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TI: Okay, and so in terms of hobbies and things you liked to do with your friends, what, what were those things?

PJH: It was around the house, playing in the mud, making mud pies, playing Indians, just doing things very simply with what we had. There weren't the, a lot of toys. I didn't know, I didn't even have a bicycle, so we were just running around, climbing trees. But as I was growing up, of course the school experience really traumatized me and I think my mom knew that it really dashed my self confidence and my self esteem that she said she wanted to have me have more poise and confidence, so "Why don't you go to dance class?" So I went to, I took dance classes from age five to age fourteen, tap, ballet, acrobatics. So it was, my mom really revolved her life around that part of my recreation, making costumes and everything, taking me to...

TI: And during performances, what kind of roles did you play during dance performances?

PJH: You know, line dance with all the little, other little kids in the same costume. I was usually the, the littlest, and I just remember my first picture taking of being in a line of like maybe fourteen kids and the photographer always getting mad at me and telling me -- I had a parasol and it kept on going... and he said, "Get that thing up." And he would do that, like, half a dozen times and I just remember him being so irritated with me and, again, I was like... "I can't do anything right."

TI: But during this time did you start getting, did you enjoy performing?

PJH: I did, yeah. My, I remember my dance teacher thinking that I was fairly gifted in dancing, and she would put me in the front and other kids would have to follow me. Like I said, I can kind of still feel a sense of, it's like two different people, outside school and inside school, 'cause the dancing is like, here I'm, not on a pedestal, but like all of a sudden I can just be myself or find a potential of just having creativity come out of my body. I didn't feel that at all in school, so I did feel like I had two different lives.

TI: And what was it about school that you felt so, I guess, limited or constrained? What was it... what was it?

PJH: I think a combination of, again, being not accepted but also my parents are, I remember my parents always talking about manners, but in talking about manners they would say, "Never brag, don't bring attention to yourself, don't rock the boat," so of course I became the quiet, silent Asian in class, formulating my own opinions and sharing was, I think I was all, kind of shy still, even though my body was like very confident.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.