Joko May

Joko May was born Tsuneko Tamari on February 26, 1942 in Kagoshima, Japan. As all children do, she had many aspirations, but found herself at a young age needing to work to support her family. For this reason, she never completed school past second grade, which was a lifelong regret. But she worked hard to support her family, and later, herself. Eventually, she found herself working in Okinawa, where she met Staff Sergeant Richard May of the USMC. Rich and Joko fell in love, and soon found themselves a family of four after the birth of Sandie and Ron; later they moved to the US where April and Kenny were born.

After some time in Illinois, Southern California and Utah, Rich and Joko moved their family to San Jose, California. The city grew quickly and so did her kids, and Joko had to figure out how to raise kids in a country and culture still foreign to her. Still, she worked. She taught herself English, armed with a Japanese-English dictionary, a Japanese-English New Testament, and notebooks full of her writing practice in which she wrote words over and over until she committed them to memory. Soon she got a job working in assembly, spending long days soldering circuit boards together. Later, she worked in a Japanese restaurant. And always, she worked at home, cleaning, cooking, balancing the checkbook, running the household. To describe her as a hard worker would be the greatest of understatements.

She was a formidable mother. She always pushed her kids to be better, to do better. She missed Japan terribly, but could not bring herself to spend the money it would take to visit. For her, it was too selfish to contemplate. When she eventually returned 20 years later, it was a changed country and no longer recognizable to her. Her life was committed to her family, just as it was when she was young.

Also: she loved playing slots at the casino. She was a Beatles and Elvis fan. Her favorite television show was “I Love Lucy.” She liked a good game of hana fuda. She loved her beer and cigarettes. She was generous. She was hard on herself. She loved to laugh. She was a great cook.

Her later years were spent being Bachan to her nine grandchildren. Every visit to Bachan’s house meant (at least) three things:

1. Udon would have been made in advance or at a moment’s notice, because all her grandchildren loved her udon.

2. There would be plenty of sweet treats for her grandkids—and an angry grimace for any of their parents for daring to regulate the amount of sugar her grandkids had while visiting.

3. At some point during the visit, Bachan would call her grandkids over for their kozukai (allowance)—a generous monthly amount she always budgeted for, which was often supplemented during other visits as well.

Her grandchildren were her joy, and judging from their tributes to her, she was their joy as well. She surrounded herself with pictures of them, she cooked all of their favorite foods, she never censored herself nor failed to strike a pose (or flip a middle finger) to get laughs from them.

Bachan lived her last days on her own terms and passed on Friday, June 29, 2018. She is survived by her husband, Richard; her daughter Sandie and her husband Mike; her son Ron and his wife Heidi; her daughter April and her husband Belaid; and her son Kenny and his wife Ruth. She is also survived by her loving and loved grandchildren Tori, Taylor, Nick, Jacob, Emilie, Kumiko, Idir, Ayur and Noah.

She was our center, our beginning, our everything. There are not enough words to describe who she was or what she meant to this family. Kenpai, our fearless warrior!

At Richard’s request, in lieu of flowers, please consider donating in her memory to Fisher House:

https://engage.fisherhouse.org/site/Donation2?2262.donation=form1&df_id=2262&mfc_pref=T

“She served, too.”