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TI: So now I just want to get a sense of growing up, what your childhood was like, you know, in the neighborhood and the type of activities in the neighborhood. So let's start with school. Like what school would you go to?

AO: Well, our grade school was named Pohukaina School and it was located maybe about seven, eight blocks from where we lived. So we would all walk to school naturally in those days, you know, very few people had any cars or anything. We all walked to school.

TI: And describe your classmates, were they mostly Japanese or different races?

AO: They could've been mostly Japanese but it still were mixed, we had some Hawaiians, we had Filipinos, we had some Chinese but I think the bulk of the students were mostly Japanese.

TI: And how did all the races get along with each other?

AO: No problem, we never gave it a second thought as to why we were different or what.

TI: And then how about Japanese language school?

AO: We all... there was a language school up to ninth grade maybe about a block and a half away from our grade school so that is one Japanese school. There was another about five blocks away so the students from our grade school either went to the school that I went to which was only about a block, block and a half away which was called Kishida Japanese School and they had classes up to the ninth grade. And there was another school there that they called it Alapai Japanese School which was five, six blocks away and there were some students that went to that Japanese school.

TI: And was this the type of Japanese school that you would go like every day after --

AO: Every day for one hour after English school, yes.

TI: And so describe, so after your English school, what would you do, would you go directly to the Japanese school, would you have a little break?

AO: We went directly to the Japanese school, we walked.

TI: And then when you're done with Japanese school, what would you do?

AO: By then, of course, it would be getting pretty dark and we would go home and some of us would maybe stop by along the way and play some kind of sports, whether it was mostly baseball at that time. But it's not organized, it wasn't organized and then of course we all went home.

TI: And then you'd go home probably to have dinner, is that --

AO: Yes.

TI: And then after dinner what would you do?

AO: Well, I think mostly we'd just spent the time with the family. After all, in our case, I mean, there were nine kids there, we needed a pretty large house but... nobody had any special room, I think we all slept in a more or less a common room with... those days there were no such things as beds so we all had futons laid on the floor. I don't know, of course there was no TV, I don't know, we did studying of course and I think that's about it.

TI: How about would you take like a daily bath?

AO: Oh, yes, definitely.

TI: And with so many, what was kind of the order in terms of how people took their baths?

AO: Well, I don't know if there was... but for one thing it was the type of bath where we burnt wood underneath the so-called bathtub and it... well, you can't call it community, it's a family bath so I think... but the thing is my father always worked until late so he never got to take a bath early. In fact, we very seldom got to see my dad even for dinner because he worked until so late. Of course, the fish business is the same today, even in those days, we never got to see my dad going to work, he left so early. And he came back after we probably were mostly sleeping so as far as the order of who went to take a bath first, I don't know, I think it could've been that the eldest went first, I don't know, the younger kids went later.

<End Segment 5> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.