<Begin Segment 29>

MN: Now before we get into your Berkeley years, I wanted to ask you about your brother Tadao and Skip in Japan, and your sister Yo. They renounced their U.S. citizenship. Did they have to get the help of attorney Wayne Collins to regain it?

YK: Oh, yeah. Wayne Collins was the one who helped all the renunciants. He couldn't get a blanket renunciation change back to citizenship, he had to do each individual that he had to represent. So he did an enormous job over many years. And so my two brothers in Japan and my sister did get their citizenship back.

MN: Do you know if they, Tadao and Skip, when they were in Japan, if they were visited by Tex Nakamura to give an affidavit?

YK: I don't know. It's very possible, 'cause I know Tets Nakamura did work with Wayne Collins. Either he or someone else probably did go there, because they had to fill out the form and sign it and so forth, and Tets was a lawyer.

MN: How early were they able to regain their U.S. citizenship?

YK: I don't really know. I think it was probably about 1947 or '8.

MN: Did Tadao and Skip return to the U.S. after they regained their U.S. citizenship?

YK: Not immediately, but they did come back later.

MN: How about your father?

YK: No, he never came back. He only lasted seven years in Japan and he passed away. So it was pretty sad for him.

MN: Was your mother able to see him again?

YK: Well, she would do kambyou whenever we got sick, and she would go there, and she was there at the end with Tadao (...).

MN: Why didn't your father want to return to the U.S.?

YK: I don't know. I guess he was, whether it was bitterness or whether he was no longer -- he never was a citizen, I guess -- so I guess at that time it was hard for him to come back.

MN: Did you ever see your father after the war?

YK: Oh, no, because he died.

MN: Now, '49, you were still in high school, but that was a big year for your family.

YK: Oh, yes, uh-huh. Yeah, my various brothers and sisters were engaged and they wanted to get married, but my mother said, "No, you have got to go in order of age." So they were waiting for my brother and Tadao in Japan to get married first, and so in 1949 he did get married. So then that spring my brother Takashi got married and then Hide in the summer, and then my sister Yo in the fall. So we had four marriages in 1949. The nursery had opened up in '48, I think it was.

MN: Now, I want to ask you a little bit about your mother. You mentioned that she became associated with the Seicho no Ie? How did she become a member?

YK: Well, I don't know if she was so much a member, but she would always have the literature, and she would subscribe to the various magazines, Japanese magazines, too, 'cause she could only read Japanese. And she would always pray religiously every night.

MN: Now, are they strict vegetarians?

YK: No. So Seicho no Ie was mostly a way of living, kind of thing.

MN: I know we have a church in Gardena, Seicho no Ie. And you also mentioned your mother used to listen to Radio Little Tokyo with Matao Uwate?

YK: Oh, yes.

MN: Were you aware that Matao Uwate was at Tule Lake?

YK: No, I didn't know.

MN: So he never talked about that on the radio?

YK: Well, I never really listened to him on the radio. [Laughs] My Japanese was limited, so I didn't really focus on what he was saying.

<End Segment 29> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.