<Begin Segment 6>

[Ed. note: This transcript has been edited by the narrator]

TL: When were you -- when did your mother come to Japan to bring you back to the United States?

MK: 1938.

TL: 1938? And why did she come at that point?

MK: Because my mother believed that I should -- after having received a fundamental education in Japan, I should come to this country, get a higher education, and make a living (...) in this country.

TL: Did you have any regrets at leaving at that point?

MK: No regrets because (I knew that the U.S. is) my permanent residence. But I'll tell you one thing (...): the impact of the Japanese education was distinct. After I returned from Japan and continued my education in this country, (after studying at an American) high school (I continued my study at a) Japanese school and (read Japanese literature. My Japanese teacher at that time, Mrs. Sano, was a very intelligent woman. She perceived my distraught state of mind and attempted to exert a calming influence on me.) And so every day after I have finished lesson I (went) out, closed the door, and (bowed) without her knowing it, because I respected that woman. (The Japanese are a highly civilized people. They do not come out and say, "I respect you." They internalize their feelings.) (...)

TL: This teacher that you just described, was she like -- was she your last teacher at the school you studied at in Japan?

MK: No. This teacher was in San Francisco. (In Japantown. I don't know what happened to her. But I'm sure that she continued to help others.)

TL: And you studied with her when you came back to San Francisco?

MK: That's right (...). Okay. (Now) let me tell you another teacher whom I studied in Japan. She was a woman, too. And when I first went to Japan -- you know, chronologically, it's getting a bit mixed up, but let me say this -- Japanese required homework during summer vacation. And I couldn't hack that. And so this teacher asked her brother, who was a college student, to come and help me. So he helped me. But after that (...), he said, "Please teach me how to pronounce English words." So I spent about another hour pronouncing English words. Now then, after I have completed my Japanese education, and my mother and I were about to go back to the United States, I went to see this teacher, bowed, and told her, "Thank you very much." You know what she did? She grabbed me, put me beside of the hallway, and then she start crying. She said, "My brother just died in China." (And she continued, "In the last letter I received, he said that the greatest joy I had in my life was to learn how to pronounce English vocabularies from you." It was soon thereafter that it dawned on me that there were Japanese who were against the war, a feeling that they could not express publicly.)

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.