Inger Iwaasa was born on the land of the Secwépemc, Blackfoot & Ktunaxa nations in Invermere, the fourth of twelve children to Asta and Peter Jacobsen, and the first of the family born outside of Denmark. Inger lived her early years on the family farm near Edgewater BC, instilling a life-long love of the mountains. At the age of seven, she moved with the family to Métis and Blackfoot territory near Tilley AB; land Inger described as sucking the boots right off your feet when it rained. She alternated going to school with staying home to care for her younger siblings.
After high school, Inger trained at teacher’s college, teaching first in Rainier, then moving to Dickson to support her sister Ester Hindbo and children Vivian, Grant and Jack after the death of Ester’s spouse Henry. In 1957-8, Inger traveled with her friend Margaret Bratt (later Fitch), hitchhiking through Europe between stints working as a supply teacher in London’s East End, au pair in Paris, in an iron foundry in North Germany, and visiting family in Denmark. On her return to Canada, Inger studied at the University of Alberta, earning a BA Degree in comparative literature. She became heavily involved in the activist Student Christian Movement (SCM), where she met many lifelong friends including the love of her life, Kazuo Iwaasa, known to everyone as Kaz.
After graduation, Inger taught at Alberta College in Edmonton, sharing an apartment with Elaine Sinclair, riding horses and tromping around Alberta photographing with Freeman Patterson. In 1964, thanks to the matchmaking help of June Oda, Inger married Kaz and moved to Blairmore, to her beloved mountains and a new career as Minister’s spouse. They soon relocated to North End Winnipeg, where Inger volunteered at a home for “unwed mothers,” and scandalized the parents by encouraging the girls to be unashamed of their pregnancies. Inger enjoyed close friendships with Evelyn and Rod McAuley, Brenda and Oliver Reimer, Jane Houston, and “midnight skulkers” Karen O’Toole and Diane Gillis.
Inger and Kaz returned to Alberta just prior to the birth of their daughter Rachel in 1969. They moved between homes of friends and relatives for several years until friend Elaine died in 1971, and they moved in with her widower Gernot Schenk in Calgary, as Inger took care of their young sons Eric and Karl.
In 1975, Inger, Kaz and Rachel moved to the Sarcee Meadows Housing Co-op, where Inger would remain for 35 years. For 7 years, she spent her time as a devoted mother and clergy spouse, volunteering for Central and Knox United Churches, as Director at Camp Kasota, gardening, and ferrying Rachel to and from activities. When Kaz was diagnosed with cancer in 1980, Inger returned to University of Calgary to become an ESL teacher. After Kaz’s death in 1982, she threw herself into this new career that united her fascination for language with her love of children, bringing her much joy and challenge until her retirement in 1994. A number of friends and family came to share her home during this period, including Vallerie and Rebecca Ross, and nieces Lorraine and Carol Iwaasa.
Inger’s Calgary retirement was filled with friendships, including meetups with the Birthday Bunch, volunteering with Knox’s Healing Touch group, and weekly dinners with Tc’al and Greg Frederick. She discovered fitness at 65, becoming a dedicated Pilates practitioner. She continued to teach ESL for the Chinese exchange students studying at Mount Royal Conservatory of Music, notably hosting as house mother a young Yuja Wang just before the pianist’s rise to superstardom.
In 2009, Inger moved to the West Coast—Musqueam, Squamish, Sto:lo and Tsleil-Waututh territories—settling first in Langley with Eric Schenk and family Schonna, Zion and Vaughn, before coming to Vancouver in 2011, and living with daughter Rachel from 2014. Inger kept a very busy schedule of Pilates lessons with Noam Gagnon, music therapy with Clemie Hoshino, concerts and plays with Liz Tajcner, Seniors’ Lounge at Gordon Neighbourhood House, decaf lattes with Sharalyn Calliou, Teresa Whitehouse, Martina Memminger and Glenn Sutherland, dinners out especially at her favorite Absinthe Bistro, and cooking with Carolyn Nakagawa, Jamie James, and Kathy Atkins.
