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TI: So, Kay, why don't we pick it up again where you were talking about how your older sister Hana and your mother were really, you know, putting things together, taking charge, but then you talked about some of your neighbors, your friends, who helped out and they were storing things. So do you remember any of the names of the people?

KK: No, I'm afraid, I can look them up, but I, my memory on names, even, I have a hard time right now, but they were not neighbors. These were friends that we had that lived out of, outside of our community. And one, the young man was learning Japanese and he spoke Japanese, so he liked to come to the house and talk to my mother and father, you know, in Japanese, and he had an eye out for Hana, I think. [Laughs] But he was a friend of my brother Buddy, I think. Anyway, his family, I remember, his family and another family took a lot of our things and kept them for us.

TI: Which was really helpful, too, because you, I mean, to have someone just watch your things during the war.

KK: Right, right. And we didn't have a whole lot of things. We were a poor family, so we didn't have a lot, but my sister had brought back kimonos and had brought back things from Japan, and so she had brought these three chests back. And so my friends took those chests, and so they put things in the chests that, like the kimonos and things, my grandfather's uniform and things like that. We had a picture of him, and his hat was on the table and it had a big feather on it, and I remember seeing that hat, but then I think they had to destroy the hat, because they couldn't store it. But everything else, his spurs, all his medals, those things I still have.

TI: So I'm curious, when I do interviews with other families, oftentimes those kind of things were destroyed because, you know, families wanted to kind of erase any connection, especially to anything Japanese military.

KK: Right.

TI: Do you recall your family ever thinking that way? Was there anything destroyed?

KK: Yeah, there were things destroyed, but that was kept, and his picture, I think, was destroyed, because I couldn't find it and I didn't know where it, where it is.

TI: Now, besides friends storing things, do you remember any other acts of kindness that happened during this time period, from some of your white friends?

KK: Yes. Some of our friends came by and, you know, they tried to help us. But then there's one thing that was not helpful was that our neighbor had moved and another neighbor had moved in. And they were nice enough, but they weren't as close as the first neighbors, we were really close to them. But the neighbors that moved came over and they took a few of my things. In fact, he had made me a cradle for my doll, and he took that back, and after the war I got it back. But that family was really good to us. The family that moved in, they were okay, but they weren't real close to us. Then, behind them, there was a rental house, and there was a family there and there was a girl that was a little younger than I was, and we would play together. Well, when I decided I wanted, what I was going to take with me to camp, I had a box with drawers in it and had doll clothes in it, and I had this little celluloid doll, arms moved, that these clothes belonged to and all, and so I wanted to take that to camp. She brought it over, and she said she wanted it. And I said, "No, I'm going to take that to camp with me." "Oh, no you're not." She put it down and she stepped on it and broke the doll. My heart just went "Uh," you know. That was a really sad time. So then I took another larger doll with me, and, but I really had wanted that other one. It would have been easier to take around. But it was one of those sad things that happened.

TI: So let's, so eventually you have to leave. So describe that, going to Santa Anita.

KK: The other thing I want to tell you about, before we leave the house, is that people would just come and take things off our porch. "You won't need this." And not pay for it or anything, they just take it. And one of the things my mother said for me to watch is to make sure nobody takes the vacuum cleaner, because we have to clean the house before we leave. But they would come and they would take, take chairs and couch, and my mother had this real nice thing where she had a planter like thing, and it was very "Japanesey," and somebody just took that, came up and they realized that that was a real nice thing and they just took it, table and all.

TI: And when that happened, what did you think? Or were there any comments in the family when things like that happened? What would you guys say?

KK: We were mad, but we couldn't say anything, we couldn't do anything, you know. "Well, there goes another thing," and that left an awful feeling inside. And then some people came and they wanted to buy things, they'd buy 'em for one dollar, two dollar, three dollars. And we were renting this house, so nobody, we had to empty it.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.