<Begin Segment 22>

AI: What was a typical daily life like in Puyallup? You'd get up in the morning, and...

RI: Well, of course, the big talk is the big mess hall where we all went, stood in line. I don't know if we brought our own plates, tin plates, maybe. And then, I would call it slop, what we got was slop. And there was a lot of, lotta times it was baked beans and maybe Vienna sausage. Whatever it was it was very high in carbohydrate because I think I gained about five or six pounds. And so I probably used to weigh about 105 or -6 pounds and by the time I got to Texas I was 112 pounds. Yeah. I think that it was the food because -- and then probably not much exercise. There was no scheduled exercise or we didn't have any sports, playing around or running around or anything. Well, this is temporary camp, so there couldn't have been that much organized activities. But I know that, like my sister, she used to play, play a lotta cards. And the way she met her husband was, the bachelors were housed, seems as though it's under the grandstands. And that's where she used to go, and a group of people playing cards, and she, it seems as though one time even I went there and played. And I learned how to play pinochle. But I don't know how to play it now, but I think something I learned there. But other than that, in our childhood by going to Baptist church, Baptists, Baptists were very conservative and we thought that we weren't supposed to play cards. We're not supposed to go dancing. We're not supposed to drink. And then, especially on Sunday, we're not supposed to go movies. So that was what we were taught. But all of a sudden in camp, oh, we were playing cards. Well, I wasn't playing cards too much, but I know my sister was. And everybody was running around a lot because they have lotta friends.

AI: Speaking of friends, did you get any visitors from the outside while you were in Puyallup?

RI: No, I didn't have any friends who came to visit me. You mean school friends? No.

AI: Or neighbors?

RI: I didn't have any. I think that the only one who came to visit was probably my sister from Camp A coming to Camp D. But other than that I don't remember going out of our area to another area. But I didn't have any hakujin friend who came to visit me. I don't know, there used to be a hakujin man called Mr. Bonus. He was a great friend of the Japanese people. He was a bachelor, English gentleman who came from England. And he used to befriend a lot of the Japanese families. And it's very possible that he used to come and visit.

AI: And I was wondering, too, did you recall, in Puyallup, were there any Sunday services, any church kind of service while you were still at the, Puyallup?

RI: I don't remember. There probably had to be, but, I think that the gathering was so quickly done and everybody was so disorganized, that I doubt that there could have been formal services. It's very possible that maybe the ministers came to visit and conduct the services, or maybe they had it in another area. But I don't even remember attending a church. Even in Minidoka I don't remember attending a church.

AI: Well, what was, what were you thinking about -- in Puyallup, did you have an idea of what was going to happen after this temporary camp? Or do you remember finding out where you were going to go next?

RI: No, I don't remember a lot of it, but I'm sure that we were all wondering what was going to happen. But of course there were lotta rumors so that we, we were wondering, since it was a temporary camp, where would the permanent camp be, and how were we gonna get there, and probably lotta unanswered questions. But I don't remember that we were questioning anybody, any authorities. Probably whatever we were told was maybe distributed and... I don't know how that information was passed, maybe on a bulletin board or something like that. But it was all sort of mass, mass...

DG: Did you stay with your same friends or did you have new friends?

RI: In camp? Well, let's see... I don't, I don't know that I had any friends living in the same area, probably mostly family friends, like my mother and father's friends, and people who lived in the same aisle or same block or -- we were all in Area (D) but there was a aisle where there were, I don't know how many families per long barrack. And I don't know that I had any close friends who were in the same, exactly same aisle. But --

DG: But you were busy 'cause you had lotta family there?

RI: Yeah. So I think it was mostly with family, staying with family, doing things with family.

DG: Did you read or study? Or...

RI: Oh, I don't know how I could've. If I didn't bring any books, I couldn't. I don't think there was a library. I don't know if we read the paper. We didn't have a radio. So, it's just a matter of hearsay or talking with other people.

AI: And then I think, after a while, there was a small newsletter in Puyallup.

RI: From, from Puyallup?

AI: Right. I think a very small one.

RI: Oh, I don't really remember. I don't remember, I don't remember reading any.

AI: What was, what was going through your mind as far as being American at that point? Were, did you, were you worried that, like some people worried they were actually going to have their citizenship taken away, or that they weren't really American anymore because of the way that you were being kept there?

RI: Well, to tell you the truth, I don't think I gave that kind of thing much thought. And I wasn't really a very thinking person about why I'm there. You know, I was just like my parents. I'm here because I'm told to be here and you move when you're supposed to, that kind of thing. So I don't remember how I felt. I'm sure if you had asked me fifty years ago I could have told you, but now I don't remember.

AI: Well, is there anything else about Puyallup that you wanted to describe before we move to the next...

RI: No, no. It was a very short time. Probably that's when I started trying to get out and go to school. So maybe I was busy applying for that, trying to find out how to get out.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.