old version

Shinnen Akemashite Omedeto Gozaimasu

Gung Hei Fat Choy

Sumi Shimatsu

Wow, it's the Year of the Ox...A Year that could herald a recovery...The New Year promises to be momentous for Barack Obama, and not just because he officially became the President in January...according to Asian astrological experts, 2009 is the Year of the Ox, and as it happens Obama, born August 4, 1961, is an Ox.

But, there's more.  Obama is an "earth Ox," and 2009 is the Year of the Earth Ox, which apparently bodes well for the recovery of the real estate, financial, and job markets.

For Obama, the Ox attributes -- logical, patient, physically strong, hard-working, eloquent, confident--seem to be ideal for establishing a new administration.  Those who will be working under his leadership should beware, however, that Ox-year people are also known to be stubborn and chauvinistic, and don't like to be told what to do.

With Obama entering his peak cycle (of life), predicts astrologer Master Andy Goh, the stock market could recover faster than expected, and the unemployment rate will begin to improve in the latter half of the year.  Out of the ashes of the economic meltdown, new global empires could emerge.

However, the New Year may bring problems for Obama himself, says Goh.  Events at work, at home and traveling should be managed with caution.

Many major corporations will change leadership, adds Goh, but he isn't saying which CEOs will lose their jobs.  That detail, he points out, will be ascertained by examining each CEO's astrological chart.

Joe Biden born Nov. 20, 1942, is a Horse and should get along well with Obama but can be strong-minded and moody at times.

Belief in Chinese astrology is said to date back to 1300 B.C.  Buddhism arrived in Japan around the 6th century A.D. and along with it the Kanshi or Eso, the Zodiac calendar, which was adopted in 604 A.D.

It's been Quite a Year, Neh!

Historic, yes. Traumatic in many parts of this country, yes. From hurricanes to fire storms, from the tanking economy to rising prices, it's been difficult for many, many people. I do hope that many of you are faring well, staying healthy and getting around well. I know as we niseis are aging, many are not doing well health wise. I wish you well. For those of use who are still able to get around, let's work at staying well!

The election was electrifying and more people not only voted in great numbers but were glued to the TV to watch election results. I do hope Obama does well. Our last few years has been getting worse and worse with everything getting expensive. Many home owners are losing their homes, many people are losing jobs, and talk about expensive! The gas price was zooming towards $5.00 a gallon. Presently, it's come down but for how long, we don't know, neh.

Well, we'll soon find out when the new president and his cabinet starts to work on everything from the economy to buying out big companies, and the war...we will all tune in to find out what will happen to this country, neh.

Even in our communities, Japan Town in San Francisco was sold, and our Lil Tokyo, too, is changing with the Koreans buying the former Yaohan on Alameda and Third Street. Little by little, the shops are closing as the Niseis, Sanseis and future generations have moved out of the area and don't visit or shop in this town so "shikataganai neh" Most of the Japanese markets and shops are in Gardena, yet, I see changes there, too.

Changes are inevitable, however, I must say, it's sad and "sabishii" (lonesome). I do miss Japan town's many shops that used to be there but am glad that when I visit SF, Soko Hardware is still there as well as many f the Japanese restaurants. The market is now Nijiya but up in Cupertino, the Marukai will soon open. In LA, there's Marukai, Mitsuwa and Jijiya around so there are enough Japanese markets to shop.

Life goes on; changes will always be with us so we juswt learn to adjust. Life is!!! So take care everyone. "Genki de neh" (stay energetic and high spirited.)

The Denver Convention

Yae Aihara

The Denver conference was wonderful, people from so many states - even Rhode Island. It was just amazing! 

Let me go back 8 years ago to the first conference here in L.A. At that conference, curriculum, particularly for Arkansas, was being established to teach high school students about the Japanese American experience. It was funded by the Rockefeller Foundation. 4 years later, that curriculum had been greatly expanded and the conference was held in Arkansas. Almost 2,000 people attended it.

Fast forward to 2008. All the exhibits were done by current high school students from different states, particularly Colorado, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. It was eye opening! The students have really learned a lot. The 5 person team from Texas, headed by Mary Grace Ketner, was so cordial and we bonded immediately. We helped them identify the nisei in many pictures they had. I understand that at the University of Texas Cultural Institute, they have many, many pictures of Crystal City.

