Excerpts From The Life Of A Logging Camp Kid

Episode Eight: The Estimable Honu-san

All of the logs that were harvested by our camp's inhabitants were floated out into the bay in rafts and loaded onto log ships. These ships were destined for Japan, as a company from that country purchased every log that we sold. Logs that are sold need to be scaled, and the company that my father worked for had a scaler; as did the purchasing company.

Definition of a log scaler per Wikipedia

The Log Scaler measures the cut trees to determine the scale (volume) and quality (grade) of the wood to be used for manufacturing. When logs are sold, in order to determine the basis for a sale price in a standard way, the logs are "scaled" which means they are measured, identified as to species, and deductions for defects assigned to produce a net volume of merchantable wood.

As a young person, I heard the word “long-thumbing” thrown around a lot in adult conversations. I believe this was a form of cooking the log books, or to be more apt in description, creative tree classifying. It only made sense that each party involved had their own representative to keep the trade of trees honest. I personally didn't care about that adult stuff, all I cared about was that we had the purchasing company's scaler in residence at camp. His name was Honu-san.

Mr. Honu was from Kobe, Japan. My pre-Alaskan existence lacked cultural diversity, so I was elated the first time I met our camp's sole Japanese resident. Honu always had a smile on his face, and the first time we met him; he pointed excitedly at my brother.

“Sumo! Sumo! I manage!” was the only bits of English that I understood in that exchange.

That was also my first introduction to Japanese periodicals and the amazing way they are read from back to front, for the latest issue of what I guessed was Sumo Quarterly was thrust into my hands. Dad had turned red from mirth, Mom looked shocked, and my poor brother embodied offended. Well, he was always getting complements about how big a man he was going to be; I figured he should be overjoyed by Honu's sumo sentiments. The short, small person in me still rejoices as I reflect on this moment.

One time, a friend of mine was crushed by a driftwood log that she thought would be fun to ride in the surf at the beach. Our beach was not for swimming. Never mind the fact that the water would kill you in minutes due to hypothermia; there was also the life force crushing, open ocean surf that angrily rearranged our beach at least every Friday. Mary survived, but had been driven home in the arms of her mother aback her four wheeler, and we all volunteered to pick up Mary's three wheeler that had been left at the beach. Honu and my mom rode in the front of an old Ford F150, while all of us kids piled into the truck's bed like a bunch of energy-drink hyped salmon.

Mom and my friend Jill opted to drive the three wheeler back to camp. Honu was really good friends with Sake; they shared a great affinity for one another. I couldn't believe that mom was unaware of Honu's inebriated state. You would have thought parking the truck at the beach with the right rear wheel on top of a stump was a dead give away. As mom and Jill sped away, Honu thrust the keys into my hands and said:

“You Drive!”

Always with a smile of glee on his face was our Honu, and for that moment my thirteen year old face matched his. The look of mirth continued as I flew down our gravel airplane runway, fishtailing gravel in my wake. That look of joy evaporated when he let Mary's sister Crissy drive. If it hadn't been for my left foot smashing the brakes, we would have hit Honu's trailer when we arrived back to camp. I understand why Driver's Education is a necessity.

Another bit of cultural education that I received from Honu-san was that people in Japan love fish eggs. He was always eating a sashimi ball, a green seaweed wrap of rice and raw salmon, and one day to my great surprise I saw that he had salmon roe in his ocean flavored green ball. He explained to me that one small mayo jar was worth one hundred US Dollars at home in Kobe. He then proceeded to show me a small chest freezer that contained many little mayo jars full of salmon eggs. My family always cured salmon eggs for bait to catch more salmon. It was common for my Uncle Aaron and his tribe, whom were Tsimshian Native Americans, to eat salmon roe like breakfast cereal, with milk and powdered sugar. Never before though, had I seen them boiled in water and soy sauce and stocked like fish flavored jam balls. It was the salmon eggs that resulted in the only time that I had ever seen Honu-san angry. My dad had a board of salmon roe with chemical curing agent on it sitting out on the porch. The eggs were no longer a shade of nature, rather they were bright pink from the cure that was sprinkled upon them as they were destined to be fish bait. Honu-san saw salmon eggs sitting on a board and immediately began trying to take them for his secret stash. The resulting English and Japanese yell fest was pretty epic.

“They are poisonous!! You can't eat them, you'll die!” My dad bellowed.

“HI EAT THEM!” Honu yelled back.

This was an expert way of international communication. Just yell the words that you know in the opposite party's native language louder and louder at each other. This back and forth interchange of the same misunderstood sentences really solves any kind turmoil. Not only do you not get anywhere when it comes to problem solving, you also get the added bonus of becoming completely exasperated, and the saga usually ends with both parties stomping away in misunderstood frustration. Honu ended up stalking off in a huff. We brought him some uncured peace-offering salmon roe later in the day. There was a salmon egg incident cease fire.

The only picture that we have of Honu-san shows him with his head thrown back and captured him in full laugh. He laughed a lot, exposing crinkles along the outer edges of his friendly brown eyes. The picture was from his birthday; the day he made us food. It was on this day that we all became connoisseurs of “Green Paper”

Honu had a little red grill, and he set it up outside his trailer. On the table in front of him he had spread a tray of teriyaki marinated chicken, onion, and then loudly asked my friend Mary,

“Do you have any Green Paper.”

After a good amount of time had elapsed, Mary returned with green construction paper, and my mother snapped that infamous picture as Honu took the paper from her hands.

“I think he meant green pepper, Mary, not green paper.” I said quietly as Honu-san shook with laughter. Apparently he wasn't offended, and squished Mary into a big-sumo sized hug before saying softly to himself.

“Green paper! Ha ha!”

Honu-San would be seventy-four years old if he is alive, and I hope he is still enjoying teryaki chicken and green paper kabobs aplenty!

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