Densho Digital Archive - Art Ishida Interview (denshovh-iart

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MN: Now what year did the rest of your family return to Hiroshima?

AI: 1935.

MN: Was your father planning to permanently stay in Hiroshima then?

AI: Well, actually he wasn't ready to come home then but he got the bleeding ulcer and he went to doctor and the doctor says you have to operate immediately or else. So father asked, "What's the chance of the surgery?" He says, "Fifty-fifty, you may live, you may die." So he says, well, in that case if it don't, you're going to die. He says, then he said that he wanted to go back to Japan and see his parents before he dies so that's when he returned. But when he returned, his ulcer got cured right away because there's no more pressure of the farming or he's relaxed so the ulcer got cured.

MN: But your father got hospitalized anyway, what happened?

AI: Well, after his ulcer got cured he went to a hot spring in Beppu Kyushu Island to recuperate. There he caught the cold and turned out pneumonia and he end up in the hospital and never came out of the hospital.

MN: While he was hospitalized how did he spend his time?

AI: He was actually hospital in Hiroshima hospital for probably about six months. Then they decided... meantime when he was in the hospital he designed his own house and had his brother-in-law, my mother's younger brother was a carpenter, had him build a house. When the house was completed they brought him back to the house, a new home. And he stayed upstairs, this is a two story house, he stayed upstairs until he die.

MN: Where was this new house built?

AI: His hometown Kirikushi.

MN: Those who may not know what Etajima is famous for, can you tell us a little bit?

AI: Etajima is known to most people by there was a naval academy school was there. That's why when I say Etajima lot of people say, oh, yeah, where the naval academy is.

MN: Now your family, their village, was it connected with naval academy?

AI: No, naval academy was in the middle of the island, we were outer edge of the island, our village. There's ten villages altogether in that island and Kirikushi is one of the ten in that island.

MN: So before your family returned to Hiroshima you were living with your uncle near Hiroshima city.

AI: In Hiroshima city.

MN: And that was for five years? And during those five years did you visit your mother's side in Etajima?

AI: Yes, we used to go summer vacation but I didn't stay at my grandparents' home. We stayed at our uncle's home, there's another younger brother, my father's younger brother, we stayed at their home because they have a same age kid as we are but we didn't care for that family so now we go to our cousin's home to sleep.

MN: When did your father actually pass away?

AI: 1936.

MN: How did you feel about losing your father at such a young age?

AI: You know, like I said when I left father when I was eight years old, when he came back, we lived together a couple of months, then he was in a hospital so I really don't know father to speak of. So I really didn't have any feelings to tell the truth.

MN: Now when your father built this new home in Kirikushi Etajima did you also have to start a new school?

AI: Yes, we moved back into the new home so we started going to the school in Kirikushi.

MN: Was it hard to make new friends?

AI: No, it wasn't because we used to go there every summer for summer vacation, so a lot of children our age is in the school too so it wasn't that problem of changing school, class.