Inger loved music, sewing, drawing, hiking, gardening and plants, horses and cats, and reading, with particular fascinations for comparative myth and fairy tales, children’s literature, Jungian psychoanalysis, and radical Biblical scholarship. She was a delightful and witty conversationalist, with a ready laugh, and a smile that lit up the room. She had a gift for relating to new people, quickly getting you talking about what really mattered to you. She befriended neighbours—both the housed and unhoused—up and down Charles Street and Commercial Drive on her daily walks, who in turn looked out for her.
Inger was an intrepid adventurer, open to new ideas and experiences until her dying day. She quit smoking via an LSD trip suggestion at Timothy Leary’s Millbrook Estate. When Rachel specialized in contemporary music, Inger learned about Canadian composers and attended every concert she could. When Rachel started a Queer Arts Festival, Inger threw her full support behind it as a volunteer, donor, and audience member. In her last decade, she was often heard to exclaim with delight, “I’ve never done this before!”
Inger had a passion for learning and research. She adored teaching, sharing fond stories of students long after she retired. A self-described “word person,” Inger spoke four languages fluently, which made dementia’s theft of words that much more cruel. She navigated the disease with a remarkable grace and humour that belied her private anguish.
Inger died in Vancouver after a decade-long journey with dementia. Heartfelt thanks to her care team, doctors Lalia Wickremasinghe, Wendy Cook and Jyothi Jayaraman, pharmacists Kunakar Pou and Ja Kyung Kim, case manager Belle Abbott, Sonia Furstrand and Edouard Beaudry of the Alzheimer Society’s Minds in Motion program, and the staff team at the Family Respite Centre.
Inger donated her brain to the Maritime Brain Tissue Bank for dementia research, expressing hope they might learn something that could prevent others from suffering the terrible pain and frustration she experienced.
Inger is predeceased by her husband Rev. Kazuo Iwaasa, siblings Gerda and John Alexander, Gerard Jacoubsen, Eunice Jacobsen, Linda Vance, and siblings-in-law Mitsuo Iwaasa, Makoto and Mariko Tamura. She is survived by her beloved daughter Rachel Iwaasa and “favorite son-in-law” Shaira Holman, son Bob Iwaasa and daughter-in-law Diane Prodor, god-daughter Vivian Hindbo, siblings Ester Hindbo, Larry and Erlinda Jacobsen, Frank and Jennifer Jacobsen, Julie Calderwood, Eva and Jim Manly, Fred Jacobsen, and Ray Jacobsen and Lise DesRosiers, siblings-in-law Clara Iwaasa, Josefina Jacobsen and Stan Vance, and a wide circle of loving friends and family.
An online Zoom memorial will be held July 31, 2020. Please email Rachel.qaf@gmail.com for details.
Donations
Donations are requested to contribute to a resting place at Mountain View Cemetery in Vancouver
https://www.gofundme.com/f/in-loving-memory-of-inger-iwaasa
Or to one of the many charities Inger supported regularly:
Friends of Canadian Broadcasting https://friends.ca/actions/contribute/?supporter_id=
Knowledge Network https://www.knowledge.ca/donate/gift-in-memory
Pride in Art Society https://www.canadahelps.org/en/charities/pride-in-art-society/?utm_expid=.Zw6wDABWRgyB0oPClDzoRg.0&utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F
St. Paul’s Hospital Foundation https://secure3.convio.net/sphf/site/Donation2?df_id=2400&mfc_pref=T&2400.donation=form1&_ga=2.200225578.587089250.1594619811-843598052.1594619811
VGH and UBC Hospital Foundation https://secure.vghfoundation.ca/site/Donation2;jsessionid=00000000.app358a?df_id=2245&mfc_pref=T&2245.donation=form1&_ga=2.247374989.884256484.1594620123-354031177.1594620123&NONCE_TOKEN=AABB8D0B7C284F8DF70D48BCC06E109E