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TI: So describe that. How... do you know how that was arranged in terms of the family joining your father at Crystal City?

SI: If you're... well, first of all, the camps that we were detained in were Department of Justice camps. I think the government wanted the families to finally get together at the end. They kept us apart for roughly two years, but they decided that, families to get together. So they established a family reunion camp down in Texas, and that was the one at Crystal City. I don't know what the reasoning behind all that is other than to, probably, for humanitarian purposes, I suppose, see that the families get together.

TI: Okay. Well, I'm really interested in Crystal City. So let's, let's go there. And can you describe, I guess, first meeting your father? How, describe that first meeting.

SI: All right. Crystal City is located about 120 miles from San Antonio, near the Mexican border. The camp was located just the outside of the city. But as you go through the gates of the camp, we were, of course, transported by train all the way from Idaho to San Antonio. And then from there, we boarded a bus to be taken down to camp. Once we got into camp, we went to the guard gates and we went to an assembly hall where all the people unboarded and brought all their stuff inside this hall. Of course, my curiosity was to see where Dad might be, you know, because I hadn't seen him for over two years. And I looked around, and finally I spotted him outside looking in from the window. He's very easy to spot because he's bald and he's got glasses. So anyway, that was the first time I saw him since he left us in Seattle.

TI: And how did he look? Did he look pretty much the same?

SI: As I could remember him, yeah, he hadn't changed all that much. He looked the same to me.

TI: And what were you thinking or feeling when you saw your dad after two years?

SI: Well, I was happy to see him. I think for my younger brothers and sisters, they didn't know who he was, 'cause they hadn't really known him all that much. Like my younger kids, younger brothers, they were only about two or three years old, and they don't remember him. So it took a while for them to get used to having him around.

TI: And so your father was there for some time before you showed up?

SI: I think he wasn't there too long, maybe about two or three days prior to the time that we'd gone into camp. He was moved from Santa Fe, New Mexico, to Crystal City.

TI: So describe your accommodations.

SI: Our unit happened to be a quaduplex. So we occupied two rooms of the quaduplex in the Q Section of the camp. "Q" stands for "quaduplex," I suppose. Anyway --

TI: So when you say, it was like a quad? Like four units?

SI: Yeah, yeah. So "Q" stands for quad. But anyway, there were several different types of residences in that camp. There were one-unit, one-room units, there were duplexes, triplexes, quaduplexes, victory huts, there were about five or six different types of housing. Is there something else you want to know about the housing?

TI: Well, how was... describe your unit. As much as you can, how many rooms, how large were the rooms?

SI: I would say maybe about fifteen by thirty for each room, and we had two rooms. And it was connected by an opening in the wall. They had just torn down some, a section in the wall, so that the two rooms were connected.

TI: And how about things like a kitchen? Did they have a kitchen or was there communal eating, what was that like?

SI: Yes, we had our own stoves and our iceboxes. Each family was able to cook their own meals in camp, as contrasted to the relocation centers, where you had a communal situation where everybody had to go to the same mess hall or they had a camp, the block cooks cook food for everybody. We were able to make our own meals.

TI: And where would you get the food to cook?

SI: They had a market where everybody would go shop for their food items. And every morning, the mothers generally or the dads would pull their carts along with them to go to the market to buy their food.

TI: And how would they pay for this food?

SI: Well, the government issued a certain number of money to each family. And these were generally tokens, or they were government-issued coins, anyway, that each family received. And that was for the whole month, which they would use to buy their items.

TI: And so besides food, what else would these tokens be good for?

SI: Well, if you want to go and buy some clothing or go to take care of your hair, you know, barber shop, have your shoes repaired. There's other little stores that they had.

TI: So this was a pretty big change for you. When you were at Minidoka, it was like this mess hall kind of food, and then now, Crystal City, you would, it would be more, I guess, normal, in terms of you shopped for food, you bring it back, and then your mother would cook it.

SI: Yes. I think that definitely, it was an improvement over what we had in Minidoka. We felt more as though it was a normal kind of life rather than the type of life that we had in Minidoka where people were all fed together and had to, well, ask others to do things for you.

TI: So tell me a little bit about your father. Did, now that he was living with you again, did you notice any changes in him, or was he pretty much the same?

SI: I don't think I really noticed any big change in him. When he was in Crystal City, he was a schoolteacher. Each adult was assigned some kind of a job in Crystal City. And so my father, having taught before, was assigned a job as a schoolteacher. And so he taught, I believe it was third grade. But this was Japanese language school.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.