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AI: Well, now when you met up with some of these Nisei cadet nurses and got to know them a little bit, they must have asked you, "Well, where did you come from?" or "What camp were you in?" or so forth. What kind of conversation would you, would you have with them?

MK: I never ran into -- well, I never was very close with them because they were seniors and I was a probie. And they were seniors so I never was really that close. I remember I bought a second-hand book from one of the cadets, because it was a Japanese name. But...

AI: I was just wondering whether you were... ever had to kind of explain about what happened with you, your family being taken to Japan and --

MK: No, you know this is it; it's a place... none of my classmates knew my experience. They never asked. They were immature eighteen-, nineteen-, twenty-year-old kids right out of high school, most of 'em from farms -- this is the Midwest. And so they never asked. The same with the instructors, they're so proper. They're very professional. They don't get involved in personal (lives). I mean, like the way they do now. I think they're more caring. But I remember, not too many adults -- I remember they were actually almost snobs because they're the ones who taught me how to wear hose, girdles to save our backs as nurses, wear hats and gloves, which I never did, other... but I thought was a little, kind of a front. You know, it was not really more from their heart. So I went (along), just, that part of it, I was, it was anonymous. They didn't know anything about my background. They never asked. I wasn't gonna tell them. So, this is why, talking about all this is... the more I do, it just all kinda comes back. But...

AI: Well, in the meantime, as you're doing your studies there, you also had some social life, and as I understand, you met up with some people, some acquaintances and then started going on some social trips, or, was it... where was it that you went, where you finally met up with your future husband?

MK: Oh yes, uh-huh. Well --

AI: How did that happen?

MK: Because I was so lean in finances, the girls did go out to have coffee, but I couldn't even afford -- and then it was fashionable to have a cigarette. But I didn't have that kind of money because the allowance that I was supposed to get never came through. So consequently, I really hit the books, practically memorized the books. And, this I think is funny, but once a week, on Saturday, when I went to the mailbox, I would treat myself to a nickel Coke. What a music that (was), when my nickel Coke would come down the machine, clang, clang, clang, it was in the bottle then. That was my once-a-week treat. But other than that... and there were no colleges, there's no Japanese living in that area. And so, this is why, that age group was not in Rochester, Minnesota, because it was a medical (center). There were a couple of medical physicians in -- not physicians, but, what to you call it? Fellows, that were taking their specialty. They, they had the Japan experience as, in the occupation, so they invited me into their home. I went and made sukiyaki for them, or whatever. But other than that, even the locals, I didn't get that involved (...). So, it's really playing the game where it fit, I just had to kinda, oscillate. [Laughs]

<End Segment 45> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.