<Begin Segment 29>

TI: So you get married to Sam, 1951, you had both renounced your citizenship. So how did you decide that you wanted to go back to the United States?

SY: Well, I found out that even though I renounced, I didn't lose my citizenship because I was underage. So my U.S. citizen was intact, and my husband's was, you know, he renounced it, so it was, he didn't have any American citizen then.

TI: Okay, so you were still a U.S. citizen but your husband was not.

SY: Yes. So he was working to get the citizenship back, and eventually he got it back.

TI: And how did he get it back? What process did he go through?

SY: He was writing to Collins.

TI: Wayne Collins?

SY: Wayne Collins.

TI: Okay.

SY: I don't know whether he got it from him or not, but he was writing to different people. I don't know who he was writing to.

BT: About how long did it take him to get it back, do you recall?

SY: Oh, about a year, I think.

BT: Oh, so it was relatively quick.

SY: Oh, you think so? I think, I'm not really sure on that.

BT: About, do you recall about what year? Was it in the mid-50s?

SY: I think so. Towards the end of the '50s, somewhere around there.

BT: So why did he want his, to get his citizenship back? Were you planning to return to the U.S.?

SY: Yes, he wanted to come back, yes.

BT: Why?

SY: Well, we got married and we had three children, and in... what was it? '80... no, it was in '79, I think, he had a stroke. And he had a citizenship then, and he was working for this American company, I-tech was the name. And he got a stroke, I think, around May, April or May. And he couldn't do any work after that. So the boss told him he could either retire in Japan or, "retire after you go back to the States." So he thought it's better for him because his brother was here, he wanted to come to Sacramento because his brother and his two sisters were here, and he had a sister in Chicago, and he had two brothers, one in L.A. and one in San Jose. So he wanted to come to Sacramento. So that's why I came with him. The whole family came.

TI: So this is about 1979, 1980?

SY: 1979, I think, he decided.

BT: And so to clarify, even though your husband got his citizenship back sometime in the 1950s, he worked in Japan and you lived in Japan until, all those years, right?

SY: Yes. And he was looking for a house. We were looking for a house to buy, you know, in Japan. But we found a place, and he went to the bank, Yokohama Bank in Japan to see if he could borrow the money to acquire that place. And as soon as the bank found out that he was U.S. citizen, they thought they will never get their money back because if he goes to the States, how would they get the money back? I guess they were worried about that, if we skipped. And that's why they wouldn't loan us the money.

TI: Interesting. So if they had loaned you the money, then you would have bought the house and perhaps stayed in Japan.

SY: Uh-huh.

TI: So it was a bank...

SY: Yeah, the bank.

TI: ...that really forced you in some ways to maybe think about coming to the United States. So you were Japan -- I'm doing the quick math -- close to thirty...

SY: Five?

TI: ...little more than thirty years, so it was a long time.

SY: That's why during my stay in Japan, my husband was coming to the States every year. The company would have a conference or something somewhere in America, in Hawaii or Florida or San Diego, every year it's different. And people from I-tech company, the boss was a Caucasian. And he would bring his, you know, workers to the conference, and their wives were invited, too. So my husband, naturally, he was a field manager, so he got to come every year, and I came with him. And we visited our, my brother was in Union City, his family was back here, my sister was in San Jose. So I got to see them all. Here I was thinking like a Japanese, all this time in Japan. And I couldn't get along with my nieces or my brothers or my sister. The way they think and I think were completely different. I was Japanese, and I spoke Japanese. So I thought I could never live here in America, you know. And every year I was coming, visiting here, and my brothers in Chicago, too, I would visit them, and I would meet their children. I really couldn't think like they were thinking. I thought I could never live out here.

TI: So it was a big adjustment for you to move.

SY: It was really a big adjustment. And it was a bigger adjustment for my, for our children, you know, because they spoke nothing but Japanese. They graduated high school in Japan. So they really had to adjust.

<End Segment 29> - Copyright © 2009 Densho. All Rights Reserved.