Migration gives children the gift of a place to be born
Igarashi Kanoa is a top surfer who won a silver medal as a representative of Japan at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics and has continued to make great strides in competitions around the world since then. Kanoa's younger brother, Keanu, is also an active surfer. The Igarashi brothers are from Huntington Beach, California, a mecca for surfing. Their parents are Tsutomu and Misa, who immigrated to the United States from Japan as Shin-Issei.
When asked why they decided to move, Misa answered without hesitation, "I love English, and I have studied abroad in Australia, but no matter how hard I try, I can't speak it like a native. So I wanted to give birth to my child in America and raise him to be able to speak at the very least English and Japanese. Children themselves can't choose where they are born and raised, so I thought that choosing where to be born was a gift we could give to our children, and so we moved to America. Also, because we are surfers, I hoped, even before they were born, that I would like my child to become a top-class surfer, if possible."
When I heard Misa say that "children cannot choose where they are born," I agreed that she was right, but most people would not think about where the ideal place would be for a child and then move there.
The Igarashis decided to move to the United States in 1995 with the desire to raise their child to be at least bilingual and, ideally, a top surfer. Although they were both popular fitness instructors in Tokyo, they had to start from scratch in the United States.
"We made our own fitness wear and sent it to Japan, and when we moved to the U.S., we lived behind the Beverly Center (near Hollywood), so we also ran a private lodging," Tsutomu recalls. Soon, their eldest son, Kanoa, was born. That was in 1997.
Kanoa started surfing when he was three years old. Then, when he was five, he moved from Hollywood to Huntington Beach in search of a better environment for surfing. From then on, the Igarashi family began to spend their whole lives immersed in surfing.
"Kanoa entered his first surfing contest at the age of six, and won his first one. When he took the trophy to elementary school, the other kids said, 'Amazing, amazing!' and he felt like a hero. That made him start to put even more effort into surfing. I still remember that experience as a huge motivation for him," says Tsutomu.
The samurai spirit at the core: "Win and tighten your helmet straps"
Kanoa has had a sponsor since he was six years old and has spent his days traveling the world like a professional surfer. As he grew up, his passion for surfing never faded, but only grew stronger, to the point where he began to think, "I want to contribute through my own achievements so that surfing will be recognized as a major sport by people all over the world."
Surfing was then selected as an official event for the first time at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (the Olympics were postponed for a year and will be held in 2021). Kanoa said, "When it was selected as an official event, I was eligible to compete as a representative of the United States. However, I chose Japan of my own volition."
Although Kanoa was born and raised in America, he has grown into an adult with a strong sense of being Japanese, thanks to his parents' insistence that all conversations at home be in Japanese, so that "as a Japanese person, I would not forget the Japanese language." "I am a Japanese person who grew up in America. And every day I feel that I am Japanese. Ever since I was a child, I have eaten Japanese food at home and spoken Japanese with my family. I grew up in an environment where the outside world was American, but the inside of the house was Japanese," said Kanoa.
What's more, surprisingly, Kanoa's favorite saying is "Tighten your helmet straps after winning."
"Actually, this is a phrase I first came across in English when I was reading an English book. I had a feeling it was originally Japanese, so when I looked up the meaning, it made sense to me. One reason is that I like the samurai spirit, but in the world of athletes, it's important not to take yourself lightly just because you've won. In my opinion, having the mentality of 'taking it easy' just because you've won is weak. There is still competition at a higher level, so you should keep working hard in training even the day after you win, and make an effort every day to get a little stronger. So you could say that this phrase expresses my attitude."
Furthermore, he is not only bilingual in English and Japanese, but also fluent in Spanish and Portuguese, having spent a long time in South America and Portugal surfing. He is also currently studying French. This means that he began studying in order to "master the local language" in preparation for the 2024 Paris Olympics.
After the Paris Olympics, the Los Angeles Olympics will follow. Kanoa has now made his parents' goal of becoming a top surfer a reality, and he never forgets to be grateful, saying, "I am who I am today thanks to the support of my family." He is truly a representative athlete of the second generation of Japanese surfers who can freely demonstrate their abilities anywhere in the world.
© 2023 Keiko Fukuda
