<Begin Segment 12>

MN: And then you said the train stopped at Parker, Arizona.

YK: Right.

MN: And then once you got to Parker, what did you have to do?

YK: Well, we all had to get out, of course, and then there were a whole bunch of buses there, the army buses. And then everybody had to put their bags up on the roof. Then we went, it must have been at least an hour drive though just sagebrush country, nothing else but sagebrush, fairly level. And then we finally reached Poston where there were the guards and the barbed wire fence, and they waved us in. And when we, as we were passing by the various barracks, there were rows and rows of barracks that were roughly about a hundred feet long and about twenty feet wide, one story, black tarpaper sides and roof. And then when we (passed by kids) waving at us, our convoy, and of course because it was morning and they were lined up for the mess hall. So the adults just kind of waved and acknowledged that we were joining their ranks. And then, of course, once the buses stopped, then everybody scrambled to get their suitcases, 'cause that's the only possession they had other than what they had in their pockets.

MN: Did the bus go to Poston I, II or III?

YK: It was Poston I and we were in Block 43. And we were, I think, Barracks 12, and in the far corner of the block, there were about fourteen barracks in each block, twelve or fourteen. The mess hall was at the far other end, and then there were the toilets and the laundry room and other things in the middle of the block. And the barracks were elevated about three feet, and so you had to take steps up into it. Inside, there was no insulation at all, there was no ceiling, and there was just one lightbulb hanging down in the middle. We had two rooms, they were actually one room, the equivalent of two. So there were eight of us? No, at that time there were ten of us, I guess. So we were in this room with just army beds, metal ones. And we had to go to the middle of the block where there was a big pile of straw and fill in our mattresses, we had to do that, and we had to fill them in very carefully 'cause you wanted to sleep comfortably, so it couldn't be lumpy. And we were issued blankets and sheets and things like that. There was no furniture, and we learned later that the only way you can get furniture is to go where the people would, there was extra lumber from building the barracks, and there was always spare, mainly scraps, and we had to get those to then make our own benches and closets and some divisions. 'Cause at first we had to just get rope and put sheets or blankets on it to provide some division for the females of the family for some privacy at night. And then, of course, the outhouse was way in the middle of the block, so most of the men, I assume, males, would just go to the corner of the barracks and pee. Also, we had a, what do you call it, a toilet pad with a metal cover on it.

MN: Chamba?

YK: What?

MN: Did you call it a chamba?

YK: No, I forgot what we called it. Anyway, it was a chamber pot. And so the females could, instead of walking half a block to the toilet could go there at night. Of course, it was metal, so when they put the cover on, it was a big clank, but everybody pretended not to notice.

MN: Now you mentioned that there was no furniture, so you had to make it, but where did you get the tools to make the furniture?

YK: Well, there was a little canteen, a little store where you could buy some, a few things. But we were used to ordering out of the Sears & Roebuck catalog, so of course we ordered tools and then they came by the post office. So we had hammers and pliers and so forth. And we had the scrap lumber and nails and other things to hang up clothes.

MN: Now what do you remember of the food at Poston?

YK: Well, the food, of course, wasn't very good, because we had to eat in one common mess hall where there were long wooden tables and benches. And the cooks were volunteers. In fact, my oldest brother Tadao was one of the cooks. And they had to cook the food in huge vats. So one thing that used to bother me was the mush in the morning, because you scoop it out, it's so gooey. [Laughs] And the milk was all, what do you call it? Powdered milk, so it didn't taste very good. Sugar was in low supply. And then the meats were mainly mutton, and so not too tasty, so they used a lot of curry and ketchup to try to change the taste. But, so it wasn't very good food, but we survived.

MN: What is mush?

YK: Mush is oatmeal, actually.

MN: So that's what they served you.

YK: Yeah.

MN: Was there any rice or shoyu?

YK: Well, yeah, for lunch and dinner, it was always rice and shoyu.

MN: And when you first entered Poston, who did you eat with?

YK: Well, of course the family at first ate together, but after a while, you ate with friends. Because the three meals a day were at certain times of the day, people were at different places. And the mess halls, it was all common seating, so you didn't really save a place.

MN: So once you settled into camp, did you sneak out of camp?

YK: Oh, well, yes. After a while, the security was pretty lax, and so you could go beyond the barbed wire. People were calmly going out, really wasn't much, anywhere to go to. But we did make, later on, the trip all the way to the Colorado River, that was very brown and wide, so we couldn't walk across. And people were starting to build fish ponds, because there was a creek nearby where you could go fishing. And people were growing watermelons and things. And then they set up some dirt baseball diamonds, so we had a peewee baseball team.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.