Allyson Nakamoto, one of the project directors, suggest that we Crystal Cityites make a pilgrimage to the Institute. When we made our pilgramage to CC way back when ('97), I think they were building the Institute. I remember seeing it from the bus but it wasn't open yet. 

Additional Comments on JANM Conference

 Nobusuke Fududa

This is a follow-up on your Sept. '08 issue of the "Chatter" on several other sessions which were held and should be of interest to the Chatter readers.

1) "Reconciling a Contested Past: The Santa Fe Internment Camp Marker" on which Joe Ando was a panelist. 4,555 of our fathers went through this camp and opposition to this marker came from veteran's organizations and the families and friends of the New Mexican soldiers who, in 1942, were brutalized by the Japanese Army during the infamous Bataan Death March. They saw the internees as Japanese Oppressors rather than victimized Americans with sons and daughters in the U.S. military during WWII. It appears that there is usually opposition to this type of memorial marker that Japanese Americans attempt to put up.

2) "Stories of Resistance": Consciousness, Conscience, and the Constitution" had Yosh Kuromiya, Morgan Yamanaka, and Hideo Yonenaka as panelists. Kuromiya was a Heart Mountain resistor. He didn't have any positive comments to make about the JACL and its role during WWII. Yamanaka and Yonenaka, both retired Ph.D.'s from San Francisco State, talked about their becoming renunciants. This was my first exposure to both topics, and it was very enlightening as we learned about the process they went through.

3) "Alien Places and Alien People: Department of Justice Internment camps during WWII and Today" was about the experiences our fathers went through during their period of incarceration. Participating on the panel was the moderator, Tetsuden Kashima, Ph.D., author of "Judgment Without Trial: Japanese American Imprisonment During World War II", who is most knowledgeable about our "Dangerous Enemy Alien" fathers (and mothers) and their experiences.

Satsuki Ina, Ph.D., the producer of 2 award winning documentary films about the Japanese American world War experience: Children of the Camps, and From a Silk Cocoon: A Japanese American Renunciant's Story. Dr. Ina talked about the correspondence exchanges between her parents while her mother was in Tule Lake and her father was in a DOJ camp. I was the 3rd person on the panel and my job was to discuss my father, Yoshiaski Fukuda's book, "My Six Years of Internment: An Issei's Struggle for Justice." The people in this audience wanted to learn more about what their fathers went through in these DOJ camps as apparently they hadn't learned too much about it from their parents.

I thought that the JANM did a superb job organizing this conference. The logistics and the expenses involved must've been horrendous. 800 people were in attendance and it must've been a very good learning experience for all. I was told that this was about the first time the topic of our "dangerous enemy alien" fathers had been discussed in a large public forum. Another topic that needs to be more fully explored and researchced is that of the Nisei children who repatriated to Japan with their parents. But for me, the most important thing I learned was the matter of "loyal and disloyal" people. This may have been as I was only 13 when I left Crystal City and wasn't that aware of our placed importance on that concept.

 The Rafu Shimpo

Over this past 4th of July weekend, the Japanese American National Museum (JANM) held its National Conference in Denver, CO and focused on the theme, "Whose America? Who's American? Diversity, Civil Liberties, and Social Justice."
 
"Among the many panels featured at the event was one that addressed enemy alien internment, focalized through the lens of the Crystal City internment camp which housed not only Japanese Americans, but also Japanese, Germans, and Italians from over a dozen Latin American countries.
 
The panel speakers included: Karen Ebel, daughter of a German enemy alien internee, and the President of the German American Internee Coalition (GAIC); Yae Aihara, a former Crystal City internee; and Grace Shimizu, the leading organizer for the documentation of the WWII rendition experience of former Japanese Latin American internees and their redress struggle as well as a member of Campaign for Justice.
 
"As much as is known about the Japanese Americans, virtually nothing is known about the Germans and Italians," said Ebel. "Their experience should not be ignored or minimized."
 
On June 29, 1940, the Alien Registration Act was passed by Contress. It required all alien residents in the United States over the age of 14 to file a comprehensive statement of their personal and occupational status and a record of their political beliefs. Due to this act, 600,000 Italians, 300,000 Germans and 100,000 Japanese were subsequently designated "enemy aliens" restricting travel and property ownership rights.
 
