<Begin Segment 17>

TI: And during all these years, did your mother ever express regrets for coming to the United States?

MT: She never, never did. She, she, I admire her for that. That she, I mean, for her to pick up potatoes and in the snow and rain and, gosh, it must have been... coming from up high to the lowest you can possibly get, is just unbelievable. I mean, but she never complained. We, the tough as things were... she kept on going and going and kept us all together and so...

TI: Picture... she looks so peaceful there.

MT: [Ed. note: narrator holds up a photograph] Yeah, she, but she's, well, she was well-liked by everybody because of the fact that I think she raised us that way, to follow the Japanese tradition, culture, education and hold our head up high and nothing that we felt hazukashii. Sure, we ate a lot of rice and a lot of turnip greens and during the depression days and meat and... were very scarce, but she kept us all together and I just think the world of her that way, that she held us all together all that time. So...

TK: Do you have any stories about your mother and, just what kind of personality she was? How she treated you? Do you remember any stories about her?

MT: Not particularly. See, she, she was very, made sure that, even after Dad died that we'd go to Japanese school. She thought that was so important. Well, I guess, in some ways they thought well, they may go back to Japan. But like I said, that whole early intentions were somehow down the drain. But she felt that as we grew up, if they were gone and we went back to Hiroshima, that she wanted to make sure that we knew where to go, so she'd make us practice that we were... let's see, we were born in Hiroshima-ken, Kusatsu, Takata. Tsubota sentaro ko. She thought that's all we could learn, at least if we knew that much we could find our relatives. So over and over and over she taught us that, besides our Japanese school, and I really, really appreciate that she, well, she made sure that we went. In other words, she, as much as we went to American school we, all the hakujin kids got to play, we had to go to Japanese school. We called it "tip school" in those days. I don't know how "tip school" ever started but, to this day I still can't understand why they called it "tip school." We all called it Nihongo gakko. But I think, in Seattle I hear, Nihongo gakko they say they all went to "tip school." So, but, Mother, Mother was very strong that way, was to teach us her Japanese culture. But she was very fair and honest and, with all of her friends and Caucasian people that might be friendly to us. So, I admire her that way.

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 2003 Densho. All Rights Reserved.