<Begin Segment 19>

TI: So tell me how you met your husband. How did you meet him?

KK: Oh, I didn't meet him first. Shiz happened to -- on the boat that she got on to come to Honolulu the first time, he was on the boat. And he didn't, she didn't know him and he didn't know her, but the families knew each other. So they had gotten word that this person would be on the boat, and, "I want you to keep each other company." Well, they both got seasick, so they met after the boat docked in Honolulu. So then he was invited to come to the wedding, because it was his, his brother, his brother's best friend was Tom. So they invited them to come to the wedding. Of course, they lived in Honolulu, so that would be a natural. There were no other guests to speak of. And Butch was supposed to come along with them to the wedding, but my brother-in-law was one of Tom's brother's best friend. He was invited to come to the wedding, but for some reason or other, he got stuck in his dental office finishing somebody's teeth, and so he was late getting to the wedding.

TI: So you're talking about Butch right now?

KK: No, Butch's brother (Charlie Isami).

TI: Butch's brother was late, okay.

KK: Yeah. So he was going to come late to the wedding, and my husband got mad and said he wasn't going to go if he was going to go that late. So he never showed up then. So I didn't meet him then. I met him when he came back, and he met us at the boat. I don't know what we did, but anyway...

TI: And so what was your husband's full name? You call him Butch, but what was his...

KK: Yoshio. Yoshio Herbert Kaneko.

TI: Okay, so he meets you at the boat on this next trip to Honolulu. And then what happened?

KK: Then, of course, at that time, you had to catch the boat to go to Hilo, we had to stay overnight. So that night, we all had dinner together, I think. I think we did, I don't know. But anyway... so then after a while, then, I don't know, somehow or other he... I don't know how it started, but we started corresponding.

TI: Because he was in Honolulu, you were in Hilo.

KK: Hilo, yeah. So anyway, it flowered from then.

TI: And so when did the two of you get married?

KK: '40, 1940. I think 1940, July 1940.

TI: And after you got married, where did you live?

KK: Oh, we first, we first had to stay a little bit with Butch's mother in Honolulu. I don't know why, something about this house being built in Pearl City on the peninsula. And when it got done, we moved out to that house in Pearl City. It was a cute little bungalow, it's nothing fancy.

TI: And when you were in Honolulu, were you able to get a job?

KK: Yeah. I think the first year, I worked for the YWCA. I was advisor to some of the, high school group of girls, some kind of a club, I don't remember what. But there, we ran into... well, I don't know, it had nothing to do with that.

TI: Okay.

<End Segment 19> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.