<Begin Segment 61>

AI: Well, so then you, you returned back after your vacation to Chicago, but I was wondering, when you, after having such a nice visit and vacation like that, if you hadn't started thinking about moving back to the West Coast.

PB: Oh, yes, I always, always had in mind that I would come back and sort of look after, look after my mother and dad. But it was hard to leave, because I was making a good living in Chicago. And I found out one thing in Chicago, if you adapt yourself and push yourself, you could become a head of anything. You could just keep advancing as long as you did a little extra and worked a little harder. And there was always work; you could always get a job in Chicago. But I hated it because it was so cold in winter and hot in summer and I'd think, "Oh, I can't stand another summer," because it felt like I could even fry egg on my bedstead. [Laughs] It was really, really hot. You just can't sleep at night because it stays hot all night, but then you figure, "Well, I got to go to work the next day." And the winters are so cold... I thought, when I first bought my fur coat, finally bought a fur coat -- a second-hand fur coat -- I thought, "Why in the world didn't I invest in a fur coat before?" Because that was the only thing that would keep you warm. And when you have to make transfers and you wait in-between, and you wait and wait and the streetcars go by and they're loaded and they won't pick you up. It's so frustrating, you think, "Will I ever get home?" and, "How am I gonna get on the streetcar when it's so crowded," and everybody makes a rush, and you know, you get pushed further and further behind and you can't get on. And oh, it's terrible. I hated Chicago, I just thought, "Oh, I just got to get out of here."

AI: So as far as living there, that was not your, it was really not ideal at all, but as far as your career and your work, it sounded like, would you, do you think that there was perhaps less prejudice against Japanese Americans in Chicago than in some of the West Coast areas?

PB: Well, the Japanese are known as ambitious people, and they're good workers and they're trustworthy, everybody knew that. And they work hard, and I know some of the people that we knew, they got very good positions in Chicago, which you never could do back in Seattle. We couldn't get a job like that. Whereas in Chicago, you could work, work yourself up to a point where there was just no limit. As long as you could do the work and show that you could be, you could do it, why, you just could get ahead that way. So it was a wonderful place to work, but the conditions were such that like where we're used to mild winters and we have the four seasons here, there's no comparison as far as living conditions.

AI: Right. Well, so then you did also take, as you said, several other vacations, and coming back out to the West Coast, and, for example, visiting Pat down in California. And in the meantime, I understand that your parents moved out to the White Center area.

PB: Yes, they, they lived out there for a while, and I thought that was ideal for them, because there were other Japanese there, and Dad had a few chickens, and he had, I think, one rabbit. They kept one rabbit and chickens for fresh eggs, and the rabbit, I think, was mostly for fertilizer. [Laughs] The rabbit produced the fertilizer and the chickens produced the eggs and they had fresh eggs and they had good neighbors, and they had a nice place to live. And I thought it was just ideal, but they eventually made this place on Fifty-fifth and Roxbury was their permanent home.

AI: I see.

<End Segment 61> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.