met him, and I had a feeling he liked me. He was a cheerful, shrewd-eyed, honest-faced man of middle age. He had been a busy and prosperous shipbuilder in Manchuria until after the war, but now, repatriated to Japan, he had been able to bring back only his family and a few hand tools. At present, the Yotsudas were living precariously from hand to mouth, or rather, from fishing smack to oyster boat.
The workshop consisted of an open shed, with living quarters behind, and a nearby pile of scrap lumber. The shop had a bare and austere appearance to American, gadget-accustomed eyes. There were no high-speed tools in evidence, no laborsaving devices, no power saws or sanding machines, not even a brace and bit. There were only the traditional hand tools of Japanese boatbuilding—adzes, chisels, hammers, augers, saws. I noted that the saws functioned by pulling instead of pushing. As I later discovered, so did the workmen.
Our group was ushered into the Yotsuda living-sleeping-dining room, with its bare tatami mats and the family shrine in the corner. There we knelt about the hibachi, trying to warm ourselves from its core of glowing charcoal. The family had apparently been banished to the earthen-floored kitchen. While the wind whistled through the plainly visible cracks, the “team” discussed with Yotsuda-san in tortuous fashion the possibility of bringing to life, in wood and iron, my sketches and notes. And I thought doubtfully to myself, When this man can’t even plug the holes in his own walls, how could he ever be able to build a good boat?