<Begin Segment 13>

TI: So they took your father away, and so you didn't see him for a while so what happened to your father?

YI: My father is a kind of a worrier, see, and I'm pretty sure that he had some problem with his stomach. He had early signs of ulcer because he used to drink. And so in the -- I'm going to change the subject -- but I was able to get his record, his internment record, copy of the internment record, you know, you can write to whatever and they send me a whole stack of 'em. And one of the thing was that he was taken the immigration station which is a... and first night or the second night, he hemorrhaged and that was on account of his ulcer. And for some reason, the investigator has a lot of imagination, there was a wire clothes hanger that was given for him to hang the clothes, there was blood on it so they thought that using the clothes hanger, he was going to commit suicide. But there were, after inspection, there were no outward wounds, he was I guess discharging blood and then he threw up some blood or something. So they rushed him to Tripler, the army hospital, so that's where the record got confused. We keep calling and they didn't know where he was, you know, I guess, the interrogators and the medical didn't get together so it took about two, three weeks I think before they finally told us that he's now at the Farrington High School. They built a emergency medical facility in the parking lot of Farrington High School and he was there. That was the first time we were able to go visit him. That was about almost three weeks after he was picked up.

TI: So he was recuperating after the --

YI: Yeah, he, I guess so, you know, the diet didn't fit him, I think, you know. He didn't say much, he didn't say much, he just asked how we were doing. And then I guess they finally diagnosed that he had bleeding ulcer. They called us, you know, because I was in school, my sister took the call and they wanted to perform surgery, you know. I think my sister went to see the plantation doctor, he was a good doctor, he said, no, ulcer can be fixed without surgery and the army surgeon probably wants to practice so don't let him do it. [Laughs] So I guess it kind of settled, you know, with diet and medication and then he was transferred to the internment camp in Honouliuli. So that must have been about a couple of months after he got.

TI: So sort of summer, summer time 1944, so he got there May and June, July, August.

YI: I guess by June I think he was at the internment camp.

TI: So at this point you're at the University of Hawaii still?

YI: I was finished, I finished my first year and so I decided to go look for job, you know, no skill and I applied, you know, for defense job or some kind of helper. And they said, "No, we cannot hire you because your father is what you call 'enemy alien.' But just about that time they drafted my kid brother, you know, he was eighteen, you know, nineteen, you know, and then the... and he was sent to, what you call, in Wisconsin.

TI: Oh, so at Camp Shelby?

YI: I think so, yeah, or around there someplace, you know.

TI: For the MIS or for --

YI: Yeah, MIS.

TI: Okay, so probably Camp Shelby.

YI: So I went back and said, "You guys decide now, right? My father is in an internment camp, you guys drafted my brother, how do I stand?" And that's when they gave me a job and it just happened that facility is no longer there, it's in Barbers Point today, well, it should be the Barbers Point Naval Station. Barbers Point was not a naval station in 1941, since then it was developed. And then I was given a job as electrician helper or refrigeration help. So we used to service the installations on the leeward side, and one of the installation we serviced was the internment camp, so I used to go in there once a week.

TI: Yeah, so when they assigned that job to you, did they know that your father was there?

YI: Yeah, because that was why they declined my --

TI: Yeah, but then they declined and then they gave you job that would put you in contact with your father. Did they know that?

YI: My dad, they would give him family visitation rights anyway.

TI: Oh, he did have family.

YI: Yeah, visitation rights. But I guess once a month or something like that.

TI: Yeah, but still it seems a little odd that they would give you a job that would get you inside the camp as a worker at your father's camp.

YI: That's why I say, that's the way our Intelligence works, right? [Laughs]

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.