<Begin Segment 6>

BN: Many of the businesses, maybe most of them had Japanese names. Yours did not.

JK: The what?

BN: Had Japanese names.

JK: Oh, yeah, the community spoke Japanese.

BN: But I'm wondering, yours...

JK: Oh, we had a Japanese name, too, Hawaii Yunyuu Gaisha. It's a direct translation of importing, yunyuu, and that name came from Hilo.

BN: What did the sign say? Was it Hawaii Importing?

JK: Both. And then a triangle with HIC. [Laughs]

BN: What other kinds of products did you sell at your store?

JK: Well, in dry goods, we sold a lot of yardage. I think at one time, Cohn Hall Marx, a manufacturer, a high-end manufacturer of fabrics, said we sold the most in the nation (...). And so it was. We had people like haole dressmakers and dress shops (buy fabrics). They would make it (into dresses) for you. The lady would come and shop at our store, or Mr. Hino would, sometimes, when she says, "I can't come, do you have this and this?" And he says, "Well, let me bring it up to you." So I remember going with him (to Alakea Street) -- she later relocated to Waikiki -- and going with him to take rolls of fabrics and showing it to her and she would make her purchases there.

BN: Is this because you had fabrics that only you had?

JK: Yeah, we had high-end fabrics, of course, just the (ordinary) kind, too, but somehow the ordering was very good. And people used to come and look over to see, businesspeople used to come and check to see what we were selling so that they could sell the same kinds of things. I think we were the leaders in the field. Of course, I'm prejudiced. When my mother retired in 1952, the man from Musashiya (which) later relocated to Ala Moana Center, came and thanked her for retiring. He said, "Now I can lift my head up. Until then (I) couldn't do that."

BN: Were most of the fabrics from Japan?

JK: I would say one-third was from Japan, and that involved kimono that were made or that were ready to be made, obi, slippers, and little purses and little stuff that you stick in (your hair). For weddings people used to, at that time, wear both a kimono and a wedding gown, so they would come to buy that. Or they had what's called a yuino, a betrothal gift, and they would come and buy things (for that). So the Japanese goods sold very well, but I think we were more famous for our yardage. Two-thirds of the store was in yardage. Some of them were on bolts, others were on rolls, and still others, like, velvet, was on a little winding thing.

BN: And those, were those imported then from the mainland?

JK: From the mainland. There were people here, jobbers, who came to show samples. And my mother, Mr. Hino, and when they could, the other clerks (chose the fabrics). The clerks, the men stayed a long time. I grew up with them. When I went to school and I needed help (with) my lesson, a Nisei fellow who worked at the store would look over my work. Japanese school, my mother would look over, Mr. Hino would look over. So there was a kind of family feeling in the store. We used to go camping together. After closing the store at ten o'clock (on Saturday nights, we would) drive over to the windward side, and they would make sukiyaki at twelve-o'clock. So it was a very good time for me.

BN: How much did you help out at the store?

JK: From the time I was about thirteen or fourteen I could help. And I learned how to measure yardage, to cut yardage, punch the cash register. I could do all of that. And so when it was busy, we helped. But even before that, when we were young kids, when we had remnant sales two times a year. My sister, my brother and I would be on the mezzanine floor watching. Because when you opened the door, the people just came rushing in, and they just (swept the remnants off) the counters. And just to see that nobody walks out, we were stationed there.

BN: So it sounded like this business was pretty successful.

JK: It was.

BN: Did you have that sense growing up...

JK: Yes.

BN: ...that your family was doing pretty well?

JK: Yeah. And because everybody worked as a community, I never felt deprived. I really am grateful for all of that kind of experiences. I had many eyes watching me. [Laughs] And we would, for example, during the summer months, George of the Amaguri Taro would go up and down the alley in the back, and he would whistle, that means, "Come out." And we would all go to Aala Park at five o'clock in the morning to play softball. Very fond memories. New Year's time, we would burn firecracker right in the alleyway. Everybody got together and stayed out there. And even during the war, we all gathered at the upstairs of Asahi Furniture. We would play card games, we would talk stories, big arguments sometimes. And then we had dancing, because the boys went to the Y to learn dancing. Very happy days for me.

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