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MA: And I'm curious if you, did you live in the same building as the laundry, or did you live in another place?

MT: There was a, it was like this, and we, the laundry's here, then there's other businesses here like that. There's storerooms, you know. But we took one of those storerooms and we could run from the back door and run around in the back so people don't see you running in the back. We took a bath at the laundry because we had a couple of bathtubs that... we kept one for ourselves and then one for the hakujins to take a bath. And then we'd run in the back to get into where we slept, and seven of us were in one, one room. [Laughs] I was in the crib, I still remember that, though. Isn't that amazing? I remember I was in the crib, and we had one, the piano my father bought for my sister to learn, but we just all lived in that one room. Isn't that amazing?

MA: Yeah.

MT: It really is. And I remember when my brother was being born, they called it... they have a name for it, huh, Kazue? Anyway, she gave me an orange and told me to go outside -- [laughs] -- and then he was born.

MA: That's funny. So you all lived in one, one room, but then you said you had your bath in the laundry?

MT: Uh-huh.

MA: And then you also had another bath for your, the laundry customers of yours?

MT: Uh-huh, right next to each other, uh-huh.

MA: I'm curious, how much did that cost for a bath?

MT: I don't think it was very much. I betcha it was thirty-five cents or something, but it wasn't very much.

MA: And was that common, to sort of have a public bath, or a bath for the public to use?

MT: Uh-huh, yeah. Because Maeda-san, Shimura-san was her name before she, her husband died, but they had a barber shop on Trent, and then behind they had baths for people to take baths in the back room, and then that's where I used to deliver laundry when I was, I'd pull the wagon and deliver laundry and then take the dirty ones back to my father's place.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2006 Densho. All Rights Reserved.