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TI: So in terms of playmates, when you were growing up, who did you play with?

FS: At that time was my, my brother was still alive, so we were playing. He always liked to be a catcher, so I was throwing the ball to him and we were catching, playing catch at that time.

TI: Okay. How about outside of the family? Besides your brother, did you have any neighbors or anything like that that you remember playing with?

FS: No, not that I could remember. No.

TI: So let's talk about sort of community things. Do you recall ever, like Japanese community events, like a picnic or church activities, anything like that where you would get together with other, other families?

FS: Only thing I can remember is my sister used to go to Japanese school, and I was, when I start getting to be around, I guess around seven -- six, seven years old, something around there. Grammar, kindergarten, eighth grade, eight year old... anyway, from there, my mother, my mother used to know how to drive the old style Ford, Ford with the three pedal, three pedal car.

TI: So you would have a gas, brake and clutch?

FS: Clutch, brake and, yes. Yeah. She knew how to drive that, so she used to take us to school and she would pick us up after we finished. Not, not at the, not at the grammar school, but after we finished the grammar school up in grammar school, we used to come to the, somebody's, they're having a, it's a... vegetables. Vegetables, going through vegetable, then we go, one family that we always come, wait over there for my mother to pick us up. And she used to drive us, drive us back, back to the 90. That was a different, different city altogether. That was in Yolo. This was in Yolo, they call it Yolo County, but it was, it's the west side of Sacramento.

TI: Okay, so I'll make sure I understand this. So your, so after school you would be waiting at this place and your mother would come and pick you up in this, in this truck?

FS: Yeah, just before, before then we had to go to Japanese school.

TI: I see. Okay.

FS: I didn't know how much, but I remember, we went.

TI: Now, in a previous conversation you talked about you actually driving at a young age also.

FS: Well yeah, in, I must've been about, about seven to eight years old, and then my, my boss -- my dad was a foreman of the orchard, so the boss, his name was Elliot, and then we called him -- Jinx was his name -- and we used to call him Niisan. And he was six feet six, and then he would put me on the car with him and then we went on the levee road. From the levee road we had to go to go to his, go to the orchard, anyway, so when you get on the levee road he would tell me, "You steer the car." And it's kind of scary because it's, both side is like you make a mistake and, one side is river and one side the orchard. It was kind of scary for me in the beginning, but he would, I'd pick it up and adjust it right away, so that's, that's the only way I learned how to make the car go straight.

TI: So while you were driving, where was, where was Elliot? Was he, like, sitting right next to you watching?

FS: Oh yeah, he was sitting next to me. Yeah.

TI: And were your legs long enough to actually put the clutch in?

FS: No, he was, he was the one that's touching the brakes and gas and all that.

TI: I see. Were, were you sitting on his lap then, on his, kind of... or, or between his legs, kind of right...

FS: I might've been sitting on top of his, yeah, on top of his leg.

TI: Yeah, because you were pretty young, so you probably needed, just to be able to see over the...

FS: Yeah. Oh yeah, he was really tall, so no problem, I think.

TI: And so it sounds like people liked having you around, or at least Elliot liked having you around.

FS: I think that's what, we liked to have him around, too, because he used to take us, he, he used make his own boats and then there's a river right there, so, you know, let's go boat riding. Nothing to it.

TI: And so this is on the Sacramento River?

FS: It would be, off of the Sacramento River, actually. There's a, we call it a slough, but the, there was a breaker for the Sacramento River and to there's a breaker, and if it overflows the water will come in to the, it's sort of like a channel, so that's where a lot of water was. It was always there in wintertime, too.

TI: Okay, so you'd go out with boats with him and do things.

FS: Yeah. We could've gone fishing, too, so it didn't matter.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.