<Begin Segment 15>

MN: Now, when you stepped off that bus into Manzanar what was your first impression of Manzanar?

AM: Well, for one thing, it was a dry heat, so it, and the air was pretty clear, so I thought, wow, this is not too bad. I thought, but then after we got there and we settled into our barracks and then the wind started to blow and then all that dust, I thought, oh my gosh, we have to put up with all this dust. But we thought, "Well, but at least we're all together," so that was the only way we could think, that we were together.

MN: So when you arrived at Manzanar what was some of the first things you had to do?

AM: Well, we were put into our barracks and there was nothing there, just the cot where we slept. And then, well, there was no chairs or anything, so only thing we, I could think of was, "I got to start making some things," so I would go to the kitchen area where lettuce crate was being thrown out and we used to pick up those lettuce crates and take it apart and then try to make something with that. So we made little stools from it and little shelves. Eventually I was able to find some bigger lumber left over from making the barracks and I started making a kitchen area for my mother so she could do little cooking because she had a little electric stove, or electric, what is it, the hotplates and things. And, well, of course during the junior high years I used to take woodshop because I liked to make things out of wood, so I had a little knowledge about making things out of lumber.

MN: Now, is this because you took a class with Mr. Sasaki?

AM: Oh, that's right. After we went into Manzanar there was a class that he had of carpentry, so I signed up for that because I liked to do woodwork, and so he was teaching how to make, teaching us how to make things out of lumbers and things like that, so that of kind kept me very interested, doing things at, in Manzanar.

MN: Do you still have the saw that you bought through Mr. Sasaki?

AM: I did have it for a long time, but gee, I don't know what happened to it. It's really pretty worn out by now. Yeah, I still have one of the saws.

MN: So you said you were making things out of wood and you came up with this idea of making screens with drywall and wood.

AM: Oh, yeah.

MN: Can you share with us where did you get this idea and what did other people think about this?

AM: Well, the thing about, the reason I thought of those things is because I lived in Japan and I saw how shoji was made, so I got the idea from time I lived in Japan. So when you open the door to go into the barrack you could see right through, see everything, so there's no privacy, so I made a screen so when the, when somebody opens the door all you see is screen from the outside, so that's the reason why I did that. And people in our block liked the idea so much that they asked me to make it for them, too, so I made some for people. And then I made some tables for some people. That was, I don't know, somehow I got these scrap lumbers and was able to put things together. But then I, when Mr. Sasaki had the class teaching us these carpentry, I was able to purchase some tools from, by mail orders and things, so some of those tools I still have.

MN: So most of this lumber, were you borrowing them from the government?

AM: Well that's what we called, we said, we're just borrowing it for the time being. So I never had any guilty conscience because I was going to use it and then leave it there when we leave. [Laughs]

MN: What was the food like in the mess halls?

AM: Well anyway, we would walk around and find out some of the things that each mess hall was making. Some mess halls the cook was a little more, well, they were more clever maybe, so whenever we heard of some mess hall that had this certain food we would get in line at our mess hall, eat a little bit and then take off right away and go to this other mess hall where we could still line up and get in line with them, so in case they run out of the thing we still had something in our stomach so we weren't, we wouldn't starve. But they always tried to keep us to stay in our own block to eat, but as the cook changed we watched what kind of cook was the new cook and a lot of times it was a different cook, so it was good. They, they would have different technique in cooking and it was kind of refreshing to have different cooks make things. Same things maybe, but we somehow got used to it. Well, Block 20 had, generally had a pretty good cook, so that was, we were very lucky that way.

MN: Did you eat with your family or with your friends?

AM: We ate, we ate with our friends mostly. It got that way because, well, when we'd get in line and things... well, I don't know, it's easier that way. So that way maybe the camp life kind of put our family out secondary almost, except at nighttime after we'd eat, finish eating, we would be home again. But other than that, well, we got to make, we got to be able to make friends with people in our block. Yeah.

MN: Now earlier you mentioned Ralph Lazo.

AM: Yeah.

MN: And you got to know Ralph Lazo once you started school, is that, is that right? School at Manzanar?

AM: Yeah. Yeah, I remember him when he was on the train. We told him, "Hey, the train's gonna leave. You better get off because you're gonna go into camp." Says, "What are you talkin' about? I'm gonna go with you guys." [Laughs] He stayed on the train and went with us to Manzanar, so he lived in Block 19, I lived on Block 20. It was the next block, where he lived. So he was really kind of life of the party because I guess he had so many friends while he was going to school in Belmont High School, so that's where a lot of the Japanese went anyway.

MN: So what did you think about this Mexican American kid coming into camp with you guys?

AM: I don't know, we felt like he was part of us, you know? We accepted him because he was, well, he never thought himself as some foreigner with us. He felt like he fit right in, so naturally we accepted him that way. So he was, he used to be kind of a life of the party almost.

MN: Now, I understand he lived in the bachelor quarters. Was he pretty popular with the older bachelors?

AM: [Laughs] Yeah, well he was nice to them. I think they liked him because he was very thoughtful and he would do things for them that the older people wouldn't try to do. He would do a lot of things for them in a convenient way, I guess.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.