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RI: And I wasn't there long, because in January, end of January I left to go to Texas. And it seemed like it was quite a process, applying to get to a school. But apparently I was very anxious to continue my college education. And so when I got on a train at Shoshone, which was a train station, I got on a train. It was end of January and there was snow on the ground in Idaho. And I was wearing a heavy winter coat, wool skirt, in those days we didn't wear pants. And I got on the train. I think it took at least two days to get there. I'm sure I was there day and night. And there were a couple of other students on the same train and they were going to different colleges, one of 'em was going to Ames, Iowa. So somewhere along the way he got out to transfer to another train while I continued on to mine. And when I got to Austin, where the University of Texas is, I, it was, I'm sure it was like ninety-something degrees. Well, Texas, Texas and Idaho are entirely different. And here I had this heavy wool stuff on. It was like maybe six o'clock in the morning. And I'm sure that there was some arrangement for the family that I was to stay with, for them to pick me up. But nobody was there. And since I had to go to the restroom I looked around and that was my exposure to "colored" and "white." So I said, "Gosh, what am I? Am I, I'm not colored, and I'm not white, so what shall I do?" But since nobody was around I snuck into the "white" area and later I asked somebody, "What am I? Am I 'white' or 'colored'?" They said, "Oh, you're supposed to go into the 'white' area." But Seattle did not have that segregation, so I didn't know. But that was my first exposure to segregation. And this is 1942. Then later on, I stayed with a family in Texas and the father, the husband was the librarian at the University of Texas. The wife was not working, but she was a social butterfly, like. I mean, she had a lotta friends. She always went somewhere, so I was a schoolgirl, which meant that I lived with them but I washed the dishes and babysat and weekends, cleaned the house. But this lady, because she had so many friends and went out a lot, she got me out of my shyness. You know, I think she took me under her wings and introduced me to her friends and I had to talk and make myself sociable. [Laughs] But I think, until then, I was quite timid and quite shy. But going out there opened me up. I give her credit for making me a more sociable person.

AI: Well, I wanted to ask you about the process of getting clearance and permission to leave the camp. And I was wondering if you, did you remember whether, having discussion with your parents about your hopes or your plans to get out, or talking to other students who were trying to get out of camp?

RI: Of course, you know, I don't really remember the process, but apparently I was very involved in it. And I think that my mother and father knew what was going on. But I think there was an organization in, in the camps that was helping students to apply to different schools and helping them process getting into schools. And I definitely think that I was intent on going to a college in Colorado. Now, I don't know whether it was University of Colorado or what, but my mother says that I received a letter from some official at this college saying no way would they ever take a Japanese who's a traitor or something like that. You know, I'm putting the words in myself, but it was some rejection that they wouldn't be caught dead accepting a Japanese student. So that was not acceptable. But I don't know why I applied to the University of Texas but apparently we were told which schools are willing to accept students and so University of Texas, not knowing anything much about the Japanese people, they were willing to take students and see whether they could help them.

So I think I might have been in, maybe not necessarily the first group, but maybe second or third group of students who went there. And so we were sort of on trial to see if we'd be okay, see whether we'd be traitors or how we would do. But I think all the students that they accepted were very anxious to continue their education so I think we did all right. And this Mrs. Moffitt, with whom I stayed, was anxious to help me know some of these students. So one, one time she, she encouraged me to invite everybody to their house to a sukiyaki dinner. And so, going to the grocery store, I think they had a Safeway there, but anyway, to buy the meat, well, at that time I didn't know what kind of meat I was supposed to buy and they certainly didn't have sukiyaki meat. But we had to buy some kind of meat. And at, all the time there was rationing going on for sugar and for gas. And then, of course there's no tofu, there's no takenoko, there's no shiitake, but somehow we got lot of vegetables and put together a sukiyaki dinner and we had a party of some of those students. But I don't remember a lot of them anymore.

AI: Well, so were people in Texas, were they curious about you? Asking a lot of questions about --

RI: Yeah, yeah they were. They were never, there was no prejudice. In fact, they were just curious. They asked me, "What are you? Are you Spanish? What race are you?" You know, they really wanted to know and they were not against Japanese. In fact, one time I was sitting in class and at the end of the class, one lady, one student in the back, she came to me and she said, "Wow, I really admire your black hair." Well, I guess they don't see many black-haired people, mostly brown or blond or whatever. She said, "Ooh, that black hair looks so nice," and she was really jealous of my black hair. [Laughs] But that's how unused to, they were to Asian people. I'm sure that there were some Asian people but University of Texas didn't have, well, many or any students, I don't know, until we went. But they were all very good to us and very helpful and I didn't encounter any prejudice.

DG: So is "we" from the Northwest or did, were there some other --

RI: No, they were from all over. They were from different camps.

DG: Oh.

RI: Well, of course, the camps had to be western United States but a lot of the students were from, originally from California. And the follow-up report that this registrar wrote, most, most of the graduates were professional people. They were chemists, or, or couple of MDs, one was a fishery graduate, I don't know. Anyway, they were all very proficient -- engineers.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.