<Begin Segment 22>

[Ed. note: This transcript has been edited by the narrator]

TI: Which brings up kind of a good segue, because when you were growing up, after school, a lot of Japanese American students had to attend Japanese school.

SA: That's right.

TI: Was that something that you also had to do?

SA: Well, I didn't have to go because Ms. Mahon told my mother that she thought that I should devote my time to going to an English school and forget the Japanese (and) let me rest. (Up to the third grade, I had upper respiratory problems). And so I never went back.

TI: Oh, so Ms. Mahon said, so it was enough just to go to regular school and then after school you should rest.

SA: For me, not the rest (of my family).

TI: But your older sister and brother...

SA: (Yes), they went all the way through, (first through high school).

TI: Now, how did that make you feel? I mean, how did you feel --

SA: Oh, I was gleeful. I didn't want to go.

TI: So what did you do after school, then?

SA: Oh, I played. We had roller skates, (...) that's one thing we had. We didn't have bicycles. Maybe some others did, but we had roller skates, so we went up and down the streets. In fact, we went in one hotel, this (friend of mine), Haruko and I, we were talking about that the other day. We used to roller skate in the (hotel) halls and her father would get so mad. But if it rained, and it rains a lot (in Seattle), but we had our fun.

TI: And so you never felt resentful that you didn't have to go to Japanese school?

SA: No, I never resented anything of that sort. There was always things to do.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.