<Begin Segment 16>

MA: And that first day, what was that like? That first day in Amache?

IN: I can't recollect. All I thought about, remember now, I was a teenager, a young teenager. And I guess a lot of my attraction, you know, to the social part of life, and to the opposite sex, was getting there. So to me, I was excited because I realized that for the first time, our social life was going to be a little more important. Being on the ranch, we didn't have a social life. You were pretty much isolated. So, you know, there was a little bit excitement, because I had heard that the group from Santa Anita, some of them were being sent there, as we called them, "city slickers." So, you know, it was interesting to see their city ways, whereas we were really, as you say, quote "country hicks."

MA: And these were people from Los Angeles, right?

IN: Right.

MA: Came from Santa Anita.

IN: That's right.

MA: I'm just curious what was different about them, or what made them sort of city people. Was it their clothes?

IN: Oh, a million ways. Once I attended school, I realized the difference. The women knew how to put on makeup. Their hair, they would put it in one of those nets. They knew how to do the, what do you call it in those days, the dance... I forget what you call it. But they knew how to do the recent dance, (the jitterbug). And they chewed gum a lot, which our family was not allowed too much. But, I mean, they knew the ways, I thought they had a lot of confidence, whereas the rural girls were really backward, almost like they were just off the boat from Japan. But the girls and the boys, and the boys were zootsuiters. They had pants that were tucked at the ankles, and their hair was you called pachuco, you know, where it would be long here and then overlapping in the back. So they were really cool. That's what I thought.

MA: Yeah, that's interesting.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2008 Densho. All Rights Reserved.