<Begin Segment 14>

JA: You mentioned how your father would prepare the bath water. It was his job to start the fire...

MH: Uh-huh.

JA: ...toward the end of the day and everyone take their bath and then the laundry would be done following that.

MH: Uh-huh, with that, with that water in the bath, which was saved for that purpose, and we use it for laundry. And if we don't, can't get it done that night after we get out of bath, well, we do it the next morning and we do it that way. And then later in life when my father did buy a washing machine finally for us, well, he did that water the next day again, the same bath water, and then we use that for all our laundry. But, see, the Japanese bath is not dirty because you wash outside before you go inside the tub. You just go inside there to just warm up, is what they call Japanese bath. So that reason the water is not dirty so all the farmers are doing that. They were using their bath water for laundry.

JA: And so you did not soak in the tub?

MH: No, you just jump in. Yeah, you soak, you warm.

JA: So you washed outside.

MH: You washed outside and just go in there and soak up, then.

JA: But the water remained relatively clean because you had already bathed.

MH: Clean, yes. All the family going in one after the other but, yes.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.