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TI: And so let's go back to the school. So you talked about earlier, on Terminal Island it was essentially all Japanese except for one, one family you mentioned. Now you're in San Pedro. Describe the school there. How was it different?

MT: When I first went to San Pedro I was in second, I was going into the second grade. When I was in second grade, I could read, I could write, I could, and from my sister I picked up a little arithmetic 'cause I would see what she was doing and she would tell me what she's doing. I would pick it up and so I was able to do that. And then I was, went to school and I was, first assignment we got was a book report. No problem; I could read the book, I could understand it. So -- it's an oral report -- I got up and gave my book report. Nobody understood me 'cause I was talking in Terminal Island English, or their pidgin. What I thought was English, but it was really basically Terminal Island, lot of words mixed in there that was really not Japanese, not English, and so nobody understood me besides my bad accent. And so they decided to put me back to first grade again. I was flunked all the way from second grade to first grade. I was crushed, of course. I'd never been flunked before. In fact, I was a good student; I moved, I missed B1, right? So, but like anything else, when you're seven years old you learn quickly, and within a year I was there. And then by the time I hit the fourth grade I had made up for the one year I was behind.

TI: This goes back to what the principal told your mother and why he, he recommended getting off the island, was that the language would, would be...

MT: Yeah, because of the language, inability to really speak English. The kids would not use it as a conversational language. They could all do the, they could read, they can write, they can do math, arithmetic. All those things they excelled in. The kids worked hard, studied hard, did well. Conversation was a difficult part of it. They had an accent. And to this day, you listen to some of the Terminal Island people, they all have accents. I mean, the people that grew up there. Some people worse than others. One of the things that happened in camp, I think, was a, was the kids, when they went to junior high school, you have to get off the island to go to junior high school, to the seventh grade. They took a ferry boat and most, most did not spend the two and a half cents, five cents round trip or something, to go to, on the bus to junior high school. They walked there. Quite a few blocks, but they would walk there, saved the pennies. And that's the first time they had to start speaking in nothing but English in class, and so, but when... and then lot of them, Niseis, older Niseis became fishermen, so they continued on what they were, but what happened is we all, during the war they had to go to camp. Now they had to speak English. So their English improved because of that, except for a few guys. There's some guys that just, like Charlie Hamasaki still talks as if he's in Terminal Island.

TI: But when, going back to, so when the Terminal Islanders went to junior high school, was it, and then like the people from your elementary school, so at junior high school they would all kind of come together. Was there a big difference between, say, the English abilities between Terminal Islanders and, say, the people who went to your school?

MT: Absolutely, absolutely.

TI: And how did the people from --

MT: To show you the differences, when, now I learned English, I speak it properly with a proper accent, everything else, I would go back to Terminal Island because my aunt and uncle's there, and then I would go with my friends to play. They wouldn't say anything; we would play. The older guys would hear me talking, say, "Ah, city slicker." There was a definite difference in the way you spoke.

TI: So when you, like, self identify, when people ask, as a kid where did you grow up, do you say Terminal Island or do you say San Pedro?

MT: Well, I always tell, I said originally was in Terminal, I was raised in Terminal Island 'til I was seven. I always say that, and then I moved to San Pedro and learned to speak English. [Laughs]

TI: The Terminal Islanders, when they hear you say, so, "No, you don't speak like a Terminal Islander," they can figure it out. [Laughs]

MT: Yeah, right. Right. Well, that's why I have to explain. And you know, I thought that a lot of people wouldn't recognize me being a, Terminal Islanders wouldn't recognize me 'cause I only stayed there seven years, although I used to go constantly 'til the war started 'cause of my aunt, uncle. I used to go in some time. His ship is coming in, I would watch his, I mean, his boat coming in, I would watch. It'd be loaded with fish coming in. Things like that. 'Cause what they would do is radio in to the cannery that they have so many tons of fish, of certain, whatever fish they had, they were coming in, so then the cannery would be ready when they docked. And if there's, if it was a big catch, everybody had a lot a fish, then they'd be lined up waiting to unload the fishes.

TI: Good.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2010 Densho. All Rights Reserved.