<Begin Segment 7>

TI: So Emi, we're talking still about Brooks and before the war and how well your family was known. I want to talk a little bit about language, so at home, what language was spoken?

ES: It was all Japanese, until my brother went to grade school. First day he didn't know a word of English and so he had to take first grade over again 'cause he didn't do too well with the English. But then the second year, then it was okay, but then he came home with all this so the rest of us, four of us, didn't have any problem with English.

TI: Because once he had that experience, did your older brother start teaching you English?

ES: Yeah.

TI: Okay, so he didn't want you to go through the same thing he had went through.

ES: No, I guess that was it.

TI: But I'm curious, for your father, how good was his English?

ES: Well, he just learned it. I think what he did learn was all from the farmer that he worked for, and he did very well. And he did writing and, well, my mother had beautiful penmanship because she had learned by herself, Palmer method.

TI: So this beautiful cursive writing.

ES: Beautiful handwriting. But of course she didn't speak a lot English, but like when she's signing her name we used to marvel at how beautiful she wrote.

TI: Now, was she, was she good enough with English that she could write, like, letters in English and things like that?

ES: Yes.

TI: But just the spoken English she...

ES: She'd just as soon not.

<End Segment 7> - Copyright &copy; 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.