Sleeping on Potatoes

By Carl Nomura

Book Overview

Sleeping on Potatoes, A Lumpy Adventure from Manzanar to the Corporate Tower by Carl Nomura is a true life account of how the U.S. government stripped away the citizenship of Japanese Americans during... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0970194730
• ISBN13: 9780970194732
• Release Date: September 2003
• Publisher: Erasmus Books
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.84 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.5" x 0.8" x 5.3"

Customer Reviews

The Lumpy Ride to Joy and Wisdom

`Sleeping on Potatoes is the metaphor for the bumpy and lumpy ride I had in my formative years,' Dr. Carl Nomura explains in the preface to his debut publication Sleeping on Potatoes: A Lumpy Adventure from Manzanar to the Corporate Tower (Erasmus Books, Washington, 2003). Nomura then extends this metaphor into a vivified mosaic of his life's experiences by bringing them to view through the eyes of a child and all the way up to a person with aspirations. Starting informally with his mother Mizuko's story, a Japanese woman who married Nomura's father because `she heard that in America everyone was tall', Dr. Nomura creates a series of true, non-fictional, real life stories that border on the line between short story and personal essay. Reliving in linguistic light the hardship of poverty, a heartless father, the humiliation of being forced to move into relocation centers during the Second World War, and the travails of disease and bereavement, Nomura throws his readers into a joyous shock with the amazing optimism of his attitude and his lively humor that arises spontaneously from the interaction of situation and language. One instance is from his school days: `we thought her name (Sister Perpetual) fitted her because she beat us perpetually'. Certainly not to overlook the fun of fishing and poker, and giving smoking up for good when an angry woman comes inches from your face and calls you a `polluting pig.' Though a doctor of philosophy in Solid State Physics, and an important figure in the corporate world of technology, it is Nomura's flair of seeing things as matter of course that lures one to appreciate his magnanimity. Not going a braggart, he opens a window to the philosophy of life-contentment, be it a doctorate in physics and excellence in management of small businesses, or using a bathroom 200 feet away from his bed in a trailer. Life is joy if you have your guts tuned to its frequency of vicissitudes. Marking Sleeping on Potatoes as a book to amuse would be a reader's pitfall. It is a book enormous in its scope, though not in its volume (250 pages). By no means is this the adventurous story of a single person, reflecting on his past. It is the story of many characters that endured and fought against social injustice and untoward circumstances-from women like Mizuko and Louise, to the sufferers in relocation centers, and the motherless litter of cats who were lucky enough to make it to Nomura's house. His heart touching memories of Mox, the neighbor's dog, harbor all the richness and beauty of life. Nomura traces the causes of discontent in marital life, discusses issues associated with terminal illness, and informs on linguistic and the cultural relativism of English and Japanese native speakers. Now in his eighties, retired and coping with prostate cancer, Nomura's lumpy ride has not come to a pause. It is bumping all along with new interest in learning and doing things and new ways of adding to the richness of his life. With

Life is about relationship...

Nomura's sparse style of writing is not unlike the character of a differential equation expressing the essential. He cuts to his distilled memory and leaves the residue of honed understanding through the filter of life experience. His life is an engaging tale; to me it seems a Horatio Alger story of the Japanese American community. He was born in a boxcar in Montana, was dislocated to Japanese internment camps and made the journey to Corporate Senior Vice President for Honeywell Corporation. Now he contributes to his community in Port Townsend, Washington in very beneficial ways, besides enjoying his own interests, family and travel. His story brings greater understanding and deep appreciation of the diversity of our American culture by his unflinching exposure of his own family history. Nomura recounts with accuracy the emotional pain, isolation and dislocation from traditional Japanese culture in the struggle for the promise of a better life in America. He voices his life experience with insight and humor, which is the great expression of the commonality of the human experience seen through the filter of a kind mathematician. He tells his story, even including poetry, which supports understanding and intimacy through his selected descriptions of challenging moments about his cultural heritage, marriage, family and career. In the end the real meaning and importance of life is about relationship. But most of all I think this book, Sleeping on Potatoes is worthy of recognition for his dedicated and talented effort to build links of understanding between cultures, family, relationships and the poetic spirit of a curious mind.

Nomura's Odyssey

This book is a winner. Sleeping on Potatoes is more than a winsome collection of captivating stories. This anecdotal history of Carl Nomura depicts a personal odyssey. Nomura's unusual journey, from a railroad boxcar through internment camp, to physics labs and corporate boardrooms, seems to have honed his gifts as observer and storyteller. The ability of the human spirit to take on life's challenges is revealed with candor, wit and mystery. Nomura believes that life is a journey filled with adventure and opportunities for making courageous decisions that can make a difference in one's life. A great read - it was difficult to put down.

Sleeping On Potatoes...that were not mashed!

I will always be thankful I met Carl Nomura in the sixties. He was professional inspiration to me and encouraged me to leave industry and get my doctorate. Now I know what he went through as a young man after reading his wonderful book. So you may think my review is biased. It is not. The book is simply fantastic! I could not put it down. I have passed it all around my family and recommended it to many friends. How could one man go through all that and wind-up a super engineer, manager, farmer, and now author?? He is blessed and we are blessed to share his memories.

much more than a memoir

Carl Nomura has a delightfully wry sense of humor, which bubbles to the surface at surprising moments, to bring a chuckle or a giggle to the dust & dirt of the American experience of being the wrong kind of people.SLEEPING ON POTATOES: A Lumpy Adventure from Manzanar to the Corporate Tower, is a memoir which needed to be told. It is written with brief, luminous strokes, alarming & wry, telling of one man's path through the unique American white water of prejudice, as well as the best revenge -- of living the good life & thriving!Rebeccasreads highly recommends SLEEPING ON POTATOES as much more than a memoir, it is the sum of one feisty & interesting Spirit's sojourn on earth & how he'd like to be remembered.