What followed mirrored the Japanese American experience: FBI raids and ransacking of homes; arrests with no warrants; improsonment with minimal due process; mass internment with no reason given; families separated; homes and property lost; U.S. citizens placed in camps; deportation, expatriation and drepatriation of Americans, aliens and U.S. citizens.
 
Many of these people found themselves at Crystal City that at its peak, housed 4,000 internees: Japanese, Germans and Italians.
 
"In 1945, the government made a 45 minute movie of Crystal City Internment Camp, making it look like a resort, showing well-cared for internees merrily going about their business, "Ebel said. "The film did not reflect reality."
 
While the camp did boast family living units, it was characterized by governing policies and actions very much like the civil and human rights violations suffered by immigrant communities in the post-9/11 U.S.
 
The incarceration of people within the borders of the U.S. is an embarrassing and sickening aspect of American history that is slowly being realized and accounted for.
 
 However, there were thousands that were uprooted from the U.S. From December, 1941-February, 1948, the U.S. government orchestrted and financed the mass abduction and forcible deportation of 22,640 men, women and children of Japanese ancestry as well as 4,058 of German ancestry living in Latin America.

Many of those incarcerated were used as hostages in exchange for Americans being held by Japanese or behind enemy lines in Europe. Over 800 Japanese Latin Americans were included in two prisoner of war exchanges between the U.S. and Japan.

"What many of us have known as the WWII Japanese American incarceration, is now put into a broader international context of mass relocation internment, and forced deportation of persons of Japanese, German and Italian ancestry," said Shimizu. "It shows a shocking picture of how the U.S. Government initiated and orchestrated a conscious systematic, planned program of massive civil rights violations, war crimes, and crimes against humanity spanning two continents before, during and after WWII."

After the war, the U.S. government worked hard to repatriate these prisoners instead of allowing them to return to their chosen country. Many never returned home. 900 Japanese Latin Americans were deported to Japan while an unknown number of German Latin Americans were forced back to Germany.

So, what has been done? What can be done? What is being done?

In 1996, a class action lawsuit called Mochizuki v. U.S.A.was filed against the U.S. government on behalf of all Japanese Latin American internees who were denied redress because they weren't citizens. A settlement was reached that provided an official apology and $5,000 reparations.

Campaign for Justice is a collaborative effort by individuals and organizations including the American Civil Liberties Union-Southern California, Nikkei for Civil Rights and Redress, and the Japanese Peruvian Oral History Project.

The organization is currently seeking comprehensive legislation that would serve to fulfill the education and compensation mandate of the Civil Liberties Act and to resolve the unfinished business of redress.

Under the direction of Ebel, GAIC is currently working on getting Congress to pass the Wartime Treatment Study Act that would establish two commissions. One commission would review the U.S. government's WWII policies regarding European Americans and European Latin Americans and related civil liberties violations. The second commission would review the U.S. government's refusal to allow Jewish refugies fleeing persecution entry into the U.S. during WWII.

"The impact of these violations has been long lasting in our families and in our communities, and has current day significance for our democratic institutions and freedoms," said Shimizu. "For us, it's very significant because our story is a hidden or marginalized part of the Nikkei community's history, and it is a suppressed part of U.S. history.

"Recognizing all of the ethnic groups affected by WWII policies adds power to the argument that our civil liberties must be protected during crises, " said Ebel. "It doesn't detract. Its study is long overdue."

For more information about Campaign for Justice, visit www.campaignforjusticejla.org or email kebel@gaic.info.

Japanese American National Museum
Whose America? Who's American?
Excerpt from the Conference program

 Toni Tomita

This National Conference was part of a 3 year project titled Enduring Communities: The Japanese American Experience in Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and Utah.The project is a collaboration between educators, communities, and students to create curricula about the Japanese American experience of World War II for every classroom in these 5 states.

Reports, Reflections and Resources - 5 former Crystal City internees from L.A.---Yai Aihara, Sumi Yamaguchi, Betty Fukunaga, Sid Okazaki, and wife, Yukie who was in Tule Lake, and I ---went to the Denver conference. There, we met Haruko Ishiyama from Denver, Joe and Millie Ando from Arizona, son Tobin from Newport Beach, Suzie Sasagawa (Masuda) from Palo Alto, and Nobusuke Fukuda from San Francisco.

