<Begin Segment 17>

MN: Do you remember what month and year you left for Tule Lake?

YK: It was either August or September of 1943.

MN: Now, the day you have to go, this August date you had to leave for Tule Lake, how early did you have to get up?

YK: Oh, yeah. Well, we had to get up very early. I guess they didn't want us seen by the other people, so we had to go very early to the mess hall and have an early breakfast before everybody else. And then after we were all there, then we got on the bus and we left before everybody else got up.

MN: Was it a big group that went?

YK: Big what?

MN: Was it a big group that went to Tule Lake that day?

YK: Yeah, I guess so. But, well, from our block, we didn't fill up the whole bus, so we stopped in a couple other mess halls 'til we were full and then we drove off to Parker.

MN: So it was just one bus?

YK: Well, no, there were a lot of other buses, too. Because when we got to Parker, all the buses were there, and we filled up the train. Well, I don't know if we filled up the train, but anyway, a trainload.

MN: Do you have any idea, so how many people were on that, in that group that went to Tule Lake from Poston that day?

YK: No, I have no idea. I do know that eventually Tule Lake had eighteen thousand people who were from all the other nine camps.

MN: Do you have any recollection of what your last meal at Poston was?

YK: No. You know, breakfast is usually mush.

MN: So you got on the bus, and then you got to Parker. And then once you got to Parker, what did you do?

YK: Well, of course, the buses stopped right next to the train, and so we were all ordered onto the train again.

MN: Did the train go directly to Tule Lake or did it stop somewhere else?

YK: No, it went directly to Tule Lake, but it was a long, long ways to go.

MN: Do you, was it a one-day trip, or did you spend the night on the train?

YK: Oh, we definitely spent the night on the train.

MN: And was it the same, you slept sitting up in your seats?

YK: Yeah, it was the same thing, they were the bench seats.

<End Segment 17> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.