<Begin Segment 5>

MN: Did you attend Japanese language school?

JM: Right, every day we had to go after English school. We hated it.

MN: What was your Japanese school called?

JM: Senshin or something. I don't know. I don't remember.

MN: Did you have to learn the Kimigayo and bow to the Emperor's picture?

JM: No. I don't remember those things. I know when we went to Japan we had to do that 'cause they put us in school.

MN: Now you mentioned that you didn't like Japanese school. Why not?

JM: 'Cause you go to English school all day and to go to Japanese school, that's taking away our time to play baseball and all those sports activities.

MN: Wasn't that what Saturdays are for? What did you do on Saturdays?

JM: Saturday, Sunday we used to play.

[Interruption]

MN: What about Sunday churches, did you go to church?

JM: In the morning.

MN: Which church did you go to?

JM: Baptist, Baptist church.

MN: So your parents didn't have a problem with you going to a Baptist church and not a Buddhist church?

JM: No.

MN: So I'm gonna ask you about how your study habit changed during (junior high) school when this new family moved onto Terminal Island. Can you --

JM: Oh, the father was the principal of the Japanese school and the mother was a teacher, very strict. And the son is Simon Sato, that was in junior high school and there's always a rowdy bunch, so they'd kind of pick on him, so I told him to stop over at my house then I'll walk to school with him. So I started walking to school with him. He was straight A student. Then on the way back they're all waiting for me to play baseball and football, so I told Simon, "Come on, play with us." "No, I can't. I have to go home and study." "What do you want to study for? You're straight A student." Then I thought about it. He studies, that's why he's straight A. Then I started going to his house after school, and for the first time I got all As and Bs. I never got A before, B once in a while. That year, that was in 1941, February my (...) grandmother was ill. She was dying, so my dad took the whole family to Japan. Then they put us in school, so I was in the fourth grade. My aunt was teaching.

MN: Before we get to Japan, let me ask you a little bit more about your life on Terminal Island.

JM: Okay.

MN: Now, did your family, on Terminal Island, did they have a homemade ofuro?

JM: Yes.

MN: Did most Terminal Islanders have ofuro? [JM nods] Not showers.

JM: No.

MN: What was the hardest part about preparing the ofuro?

JM: We had to chop the wood, and I was only about ten, eleven, twelve. It's a lot of work chopping the wood. Then we'd put it in the burner, and that's the way we heat up the water.

MN: And then you sit on the slab of wood inside the ofuro?

JM: Uh-huh.

MN: Now, your father, as the male head of the family, did he go in first?

JM: Well a lot of times he's not home 'cause he's fishing, so it didn't really matter.

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