<Begin Segment 8>

CI: So we went to Japanese school after American school just like everybody else did.

SY: What was the... it was Chuo Gakuen.

CI: Chuo Gakuen, yes.

SY: And you went every day to Japanese school?

CI: Every day.

SY: So did you learn a lot of Japanese?

CI: Well...

SY: You spoke English at home, right?

CI: Yes, uh-huh.

SY: Your stepfather spoke only English?

CI: He was born in Hawaii, so he was a Nisei also. And until my grandfather passed away, we spoke sparingly Japanese. And my mother probably was very comfortable in Japanese, but after Grandfather died, then it was almost always English.

SY: And what other things did you do besides going to school and going to Japanese school while you were living in Boyle Heights? Did you play with other kids in the neighborhood? What kinds of activities did you...

CI: You know, everything was centered around the Japanese community. And so we used to go to undoukai, I don't know if you remember those. It would be through church. I went to Nishi Hongwanji.

SY: Which was downtown, right?

CI: Downtown, yeah. It's where the museum is now.

SY: Right. So you would take the bus to go downtown?

CI: Well, the bus picked us up. The church had a bus, and it would pick us up.

SY: And undoukai was a...

CI: Kind of like, well, it's like a carnival. Not a carnival, but something like that. They had races and people took barbeque things and onigiri.

SY: Kind of like a picnic.

CI: Yeah. So it was mostly centered around that.

SY: And that would happen how often?

CI: I think once a year. And then if you belonged to a kenjinkai, like a ken, which we did not belong to, then they had also the kenjinkais used to have those picnics, too.

SY: I see. Were the Japanese kids divided by Buddhist and non-Buddhist, do you remember?

CI: I don't think so. I don't think they were really divided. But of course we saw most of the same people. Because the church also had buses that would pick us up.

SY: And you all went, since you all went to the same school, so it was the same people you saw in school and in church?

CI: And some of us took piano lessons from the same teacher.

SY: She would come to your house?

CI: No, no, no. We went to Ms. Early's house. That I remember.

SY: And you learned how to play the piano.

CI: Yes.

SY: So were the boys doing different things than the girls back then?

CI: Yeah. Well, I know that... well, my brother used to go to the Fresno playground, and they had different activities. So he used to, I remember one time that he was to carve something. And well, I guess my grandfather looked at this thing that he carved and he wasn't very happy with it. And so he ended up carving this Chinese... I have no idea why it was a Chinese figure, but the way Grandpa carved it, you could see the queue, the braid in the back. You could see the weaving of it. Well, our grandfather was a very talented, artistic man and taught Paul how to do many, many things.

SY: So your brother and your grandfather...

CI: Yeah, they were very close.

SY: Were very close. And you were probably, were you closer to your mother?

CI: Probably. The one I was closest to was my aunt because Mother was very busy with other things.

SY: She was helping your stepfather? What was she doing?

CI: Oh, no. But running a household of five children, or four, however many we had at that time. And my grandfather was living with us. And my Aunt Eleanor, before she married, so she was there also.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright &copy; 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.