ABSTRACT
When Hiroko Kubota designed the study, wrote her proposal and complied with the ethical review processes required by the university it seemed like a long enough time for those who came to the soup kitchen to get to know her. She began to imagine how the men who came to the center saw her from the midst of their lives where they had not known young women who were interested in hearing of their experiences. She was reluctant to accept the ways the agency staff saw her as a young female who would somehow be unable to engage with participants outside the center. As she came to accept the physical constraints around the place to meet with participants she realized that she needed to improvise new ways to engage with participants. Hiroko struggled as she composed a relational narrative inquiry field with the constraints Apapane, a participant, placed on the inquiry relationship to not discuss "the matters".
