Over time I realized that they called me by different names. It was like juggling identities: I was Enko, Enchan, Yumiko, Emicita, Nenita, Bichito, Yboty, Ojimesama. Even though my real name was Emilia Yumi.
My childhood was spent in the first Japanese colony in Paraguay, La Colmena, a community organized by my father Hisakazu Kasamatsu, who was an official of the Paraguay Takushoku Kumiai (Paraguay Colonizing Company), whose members have always tried to maintain the importance of Japanese culture and its social impact among immigrants and their families. We grew up with all the discipline and education of the rigorous Meiji era, which persisted over time.
However, given the circumstances, integration with the nationals who came to share the urban area of the colony was also necessary. There was an interesting rapport and a rampant bilingualism with Spanish, perhaps trilingualism with the language of the indigenous people, Guaraní. The majority of the Paraguayan population was fluent in that language, so it was necessary to use it in the contracts with the natives to be the farm workers, since they only spoke that language.
When I got married, my husband, who was Paraguayan, started calling me Emi. And I liked that diminutive way of naming myself and I identified with that name. We had the opportunity to live in Japan for five years, when my husband was appointed ambassador of Paraguay and, gradually, I became Emi. Then we went on a mission to Washington DC for three years and there I definitely became Emi or its pronunciation in English, which was Amy.
When I returned to my country, I continued to use my name Emi, and no one could ignore it in the various organizations I served as a leader. I was also an ikebana promoter, writer, researcher, and international speaker on Japanese immigration, literature, and gender. The positioning of that name at all levels was already imminent. No one knew me by any other name, and even when they called me by my real name, I would turn around and say, “Who is that?”
In today's world, the use of diminutives is very common: Instead of dad, they call mom 'pa', instead of Lucas: 'Lu', for Makoto: 'Mako', for Stefany: 'Stefi'. 'Yeru' for Yeruti and Otoosan: 'Otoo'. Okaasan: 'Okaa'. Famous nicknames or personifications for their way of being like this exist: 'Gato', 'Negro', 'Bichito'. 'Je je', 'ET', 'Mberu'...
In conclusion, the fact of becoming one with a name with which one fully identifies and being satisfied with that new identity is valuable and identifiable within a range of possibilities that arise in life.
© 2024 Emi Kasamatsu
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