<Begin Segment 9>

MA: So after high school, you went to Pacific Sewing School?

MH: After I finished high school, I took, I went to Pacific Sewing School. And I also went to Japanese school, language school, too, during the summer.

MA: How many years did you do that?

MH: At first, I went to, when I lived in the other area, the first area, there was a Japanese school in the neighborhood, and there were a lotta Japanese families. They were several blocks apart, but there was a good community of Japanese. We all went to Japanese school in those days. The parents, after regular school, we all went to this one building. It was a house, it was a home, a two-story home. And they had hired a teacher from Japan, a lady teacher, very strict. And if what she did now, people would be suing everybody. 'Cause you wouldn't dare strike anybody with a stick you know, with a ruler, saying, "You behave now." Whack. "Come here." Whack there. But anyway she was very strict and, but very good. And I went two years. I went two years and then when we had to move from where I was to this other home on Avalon, then there was no school in that area, so I had to quit. But then I went to Saturday school. I was old enough to take the bus. Not the bus, we called streetcars in those day. And I would go Saturday from nine to three.

MA: This was Japanese school, but on Saturday?

MH: Downtown in Japanese town, they had a big one there. So I went there on Saturday. And then, but you know if you don't use it, you forget it.

MA: Did you speak at home with your parents?

MH: I did. I spoke at home, while the parents were around. But after they passed on, well, I, it was mostly English. Of course my husband is fluent in Japanese, because he was raised, and so is my brother, and so we did speak a lot at home. But after the kids grew up, after we had families, then English was much stronger. So, of course my parents were gone, too, by that time. And, but, when my two boys were growing up, my mother and his father was still living, so they spoke nothing but Japanese. So, they spoke fluent Japanese, but once they got into school, they don't speak it and they forgot. And then the parents are gone, so there's not much in... now my son here, he's not picking it up, because he has a lot of the people, that do shop, that come in there, are a lotta people from Japan that don't speak English very well either. Even though they're American, married to a Caucasian people, but basically they do like to speak their Japanese language. So he's picking it up again. So a little bit, but not fluently.

MA: But when you were growing up, it was all Japanese in your home?

MH: It was Japanese there, for quite a while. At home, you spoke Japanese, and when you were outside you spoke English.

MA: How was your parents' English?

MH: They were very limited, uh-huh. Not, their expression was "Whasamatteryou?" What was it... "I don't understand." Just things like that. And they learned to know the different vegetables like carrots and onions and potatoes, that we taught 'em that, when they were to go to buy something, what you need. "You gotta know what you're gonna get, you better learn to say apples or oranges or the veggies' names." So I taught them that to say whenever they need to get, you know, stores. But when we had our own grocery store, they picked it up eventually, anyway, so it wasn't too bad. But they couldn't carry on a conversation like everybody else. That's why we are, we are brought up as American citizens and we, we speak English, and this is it. Our second language is Japanese. But when they were alive, we had to learn both. So whenever you had a problem, most of us were grown up by that time, so we can help translate. If they have to go to doctor for instance, and you have to take 'em with 'em, because they don't know medical terms as well.

MA: So you did a lot of translating when you were younger.

MH: More or less, we kind of did the best way we can to make 'em understand. So, to this day, I'm kinda glad that I do know enough Japanese that I can help some of these newer group of Japanese that come in that don't speak any, hardly any English, like medical terms. I can help them. I know what liver is and kidney is and what heart and pancreas, and that sort of terms I could tell them. But I couldn't tell them in full details, but what medication is good, what they tell them. You know, "This is for heart," or "This is for blood pressure." I can help them a little bit on that, too. So I have a, I feel a little, I feel that I can do that much to help somebody, have an advantage to that part. So I have this visiting nurses association comes once a month at our Tamai Tower. At first, there were a lot of Issei people living here when I first came here in... twenty-five, twenty-six years ago, and they didn't speak any English either. So whenever the nurse wanted to ask question, I could always help them. So now that, after, they're gone, there's not many people here, except the newer groups. There's maybe two or three people that don't speak fluent English yet. So I can help them for that, too. But not as much as before.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.