AROUND THE WORLD

We moved to San Jose in 1970 because my dad was in the process of getting his college degree from San Jose State after 20 years of service in the U.S. Army. My father was born Gerhard Alexander Fenzke in Germany in 1927 but spent his childhood growing up in Chicago. My dad was a very good man who was very strict but fair and he instilled in us that we should judge all people equally regardless of their race or beliefs. He was a staunch Democrat and was very interested in politics. He joined the military out of high school, reached the rank of Master Sergeant and stayed in the Army until a massive heart attack almost took his life and forced him to retire and start a new chapter in his life. Being in the military we were always moving somewhere every couple of years. My dad was stationed in Tokyo, Japan when he met my mom, Kyoko Aoyama a beautiful young woman from one of Tokyo's most respected families. While my mom doesn't talk about the details of their relationship I do know because he was an American this love affair was forbidden and my mom had disgraced their family name and soon would be exiled from her family and country. I was born in a U.S. Army hospital in Tokyo in 1955 and we moved back to the States the following year. It would be more than twenty years before my Mom would come back to Japan. My brother Jay who plays an important part in my life and this story, was born in Manhattan, Kansas in 1957 and then we were off overseas to Germany where my Dad was on his new tour of duty. After living in Munich for several years and having memories of bad weather, visiting castles and all those square apartment buildings on base where we lived we finally came back to the States where we settled down in Monterey, California . My parents bought a small house in Pacific Grove and this is where most of my childhood memories are stored. After my Dad's heart attack he left the Army and embarked on a life long dream that would take our family to San Jose and eventually Santa Barbara.