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TI: And before we talk about how they met, can you tell me a little bit about your father's family? Like what did they do in Japan?

ES: I know very little about my father's family. However, we did go visit the community when we visited Japan. I visited Japan in 1969, first time I visited Japan, and I, at that time I took a group of JACL members on a tour of Japan, not knowing Japan myself. But I decided I could get a group from Portland together and we went to Tokyo, went all the way down to Kyushu and back. I think it was a two week tour, but when we got to Japan then I asked, I think it was the Fuji Travel Bureau, I took, got that group of people to help us through all of Japan on the tour, and we did very well. We, surprisingly, we got to Hiroshima and there was a man that I had met in camp, in internment camp here in America, who had been repatriated to Japan on this repatriation program the government had. He was on that first ship.

TI: So he must've been surprised to see you.

ES: Very. Yes, it was very unusual. I can't even remember his name now.

TI: Now did he have, I'm curious about that meeting with this man, but what did you guys talk about?

ES: We just happened to be on a train, and he said he'd been in Portland so I said, "What is your name?" And you know, it's just, I can't even remember what his name was, but anyway, it was, he had a job because he was bilingual and he really took us through Hiroshima and Kyushu.

TI: So he helped you, then?

ES: Yes. Very helpful.

TI: But that was almost like happenstance? You just met him on the train and he started helping you.

ES: Yes.

TI: Did he ever talk about how his life was in Japan? So here he grew up in the United States, in Portland, and then during the war went to Japan.

ES: Well see, he was still a minor, so a lot of these people, Niseis, were minors, so they had to come back to Japan even though they -- well, they didn't have too much to say. They had to follow their parents. And so he got a job with Fuji -- I think, what is it? There was another name for that travel bureau.

TI: I don't know.

ES: There were several groups, I know, and we picked out this...

TI: But did this man work for the travel agency?

ES: Yes.

TI: Okay, so he worked, so it was his job. He was supposed to take you around.

ES: Yes.

TI: I see.

ES: Yes, because he knew Japanese and had learned Japanese. And so it was a very pleasant trip.

TI: Now, did you ever get a sense that he felt, maybe awkward about being first in the United States and then going to Japan and living? Did he ever talk about that?

ES: No, I really don't think so. I don't, I think he felt pretty much at home. But it was, it was quite a change, I'm sure, but he's still a child, maybe early teenage, when he went to Japan.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright &copy; 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.