A Commemorative visit to the Amache Camp Site in Granada, CO...a highlight of this conference for me was the opportunity to visit Amache or "Camp Amache" as the students call it. Conference attendees had the opportunity to visit the camp site on either the first or last day of this event. 6 busloads filled with 240 riders set out on 7/3 at 7:00 a.m. for the 4 hour ride to Granada located in southeastern CO.

We were warmly greeted at Granada (Gra nay da) High School and hosted to a lunch provided by the Friends of Amache Preservation Society, and the Town of Granada. After lunch, we saw an exhibit of what the students had excavated from the camp site along with their reports, some artifacts donated by former internees, etc. as well as a program presented by the Amache Preservation Society, a group of local high school students who serve as Amache's caretakers. In their presentation, they spoke about their projects, cleaning up the cemetery area, planting trees around dthe memorial markers, building a storage shed nearby for the gardening equipment as well as a recent trip to Japan by 4 of the students.

We were taken by bus to the camp site to view the kiosk panel and walk among areas marked as "East", "Midcamp", and "West". There are no barracks or standing structures left, but the remains of what was once a fish pond were still visible. The areas were sectioned off and delineated by stakes and "flagged" - indicating some artifacts were still being found by the students. An old rusted wash tub evoked images of a young child playfully splashing at bath time or a mother washing clothes with a scrub board. Our last stop at the cemetery where a Buddhist ceremony was held in front of the Ireito memorial marker dedicated to the 31 volunteers from Amache who gave their lives in WWII, to the 7,000 persons relocated here, and the 120 who died while in camp.

Today, Amache is among the best preserved internment camps due to the extraordinary efforts of a dedicated teacher and a small group of Granada High School students who formed the Amache Preservation Society.

So who is this teacher? That's what I was curious about. His name is John Hopper. He came to Granada High School in 1993 as a first year social studies teacher. He was curious, too, and wanted to know if there was anything historical significance in the area. BINGO! Amache Camp. He learned all he could about Amache and developed his own curriculum

I had the opportunity to speak to Mr. Hopper. He is still teaching but his classes are limited to juniors and seniors. In a high school with an enrollment of 75, there is a waiting list for his classes. Speaking for his students, current and former, at the excavation sites not too far from Granada, you can feel their enthusiasm for their studies, their excitement as they share the new discoveries, and their self-confidence as they talk about their projects.

For more information and updates about ongoing efforts to preserve and protect Amache, please visit the following websites.
The Amache Preservation Society www.amache.org
The University of Denver, Dept. of Anthropology  http://portfolio.du.edu/amache

P.S. In the July 4 edition of the Denver Post there were articles and pictures about our visit to the Amache Camp site. Among the photos taken, a big one of our Yukie Okazaki at the Buddhist ceremony.

Little Tokyo's Oldest Tree
Dedication Celebrates a Living Landmark

The Historical Society and Koyasan Temple dedicate the Aoyama Tree...a Moreton Bay Fig tree that has grown with the Little Tokyo community and the Koyasan Buddhist Temple for the past 88 years. It shaded the many community leaders, city representatives, and temple members gathered for the dedication ceremony for the first living historic cultural monument in downtown Los Angeles on Thursday morning. The tree, the oldest living thing in Little Tokyo, stands at the edge of a parking lot on the campus of the Japanese American National Museum, marking the historic site of the Koyasan Daishi Mission.

Hosted by the Little Tokyo Historical Society, the reception marked the culmination of a long effort to have the tree recognized for its historic importance to the community. Koyasan Daishi Mission was founded in 1912 by Rev. Shutai Aoyama as the United States' first Koyasan Shingon Buddhist Temple. The temple moved into its current location on First Street in 1940. It was located on a rundown wood frame restaurant on North Central, now the JANM Plaza...and in less than 2 years, war started and the many Buddhist priests were interned at places like Crystal City Internment Camp.

Though the temple got back on its feet after the war, the original site was razed in the early fifties and all, but the growing rubber tree was torn out for a new parking lot.

Today, that tree, well over 100 years old, still connects the temple and the community to its past. According to Koyasan Bishop Taisen Miyata, the congregation recognizes the tree as a "Bodi tree", a source of enlightenment. "Historic preservation is much more than preserving the bricks and mortar; preserving places, landscape features, natural features, whatever it is that makes a community a community, and this tree is really a prime example," said Ken Bernstein from the Office of Historic Resources, the office responsible for endowing the tree with landmark status.

