<Begin Segment 25>

MN: And then you mentioned during your furlough when you were in Korea you were able to visit Japan?

AI: Yes.

MN: What was it like to visit your mother's house?

AI: That was when I went... when I knew when I was get a furlough so I prepare earlier, and being a peon army we have no money, small pay so earlier I start buying things, box of chocolate, a bar of soap and accumulating, get ready to go Japan. So by the time I was ready to go I had two duffle bags full of gift accumulated. And they're all hundred pound each both bags had to carry that. Going to the airport was fine, jeep will take us I didn't have to carry anything. And then I get on the plane and went to Fukuoka that's where we land, and from there I had to take a train. Now this time on train but it was close enough and jeep took us to the station so when I went to reach Hiroshima I got off at the Kure rather than Hiroshima station. Kure is just on opposite side. From there I'm all by myself, there's no army truck, transportation or nothing. And by the time I got home I had a big hole in both duffle bags. And when I went there, even K-ration they enjoyed it, I mean, they were so hungry from everything. They really had nothing even you had money there's nothing to buy. So when I gave the gift to Mother, then she starts dividing to everybody. She said now I have to give it to all the relatives so started dividing everything in small pieces here and there. And she spread to everybody, even bar of soap, they didn't have soap so that was really something, really surprised.

MN: Did your family lose anybody in the atomic bombing?

AI: Yes, my uncle. That one particular day he was repairing a roof and up in a roof facing where the bomb was dropped. And when the explosion he got flash burned so his whole front was burned but with the explosion he got blown off of the roof so fortunately just the front burned, back wasn't burned. But unfortunate part is everybody got burned, they all got infections afterwards so that took him a few months before he died but finally he died. The infection got so bad and I saw him, his scar, it's ugly scar, you never see it even the burn that atomic burn is something else.

MN: And what did the city of Hiroshima look like?

AI: Flat, nothing. Only building left was the Fukuya department which was concrete steel and concrete built. Then knocked down it was there. Sumitomo bank was standing, all the windows was blown out. So any concrete steel building was there but rest of the buildings all flat.

MN: You're in the U.S. army and you were seeing this. How did you feel when you saw this?

AI: You can't even describe the feelings. Wow, that was I think my only word.

MN: Sadness, anger?

AI: Well, sadness yes, anger no. I mean, it was so bad that you can't even get angry.

MN: Was Etajima affected at all?

AI: No, they were far enough.

MN: Now while you were in Japan visiting you also got married. How did this come about?

AI: Well, I knew her, this was my mother's things that she arranged it. And I knew her from... she was born in Pasadena. And they lost chance coming back to U.S. before the war because father died, mother die and just two girls and nobody here that they can depend so she got kind of stuck there. That was Mother's things that she said, "I got somebody here, I want you to get married," and sort of things that we kind of met each other then I ask her, "You want to get married?" She said yes so it was kind of simple.

MN: So after you got married and you returned to the United States to be honorably discharged, did your wife accompany you?

AI: No.

MN: Why not?

AI: Because I couldn't bring her with me at the time, the short time, I have no time to register marriage to the army. Unless we're legally married, we had a Japanese ceremony, but not for the U.S. And plus, if I register to marry I have to extend my stay in Korea which I didn't want to stay any longer than necessary. So we figured I would talk to them and say, "I'm going to go back and as soon as you get your passport, come soon as you can." So that was the arrangement we made.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.