<Begin Segment 34>

HK: And as for Tule Lake pilgrimage, in 1974, towards the end of the year, I was invited by a student group from UC Berkeley to, to make a presentation about my experience at Tule Lake. And that was the time when I first came out with the fact that I had opposed the registration, that I was a "no-no" and so forth. And then soon after, they had a community program, I think, and I repeated the same message, and came out with the whole story about the camp. And to that point, I don't think anyone ever publicly said anything about the camps. And then in 1975, they had a pilgrimage, so naturally they had to have me go, and I came as a guest with Toshio Mori, and they, they specially drove us, both of us, to the pilgrimage. So Toshio spoke, and then I came to that pilgrimage, and it was mainly college students from State and UC Berkeley. And there were a few Nisei, and Edison Uno was a prime mover of that pilgrimage. So he was there, and he was going to publicize it and so forth. And in those days, people brought their own bedrolls, and they slept on the floor in the fairgrounds, building. And we were, we came in, early in the morning, I think. We started out at night, and then we got there fairly early in the morning, so everyone went to sleep. And I was, I had been writing my poem on the bus, coming, so that partly it was half-written, and I wanted to finish it, so as everyone slept, I was sitting writing the poem. And by nine o'clock, when the program began, I had a draft, second draft, I guess, so that I could read. And so I read the poem then, that was the first time that I read the poem, and I changed it a bit, but not very much, from the original. And so that --

AI: Excuse me, so that was your poem Meeting at Tule Lake?

HK: Yes, it was, uh-huh. And it was directed to the students, so that it seems kind of odd that I'm talking to the students, but that was the, the makeup of the group at that time. These activist students brought us out, and they were there. And so that was the second pilgrimage, in 1975. And then I've been to several after that, once when we were staying at a motel, and then couple of times here. This is the second time. And I don't know if I've missed one before this one, I think. No, no, I came to the one before, but I missed the one before that. So I've been to about three or four pilgrimages.

<End Segment 34> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.