Closing the reception, a certificate of recognition was awarded the Little Tokyo Historical Society from the office of city councilwoman, Jan Perry, who expressed her own wonder at the longevity of the tree.

"The fact that it is strong and has sustained and has great longevity in the midst of an asphalt desert is reflective of the values, I think, of this community, and its own strength and desire to sustain itself and to share with others.

The dedication of the tree makes the first step in a larger plan to create an art park on the JANM Plaza which includes the Geffen Contemporary and the Go For Broke monument.

Public Television personality Huell Howser attended with his cameraman and trademark enthusiasm in tow. And, of course, the congregation of Koyasan Beikoku Betsuin turned out en masse to support their new landmark. So, one of these days, we may be able to see it on Huell Howser's "California Gold" program on television!

An Interesting Telephone Call 

On Jan. 19th, I received a telephone call from a "stranger" named Raymond Chong. It was the night before our Shinnenkai luncheon and this person called because he saw on the Internet (I don't know where) that I'd lived in Japanese town in Los Angeles before WWII. In talking to him, I found out that his father & uncle worked at the old Nikko Low and Entow-Low restaurants. He asked if I remembered these restaurants, and I did.

My father was one of the original 49 Japanese pioneeers living in L.A. and was the first Japanese photographer. He was the publicity photographer for the Belasco Theatre, an old vaudeville theatre, and many of the "stars" who were featured in the Herald Examiner and Los Angeles Times newspapers. His first studio was on Main St. where City Hall is currently located. The caller wanted to know why the Japanese town had Chinese restaurants when China Town was down the street on Broadway and Hill Streets. Well, we Japanese enjoy Chinese food so I told Raymond that Saturdays were days off for the farmers who came into the city to enjoy good food after toiling in their fields during the week all over Southern California. Also, the Japanese families had Chinese food for wedding receptions and after funerals, and that these were very big groups! Raymond was surprised to learn that we Japanese enjoyed Chinese food so much. He asked if I'd eaten at Far East after they re-opened and I told him "yes"; however, I had to tell him how greatly disappointed I was because they didn't cook good Cantonese food like they did before. They no longer make "hamyu" and they didn't have the carmelized sweet & sour; chow mein; almond duck, etc.

Raymond asked my father's name so I told him it was Tokiji Utsushigawa and if he looked on the Internet, he would find an old panorama picture (the really wide photographs) of the Los Angeles City wholesale market where the farmers brought their produce on horse and buggy.

While we were talking, Raymond looked it up and said, "Oh, it's a really old picture". He told me that his father went to Central Junior High school and also to Belmont High School, schools my two sisters graduated from. It was very, very interesting talking to him. I asked Raymond if he cooked Chinese food but he said no, he was a Civil Engineer and Traffic Engineer in Sugar Land, Texas (near Houston). He sent me a snapshot of himself and of the old Far East Restaurant.

Mr. Kido of the other Chinese Restaurant, San Kow Low, went into Heart Mountain and was the chef for Block 12. I lived in Block 14 but our chef was horrible and the food was so awful, so I often went to Mr. Kido's messhall to eat. He always had food that was so tasty!

Anyway, I told Raymond the Chinese restaurants thrived before the war because of the good business they got from the Japanese community. We Japanese and Japanese Americans enjoy eating mmm good food even today. No more Nikko Low which was next door to Fuji-kan, the Japanese theatre, and Entow-Low, nor San Kow Low. Now, we go to Gardena to the Seafood empress, neh. And Raymond found out why his father and uncle worked in two of the Chinese restaurants in Lil tokyo before the war.

Watching "Dancing with the Stars"?

Isn't it wonderful to watch Kristi Yamaguchi dance? So graceful and beautiful. Married, mother of two daughters, she's a wife and homemaker. Her husband is Bret Hedican, a hockey player for the Carolina Hurricanes. She and her daughters have been rooting for Number 6, Bret's number, at the games during the hockey season. It's nice to see her in the spotlight once again. I'm rooting for her to win the Championship like Apolo Anton Ohno. Go Kristi!

