Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: Kajiko Hashisaki
Narrator: Kajiko Hashisaki
Interviewers: Brian Hashisaki (primary); Tom Ikeda (secondary)
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: March 26, 2007
Densho ID: denshovh-hkajiko-01-0002

<Begin Segment 2>

BH: And you had a number of siblings, so do you think we could get the names of your brothers and sisters?

KH: My eldest sister was Hiroko, and my elder brother was Tsukasa, then I came in between. And then below me is Ishiko and Maiko, then Chikara. There were six children in the family.

BH: And you were all born in Seattle?

KH: In Seattle, uh-huh.

BH: You had mentioned that your first home was located in the "red light" district of Seattle.

KH: We were half a block from the red light district. We would look out the window and we could see cars stop or taxicabs dropping men off, and then every once in a while, we would see police cars. We didn't know what was going on, but pretty soon, all these women would be loaded into the police cars and taken away, and then they'll come back. Well, it turned out that they were being tested, given physical. And when we started recognizing what was going on, then my parents decided that they better move us out of the neighborhood.

BH: Do you recall that there were a blend of cultures in that red light district?

KH: There were what?

BH: A blend of cultures, more than just Japanese?

KH: There were some Japanese in the apartment unit that, there was one long building with several apartments, and we were upstairs, and there were other Japanese living in the apartment unit.

BH: What about African American...

KH: Not that I remember.

BH: Not that you remember?

KH: Uh-huh.

BH: And in that time, did you ever feel that you experienced any form of racism or prejudice towards the Japanese?

KH: No, I didn't notice anything. Nippon Kan Hall was close to us, it was just about kitty corner from the apartment.

BH: And can you tell me where that is?

KH: My mother used to go over there and take classes. I know she learned how to draft patterns for dresses and things like that. They had social activities for the women.

BH: So it was sort of a school.

KH: Uh-huh.

BH: And your family decided to move because it wasn't very safe. Did anything...

KH: Well, not only that, I think, because there really was no playground for us. We were upstairs, and we had no place to run around. So we moved to 421 Tenth Avenue, which is Jefferson and, Jefferson and near Broadway. And we had a yard, a street that we can play on, we used to play "Kick the Can" at night, do things with the neighbors across the street. There were quite a few Japanese in the neighborhood. I remember the Tada girls, and the Hirais, the Yokoyamas. The Yokoyamas were, they had two older daughters, one of 'em played the violin, and I eventually started taking violin lessons from the older one.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2007 Densho. All Rights Reserved.