MAGNA BAY

This is us on the final day in Magna Bay, sitting by the wharf of Shuswap  Lake.

Kay, Noriko, Jane, me and May Uyeda

1953 and 1954

We trained into Notch Hill from Vancouver to above for two summers to work as strawberry pickers,  followed by bean picking in Kamloops BC. We easily worked  9 -11 hours a day  at 45 cent an hour. No complaints!  We were obedient  and  being in a large group  made it fun. The bulk of the workers came from  Greenwood BC. Meals were served, washed  our clothes in  Shuswap lake, drank water from a  running stream,  bathed in their wooden bath outside  and out door toilets of course.

My monthly cheque was $ 125. Sent most of it to my mom in Vancouver from Kamloops  (paid in cash).

The  1953 summer, we were driven to Kamloops  to pick beans and that was an  8 hrs  a day, stayed in Skelly’s bunk house with the Greenwood girls. This was like a poor man’s  summer camp .

Went to watch movies at nights.  Be it a drive in theatre or  a theatre downtown, bowling ,  and tasted my first creamsicle. There were no malls, stores were closed at 5 pm we kinda enjoyed this  “ away from home summer “.

Bean picking was a lot easier than strawberry picking. Standing up, singing as we picked, and no boss looking over you. We had an enjoyable lunch with  20 of us eating the same sandwich, we made the night before.

Came home by train and started school  at Kitsilano pretty well immediately, those were the days, we thought  they would never end.

On our final day in Magna Bay, we celebrated with a soft ball  game, me, Kikuko and in the front is  Kay and Jane.  

We are washing our clothes in the lake in the evening after working 10 hours ….