Getting Ready for Vegas

Toni's busy getting the list of friends who have been registering with her to go May 20 - 22. She continues to work hard getting seats, rooms at the California Hotel, and the exciting Slot Machine contest. Start exercising your fingers! It's really so nice to have everything ready for us when we get there. Hopefully, we'll be in the West Wing rooms, neh? So, see you there! It's always so nice to see most of the regulars there...and our wine-master, Mas Okabe, and the cookie baker, Shirlee..."kubi o nagakushite matte imasu" (Am waiting for it with my neck stretched out long).

Shinnenkai Luncheon

The Shinnenkai luncheon held at Sambi restaurant this month was a huge hit. There were 55 attendees including the "oldest" senior at 95 years old, Mrs. Chiyo Fukunaga, and the youngest CC-ite (born Nov. 1945), Mr. Ken Takeuchi. You can view photos taken at the luncheon by clicking on the Pictures link to the left.

Toni reserved a private room for us and we had a great Japanese buffet lunch. Yae welcomed us and I introduced the sansei's who attended. We also presented a lovely "Butterfly" orchid to Mrs. Fukunaga and then remembered many of our departed friends with a silent prayer.

After lunch, Toni discussed our upcoming trip to Las Vegas on May 20th-22nd.  (For more information, check Announcements) Then, Toni and Yae talked about the JANM Denver Conference that will be held in July.

Thank you's to Joan Takeuchi, Ben and Emi's daughter for making very nice goody-bag's for all of us, and the lovely chrysanthemum flower centerpiece that Toni picked up for each table. We all played "Jan Ken Po" to see who would be the lucky one to win the plant!

It was a wonderful get-together... people all chatting with each other, and the food was mmm good!! Remember, next year the Shinnenkai will be held in Gardena on Sunday, January 18th at the Seafood Empress Restaurant in Pacific Square.

Gardena 5K Results

Kazuko Tajii was victorious in the 80 - 84 female category in the Gardena 5K run. Good for you Kazie!!!

Japantown's Coney Island Chili

(Submitted by Sat Ichikawa from The North American Post)

Looking back to 1939, the economy finally looked like it was getting over the Great Depression. Eeryone seemed more optimistic. In fact, from my perspective, my allowance was increased which allowed me to sneak out for snacks filling my growing appetite. My friend, Reo (Reo Kanogawa, whom I always called "Leo" or "Fat" growing up together, died in October 1990) and I would drop in to Coney Island restaurant across from State Drug on Jackson Street. In the beginning, we ordered their popular 5-cent hamburger. The Issei owner/cook would take out a golf ball size meatball from his icebox (refrigerators were still not that prevalent). He would flatten this to a thin 3-inch bun; this dinky hamburger resembled the size of a hole in a doughnut. But, the chili that was poured on soaking the bun made it more delicious than what you now get at McDonald's with their pickles, mustard and ketchup. Yummy!

Later, we progressed up to the 10-cent bowl of chili beans with oyster crackers. Talk about comfort food! What made the Coney Island chili so great was the fantastic chili flavoring, with the just the right amound of chili, hot pepper, beef fat and also it's soupiness. Most chili, authentic or not, seems too thick like goulash, and a bit starchy due to the beans dissolving in it. Boy, if I only had the secret ingredients and recipe for that chili, I believe I could make a fortune selling it as a franchise. (Of course, after you get rid of the saturated fat, the trans fat, the sodium, the cholesterol, and the carbohydrate to meet today's health standards, nobody would care to eat it!) Today, as a fast food version, I will take a can of Nalley's chili, dilute it with water, and add a touch of Tabasco. But, it's just not the same!

Eventually, if we saved enough we would step up to the super dish. This was the 15-cents chili over hot rice without the beans. Now you were in paradise! The reason it tasted so good was the chili sauce was kept in a separate pot from the beans so that the beans never diluted the chili flavoring. Thanks to the excessive amount of beef fat and possible inclusion of monosodium glutamate, the chili was tastier. Nobody talked about healthy diets in those days.

Boy, what I wouldn't give to taste another bowl of Coney Island chili! But then again, this may get me to heaven (or the other place) a lot quicker than I had planned.

Thanks, Sat, for sending in this interesting article...there are many foods I used to enjoy growing up; however, today, it would be considered high fat, cholesterol and salty, etc., etc. It's a no-no in my aging body's diet. Shucks!