<Begin Segment 15>

MN: Now, you saw your first geta at Poston.

RW: Yeah.

MN: What were the geta used for?

RW: Well, they're kind of elevated shoes. We used to wear to go take a shower, and then you could just wear it right into the shower and stay on it instead of walking on the floor barefoot. Although they did build some wooden platforms people could stand on. But when it rained and stuff like that, if you wore those then it would keep you above the mud on the ground.

MN: Did you make your own geta?

RW: My dad did, but that's the first time I ever got exposed to it 'cause we never wore 'em in Redlands. In fact, I guess it's one of those things that you wouldn't do in Redlands. You wouldn't be caught dead wearing getas in Redlands since there's no Japanese. If you're in an area where there's lots of Japanese it doesn't matter, but in Redlands, I didn't even like to go to the store with my mom because she would speak in Japanese and I was always embarrassed about that. Back to what she said, you're Japanese, you're Japanese, you're Japanese. So I used to be embarrassed just to be there with her, I'd usually try to pull her aside or quietly say something.

MN: So what is ironwood?

RW: Basically ironwood is petrified wood. It's just like a piece of iron, or it's more like hard tile, but it's wood. And we would go to the mountains east of Poston, and of course you couldn't carry too much back, but we'd pick up some, bring it back, and the older men wanted it. Some of 'em would mold, cut 'em up -- I don't know how they cut it, but they'd make stuff out of it.

MN: So you, you went out of camp and then you found these ironwoods and you'd just give it to the Isseis?

RW: Yeah. I mean, we didn't go every day or anything like that, but we'd, every once in a while, 'cause it was pretty far to those areas. It's like a big, big wide riverbed, and then you go to the mountains, then on top it becomes a plateau and up there is where all that ironwood was. It wasn't just all over, but there was quite a bit around there. And as we went over there, as you're climbing that mountain, I remember you could see layers of shale, so we'd go over there and dig around, and it was interesting 'cause we used to find clam shells in that side of the hill, so it was like a river at one time or must've been water, even from the ocean maybe. Then the water receded down from hundreds of years, thousands of years, but it was some petrified clam shells and so I'm thinking, hey, this must've been water here at one time. It was interesting, educational for us to do that, to go up there and look around, find things. I was talking to a couple girls from camp and now ladies, and they said, "Yeah, we used to go up there," so I guess a lot of people used to go. So there was quite a contrast between Poston and probably, like, Manzanar, which was still in California. I understand, even Heart Mountain had a fence and stuff, whereas we didn't. We had a two or three strand barbed wire. That's all. Was to, probably to keep the cows out that were roaming. We could just go out and go fishing and do anything.

MN: 'Course, you are in the middle of the desert too.

RW: Yeah, so where can you go? When I give speeches at schools, elementary and middle schools, that's one of the first questions they ask, is, "How come you didn't try to run away?" And so you just answer, "Well, there was no place to go, and my family's there and I'm not gonna run away from my family. If I run away and they catch me, then they're gonna just bring me back." I think the most logical answer, is there's no place to go. Where would you go? And besides that, if you wanted to go you just go to the administration office and get a permit to leave. You could go east anytime. Besides if you run away, you are breaking the law.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.