<Begin Segment 6>
TI: Tell me a little bit about the house and how that worked.
TM: Well, this is quite a long story too. Initially the house was quite small and as the family got larger, it was a need to get a larger home. So my father built a two-story frame house and surprisingly the lumber came all the way from Honolulu, from Halekulani Hotel. The reason was because Halekulani Hotel remodeled their hotel and had excess lumber. So the lumber was bought from Halekulani Hotel and then the frame home was built. And this was, oh, I would say, about 1930 or so, after I was born.
TI: Okay, and so how big was the house? How many rooms did it have?
TM: Well, the house was rather large. It was a two-story house. On the first floor you had a large living room and (...) adjoining it was a large kitchen. And then you had a closet space there too, and a stairway leading to the second story and then we had three bedrooms on the top. So as far as I can say, it was quite huge.
TI: Okay, good, and then in terms of your sleeping arrangement, did you share a room with your brothers or how did that work?
TM: Yes, what happened was that the living room was large enough so, with the tatami goza,you could make it into a huge bedroom. So the beds could be folded and put into the closet, and so initially the whole family slept on the first floor, and during the war more so because of the uncertainty and the fear and whatnot. So the third... three bedrooms on the top, as I recall, were used by all the boys, all the girls slept downstairs.
TI: So was that just during the war or was that all the time?
TM: No, before the war, it started already.
TI: And so the five boys slept in the three rooms upstairs?
TM: Yes.
TI: Okay. And so how did that work? Did you share a room with one of your brothers?
TM: Well, one room was not used. It was sort of a business office for my father so my brother and I, that is David, second oldest, slept in one room and Hideo in another room.
TI: Okay.
<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.