<Begin Segment 7>

JT: But remember coming home after you left the camp? Did you all come back as one family?

KN: Yeah, we all came back as one family. We stayed at Mas Oishi's place, I was telling you, in Oakland. And I don't know how long we stayed there, six months or something. But then we came here to the gakuen.

JT: Right. Well, back up a little. You said you left from the ryokan, the hotel. What happened to the hotel when you left?

KN: It was sold, it was gone.

JT: You had to empty it?

KN: Oh, yeah. In fact, I completely forgot about that ryokan until you brought it up, and my brother was telling me about it, too.

JT: And where did you come? You come back to Alameda?

KN: We went to Oakland first, East Fourteenth Street, Mas Oishi's place, and then we came to the Buddhist church here at the gakuen, that's what they call it.

JT: That gakuen, that was that building...

KN: 2320.

JT: 2320 where the apartments are now.

KN: Right. But was had all the families there.

JT: When you say "all the families," can you remember how many?

KN: Tomines.

JT: Oh, the Tomines?

KN: Yeah, Ozekis, Sugiyama, somebody else. I can't name 'em all.

JT: There were, like, five families who were there. Do you remember what it was like? Did you live in one room?

KN: Oh, no, we all had separate rooms.

JT: I mean, did your family all live in one area, one room? Was it kind of like an apartment building?

KN: I think it was just a room with partitions between.

JT: I remember there, I used to play there. But what about, and you had to share the bathroom, too, right?

KN: Yeah, but with all the families.

JT: With all the families.

KN: And had one neutral family toilet and all that stuff.

JT: And the laundry room.

KN: Yeah. And how they cooked, I'm not sure how Mom did that.

JT: All I know is that you knew what the neighbor was having for dinner by the smell, by the aroma, I should say, right? And you told me a little bit about that, was your grandma a good cook?

KN: My grandma, or my mother?

JT: Your grandma. She used to cook okazu kind of things. But was your mother a good cook?

KN: I think so. I ate whatever was on the table.

JT: [Laughs]

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2021 Densho. All Rights Reserved.