<Begin Segment 37>

LH: When you got to the University of Washington, what was it like going to college as a Nisei?

FG: Well, it was a little bit of a surprise because then when we were in high school then we were kind of co-equal with everybody, right. Then when we got to, when we got to college then all of a sudden there is a difference between the fraternity and sorority kids and us, and so we weren't really socializing anymore. We used to socialize in school. That's an interesting thing about high school at the time when I was going to school, we were all, we were all friends in school and then the minute the bell rang when school was over then we all went our separate ways. We never socialized off of the school campus.

LH: Meaning Japanese, Nisei, Nikkei and...

FG: The hakujins, yeah.

LH: Was that true with all four races that you wouldn't associate after school with like say your Chinese friends, your Filipino friends, or was it just the white students that you wouldn't...

FG: It was the whites, but then it also kind of depends because some of the Chinese were, would go to, I think they were still going to Chinese school right after school. The Jewish were going to Hebrew school, but then I think I'm talking about the others, the other ones that we had. And at that time I think that Garfield was composed of probably about one third minority and that would include the Chinese, the Japanese, the Filipinos, and the blacks. And then the rest of them were white and then the... among them would be the Jewish. We had a pretty large Jewish community and so, and I think maybe a little less than half were Jewish. So that was my graduating class. I think it's changed as the years went on. It changed. By the time my brother Paul went to Garfield too and by the time he went, it was different, and it was only five years, but the composition was different. Then my son Kevin went to Garfield many years later, about thirty years later, and the composition was very, very different. So I think maybe it was just because of when I went to school.

LH: Well, you were going again to the life at the U. You had mentioned that the social life in high school was that you would socialize in class at school and then go your separate ways after school. And then at the university there wasn't even that time during school to socialize.

FG: And by the time, by the time we were -- well, when we got to the U then the people that we knew in high school were very busy with their sorority sisters and fraternity brothers and things like that. And there was a lot of... I think that there were things that they had to do too so we barely talked, even talked to each other.

LH: So did you ever consider trying to join your Caucasian friends in the sororities or in their activities?

FG: I don't think we were allowed. I don't think we were allowed. I think there was only one, I think there was only one sorority that allowed and it was a real revolutionary. I can't remember... Betty... I can't remember what her last name was, but she was accepted into a sorority, but there was no reason to even think about sororities or fraternities when I was in school.

LH: So what then did your social life encompass at the U for Japanese Americans?

FG: There were the Japanese American social groups that the Valedas, the Valedas were the girl's counterpart to the SYNKOA. Of course, SYNKOA was a house, the SYNKOA House, where the men's residence. And then the people who lived and came from there, those were the guys and the girls were, the Valedas were kind of an off, came from the... it was a high school group that was formed by the YWCA and then so that group went into the college group, not the same people I think basically, but it added more people. But that was our social life, if that, and then off campus many of us would go to the church groups. And I spent a lot of time after school at church. It depends on the person, I think. I think some of us after school worked so there wasn't too much social life per se I don't think.

LH: So you didn't have, so your involvement with the Valedas was pretty minimal or was it...

FG: Mine was, but I think it depends on...

LH: On the individual.

FG: Yeah.

<End Segment 37> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.