<Begin Segment 7>

MN: Do you remember what you were doing on Sunday, December 7, 1941?

JI: Well, I remember in West Covina, I was on the farm in West Covina, and that was on the street there, right on the sidewalk there, I heard the news over the radio. And I was all by myself there. And I kept wondering if I should be involved. Then I decided to join the army, turned the farm over to a neighbor, then was inducted in Minnesota.

MN: Not yet. Right after Pearl Harbor you tried to join the army. That first time, did they take you?

JI: No.

MN: Now, that first time, they did not take you into the army.

JI: Yeah. I was involved in, with the evacuation.

MN: In 1942, the spring, the Terminal Island people were kicked off the Terminal Island. Did anybody move into your neighborhood?

JI: Did any what?

MN: Did any of the Terminal Island people move into your neighborhood?

JI: No.

MN: When you had to leave for camp, what did you do with your farm?

JI: I turned it over to my neighbor, a hakujin neighbor, and asked him to take care of it. And then he would keep all the profits.

MN: And there was a Chinese man, Louie On?

JI: Also I had the, my Chinese insurance man do the paperwork on it. 'Cause he didn't do any work. My neighbor did the work.

MN: The hakujin man did the work?

JI: Yeah.

MN: And then Louie On did the paperwork.

JI: Well, I guess he did. I'm told afterwards he didn't pay anything, hardly. So I had to pay the debts when I got back.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.