<Begin Segment 21>

TI: So let's go back to your life.

PY: Okay.

TI: Because after, you said after you worked as a fishermen, some of your friends decided to go back to school, so you also went back to school. So let's pick up the story there. So you went back to Waseda?

PY: Uh-huh.

TI: And what was Tokyo like after the war?

PY: Well, those days it was still hard to get enough food. I had a hard time, you know, from Hiroshima, summer vacation or winter vacation, I used to really like to go back to Atatashima so I can get enough food. And then when I, after that vacation is over, when I go back to Tokyo, what I had in a bag is nothing but food. Yeah.

TI: You said you had no books, just food. [Laughs] So finally you graduated from Waseda in about 1946? Or no, you went to, I'm sorry, you went to Waseda in '46 but then you graduate...

PY: Around '51, I guess.

TI: '51, that's right. And then I think you remember Ralph's invitation to go to Hawaii.

PY: Right, right, right.

TI: So tell me what you did after you graduated from Waseda.

PY: Oh, you know, even those days, they had so many restriction to go, to go America. Once they ask you whether you join the military or not, you have to bring some kind of certificate saying that you never joined the American, Japanese military, and then whether you participate in election or not. No, I didn't vote or anything. Those certificate you have to show them. Well, I didn't do all those things, I wasn't in the military, government. And the good thing was I was still holding the birth certificate of the Hawaii, birth certificate. So I brought that to the Yokohama consul general, American consul general, and they okayed me right away.

TI: So they recognized you as a U.S. citizen.

PY: Yeah, U.S. citizen, right.

TI: Because not only you had a birth certificate and you could show that you did not participate in the military or vote in their, in elections. And so they said because of that, you're still a U.S. citizen, and it would be easy for you to go back.

PY: Yes.

TI: Okay, so that's good. Versus your brothers, your older brothers, because they were conscripted into the Japanese military, they lost their U.S. citizenship? They became Japanese citizens?

PY: I guess so, I guess so. And by then, they were married to Japanese national, so I don't think so, they had intention to go back to, come back to Hawaii. I was young so I was still single yet.

TI: Okay, no, that's good information.

<End Segment 21> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.