Megan, my great daughter, age 11 (in 1988), am just putting the picture up cuz I like it …
In the 1970s, when I was “co-ordinating” the Tillicum Food Co-operative — honestly, a big deal, a multi-million dollar grassroots endeavour that not only changed eating habits across Metro Vancouver, British Columbia, and beyond, but put power into the hands of activists and working people — as Tillicum’s produce, and some other, suppliers were located in the area just north of Powell Street, and east of Main, Cathy and I would frequently stop in for lunch at the then one and only existing sushi restaurant in Vancouver, The Japanese Deli, I think it was called, or perhaps some other name.
As time passed, as Cathy and I moved into the Interior for me to take a job as a teacher, and she as a Financial Aid worker with the Ministry of Human Resources, and as I moved on from my responsibilities with the Tillicum and Fed-Up Food Co-operatives — although Cathy and I re-invigorated the Shuswap / North Okanagan food co-operative movement in our years in the Interior — we got out of the habit of eating Japanese cuisine.
I recall in the early 1980s attending a garden party at the University of British Columbia, accompanied by my friends Scott Parker and the late Daryl Adams — with whom I worked on the Galindo Madrid Defense Committee, in concert with Gary Cristall and the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights in Latin America, and Svend Robinson — the food on offer at the sunny, mid-spring afternoon political event, fresh sushi, the first time in years I’d had sushi, although I had long ago mastered the use of chopsticks (which took me four arduous months — one cannot honestly call me the most co-ordinated person in the world, but once I get it, it’s got!).
A couple of summers later, in the summer of 1982, when Megan was a whole five years old, I asked her one summer’s day where she’d like to go for dinner, to which she replied, “Kibune Sushi — it’s my favourite.” So, off Jude, Megan and I went to Kibune Sushi on Yew Street, just up from Kitsilano Beach. Once we’d seated ourselves in the tatami room, after a couple of minutes, the waitperson came by with tea and to take our order. Being the adult present, I set about to order — but, really, what did I know about ordering sushi? Not much I can tell you.
After about 30 seconds of my fumbling around with the menu, Megan looked over at the waitperson and said, pointing in my direction, “He doesn’t know much about Japanese food,” and then turning to me, she said, “Dad, I’ll take over the ordering. You just sit back — we’ll be good.”
Megan, age 5, a ‘take charge’ kind of person, always …
At which point, Megan set about to order …
“Well, given that my dad doesn’t know much about Japanese food, I think we should start him off with chicken yakatori, because that’s really BBQ chicken, and I’m sure he’s familiar with that. An order of chicken yakatori, then. Next, a California roll will hit the spot, I think — I know my dad likes avocado, and my brother and I do, as well. So, an order of one California roll. I like the yam roll, and I think my dad wouldn’t find that too confrontational — so, we’ll have a yam roll, as well.
(looking at me, Megan said) “Now, sooner or later, dad, you’re going to have to get used to eating sashimi. To complete our order, because all three of us are hungry, I’m going to place an order for an assorted sashimi platter,” which the waitperson dutifully wrote down.
So, that’s Megan: in control always, and I do mean always. Honestly, in the entirety of my life, I’ve never seen anything quite like it: Megan sets her mind to do something, and it’s done — almost like magic. Megan is stubborn, she knows her own mind, she knows what she wants, and she always gets her way — it’s simply unprecedented in my experience.
Oh, and did I say that Megan is a lovely, lovely person — tough, but wonderful, possessed of a social conscience, capable of much good, and one of the brightest, most able people I’ve ever met. And I’m not saying that because Megan is my daughter — she is simply a gift of our landscape.
