Kimiko Kuwana Sakai, daughter of Japanese immigrants, Hisa Muranaka Kuwana and Jitsuzo Kuwana, was born on April 26, 1916, in Pahoa, Hawai'i. She is one of eight children born to the Kuwanas. Her mother's main responsibility was running the household and caring for the children. Her father was a foreman at 'Ola'a Sugar Company plantation. Sakai graduated from Hilo High School in 1934 after completing Hilo Intermediate School and her primary grades at schools in Pahoa and 'Ola'a. After graduation, she worked as a kitchen helper at Dr. T. Kutsunai's hospital in Papa'ikou. She also took care of the doctor's elderly grandmother until he moved to New York to further his medical studies. In March 1943, she married Isami Sakai and spent the war years on O'ahu where he was stationed. At war's end her husband resumed commercial fishing and-they returned to live on the Big Island. The 1960 tsunami destroyed their home in Wailikea and forced them to relocate; temporarily to the Naval Air Station, then to an upstairs apartment in the railroad depot for about a year, and finally to their present residence of over thirty years. While housed at the railroad depot, Sakai began baby-sitting for families who had lost their caregivers (i.e., grandparents). Years later when her own children had entered college she began working in the kitchen of Paramount Grill on Haili Street Widowed since 1990, she is now retired and still resides in Hilo. The Sakais raised six children and helped care for their grandchildren.

Scope and Content Note
Pahoa-born daughter of Japanese immigrants tells of growing up on the plantation, schooling, and working as a kitchen helper and cook. She speaks of her marriage to a fisherman and raising their children in Waiakea. Describing how they survived the 1960 tsunami, she includes a sketch of their escape route.

Program Note:  
This interview is part of the Center for Oral History's project Tsunamis Remembered: Oral Histories of Survivors and Observers in Hawai‘i. Interviews from this project are available in the Center's ScholarSpace open access repository.

The Center for Oral History (COH), in the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, collects, documents, preserves and highlights the recollections of Native Hawaiians and the multi-ethnic people of Hawaiʻi. It produces oral histories and interpretive historical materials about lifeways, key historic events, social movements and Hawaiʻi’s role in the globalizing world, for the widest possible use.