<Begin Segment 22>

JA: What kind of activities were there for the young people in the Nikkei community?

MH: Well, we had an annual picnic at the Kokaido field for everybody, the whole family and all bring their best. And the organization bought the pop, and the beer, and the watermelon and soft drinks like that, and they had a wonderful time there. They look forward to it once a year. They had it at the Kokaido picnic ground there, we call it there. And we had baseballs for all the kids, and they had baseball, baseball team, in fact, and they had a basketball team from Bellevue. And they had judo competition all over. They come to Bellevue, Kokaido had a judo tournament there, too, and they had kendo tournaments there, too. So they were, so the youngsters were always kept busy with activities like that plus at school. See, when they were in school, they were playing baseball, football, and all that at their schools, too, as they were growing up in the high school level.

JA: Were there many spectators during these baseball games or basketball games?

MH: Well, I would say plentiful. I think most everybody went, but the parents usually can't go because they're busy on the farm.

JA: But for the young people it became a social activity.

MH: (Yes). It became a social activity for the young people, yes. They would all go.

JA: And what kind of activities were there, that maybe, for the young women in the community?

MH: Young women? Well, the young women's, that I was in, we had a basketball team. I think that's all the team we really had for the girls is actually that type of thing. And, otherwise, we were busy involved in, like I said, the Japanese tea ceremony and flower arrangement, and that's all really the activity that we had for girls.

JA: How were Nikkei youngsters when they get to the dating age? How were they able to meet and socialize?

MH: Socialize? Well, it was kind of hard I tell you that, until we started going to baseball games and basketball games or something like that. Then we meet the other people on the other side from Tacoma, Auburn, Seattle, and all that area so that's... and then we invite them to a Bellevue dance and they would come to the Bellevue dance, or we would be invited to theirs so our group would go over to theirs. And so we were able to socialize with Seattle people, Bellevue, Auburn, Tacoma, and then we had Green Lake, too, involved and Bothell was involved in our group.

JA: So these sports leagues provided a real link between communities.

MH: A lot of good -- yes.

JA: Throughout the Puget Sound area.

MH: Yes, it did, very much. That was very important, and when they were all growing up.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.