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KN: So what happened to your parents' relationship when, you mentioned that your dad disappeared?

EK: Well, you know, during this time, right after Pearl Harbor, my dad's name among hundreds of other older and more established Japanese males' names appeared in the paper. And so these people were hunted, and many ran away to hide in the jungle, or in the sierra, the mountains, or someplace outside of their home. But my father thought to himself, and he said, "I can't leave my young wife with," at that time, "four children, and then go to someplace where I don't even know what's going to happen there either. And so he dug a hole under the planks of the, I think it was one of the beds, and made a room enough to put a little cot, a tiny table, and lamps and a radio. And he dug this wire from the school, which I said was close by, to get shortwave news. And so whenever someone suspicious came into the store, then he would hide in there. And I remember when you opened the plank -- because there's no window, no air -- that smelly dirt smell, very musky and very kind of damp smell would come up. But luckily, he would hide, and then when that suspicious person or persons would go, then he would come out.

KN: What would you as children have to do when your father went into hiding, if people asked you, "Where's your father?"

EK: Oh, yeah, they told us that we must not say anything, and we didn't.

KN: And so how long did your father stay in his...

EK: On and off. He didn't stay, like, for days, because I think it would have been too much. I mean, there's no air there. [Laughs] So as soon as the people disappear then he would come out. So it was like, I don't know, an hour at the most, I don't know how long, but short time. Short time, many times.

KN: So your father went in there, be about 1943, he started to hide in 1942?

EK: I think 1944, after... let's see. Oh, no, maybe 1943, because '44 he was taken already.

KN: Can you explain that, what had happened?

EK: Well, the whole year, no one suspicious came, so he thought, "Oh, maybe this is over. Maybe they don't need any more guys, Japanese guys. So he said, "You know, the children have not gone out, we have not taken then anyplace, so let's go for a picnic." So the whole family, including my grandparents, who by then had come to live with us, 'cause he had opened a second store and he told them, "You can run that store and have your own place to live." So they said, "Oh, yeah, we'll do that, because we don't want to, we're getting older, so we'll close up shop." And so they did, and so they lived with us for about a year and a half maybe. And so we all went on a picnic, and when we came back... you know, in South America you eat rather late. So people, my mother and nannies were cooking dinner and we were being served when there was a familiar knock. They had devised a knock so that friends and relatives would be let in. And so this young apprentice named Victor, he must have been about sixteen, seventeen... often in those days, parents would ask a quote/unquote "successful businessperson" or storeowner to please train their sons to be storekeepers or whatever it might be. And so he had two of those boys living with us. They were like family. They ate with us, they toiled with my mother, and my dad would show them about business.

KN: These are young Nisei.

EK: Yeah, young Nisei. And so the youngest one, named Victor, ran to the door thinking it was a friend. And now we had just, you know, for a whole year no one showed up that seemed suspicious. And so we were kind of, lost track. And so he ran, opened the door, and here walked in about, I don't know, four or five detectives. And said, "Sorry, but we have to take you in under the order of the U.S.A." And my father said, "Uh-oh, I'm finally caught." And he told them, he said, "The family's eating dinner. Please wait. I'm not going to run away, you just stay here and keep an eye on me." So in the meantime, my mother quickly started to gather clean linen, 'cause she knew the jails would be awful, filthy. So she gathered all this clean linen, but there was no time to embroider his name. So what she did -- and this is something that people have said, "Oh, I never thought of that." Well, you take an avocado seed, you peel it, and you poke, you put the sheet on top of it, and with a needle you poke through to make the letters, "Higashide," and that becomes permanent. No matter how many times you wash it, it won't come off. They didn't have the pens that we have now, you know. And so that's what you did.

KN: And so she marked each of the linens for him to take with avocados?

EK: Yes. So in the meantime we're eating dinner, slowly, and he would gather, you know. And then my mother would put his clothes in luggage to take, clean underwear and shirts and things like that, 'cause we didn't know how long he would be kept there.

KN: What did you as children think about this? I mean, you were witnessing...

EK: Oh, yeah, it was a turmoil. And I remember feeling scared, but we didn't know what war is or was. It's just that here these strange people are coming to get Father, and he didn't do anything bad. But it was being done.

KN: By the U.S. government.

EK: Yeah, but we didn't know who U.S. government was, nothing. It's just that he was being taken, and so it was a very sad time. And my mother's friend, whom I saw back in 1995, she said, "You know, Elsa, you were such a happy child, always just being so happy and cheerful and smiling all the time. After that day," she said, "it was like a different child. Very gloomy, no smile," and so I didn't realize that until she told me. I said, "Wow, even as a child I guess you really feel it, but you show it," which I didn't know I did. So that was a new insight into my, how I was really feeling. I remember when they took him away that there was this heavy velvet drape in the hallway in the back, and I remember that my tears were coming, and so I wiped my tears on that. Yeah, I remember that.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.