<Begin Segment 25>

MN: So who, what members of your family were at Santa Anita when you got there?

CH: Oh, my brothers and sister. My sister's husband was Issei, Shizukazu. He got released, too. He came, too. That's why everybody was there, the whole family. My brother, he was in army already.

MN: Tamikazu.

CH: Yeah, yeah.

MN: So when was he drafted?

CH: 1941, April, I think, around there someplace. April or May, around there someplace.

MN: And what was he doing at this time?

CH: They gave him a fake gun and march. Fake gun, wooden gun and march, this and that way. Then Presidio of Monterey, I mean, San Francisco, Presidio, they organized these intelligence score. Then they moved to Fort McCoy. Camp McCoy. That was the first Italian school. And then that filled up, so they had to move to Fort Snelling. That's where he was teaching over there, Fort Snelling. Of course, he was bilingual, graduated from Japan school. There wasn't too much... he was a Kibei.

TI: I'm sorry, was he an instructor or a student?

CH: Teaching, instructor. I think he was instructor. That's why he stayed there a long time. He didn't go overseas. Then he went to someplace else. McCoy to Snelling to Fort Hood, I think. I don't know what he was doing in Fort Hood. I think they got, all the Kibei got, ganged together. All different camp, and stuck 'em in Fort Hood. Oh, no sense, they're all right, that's why Snelling. So when he was supposed to go to Philippine, I went to see him from Chicago. He said, "I'm going overseas, Philippines." But somehow, I don't know, something happened, that's why he stayed there. He didn't go. I went to see him. "Niisan, goodbye. I hope you come back alive," I told him.

MN: What did you do at Santa Anita?

CH: That's where I met my first girlfriend. Oh boy, oh boy. Santa Anita, there were a lot of dance. Dance, and you meet all different kind of people. Then lot of guys were working, too, you know, so, yeah, maybe I should get a job. What should I get? What's the best-paying job? Eight dollar. I think eight dollar a month. It was eight or ten, around there someplace. Fixing the camouflage net. You know, camouflage net? Nah, that's too, they come back dirty. How about work in the kitchen? That was something like eight dollar, kitchen. But when I was looking for a job, I thought, "Nah, why should I work?" Then the relocation time came up before I got a job. But I met a lot of guys, people that I used to know from before the war. Yeah, there were a few... there was maybe twenty family, maybe, of Terminal Island people there. But most of them, remember, went Manzanar, you know. Yeah, twenty families. See, we couldn't go Manzanar because the district my uncle, it was downtown, see, they all went to Arkansas. Four went to Manzanar. We ended up in Rohwer, Arkansas. Three days, three nights, the train. Took that long. Went all through Texas, Texas took one day. The train's not moving fast enough. It's slow, slow train.

MN: So, but Santa Anita, you were there for how many months before you went to Rohwer?

CH: Santa Anita, was August. September... maybe month and a half maybe. Not too long.

MN: And by then your father had also joined you, is that correct?

CH: Yeah, we went to, we had a... father and mother and everybody, the whole family went together.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.