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TI: How about just like preparations? Do you recall anything that you had to do with the house or anything else to prepare? Like the --

JK: Only thing I remember is that we had this monster garage sale like you see today. And I guess that's, everybody said, "That's what you do. You put all this stuff out on the lawn and then the vultures come and see what they can find." I think we sold an oscillating fan for like twenty-five cents. Some, now I think about it, today's world, where I live they don't allow garage sales, but where my son used to live, my son and daughter-in-law, they allowed garage sale once a year, and so I took some gear over there to have 'em -- so I'm sitting there watching, and my son said, I said, "I want forty-five bucks for that tent. I paid two hundred dollars for it." And my son says, "Dad, you'll be lucky if you get twenty-five dollars for it." But I promised my wife that I would come home with at least forty dollars, so I said, I'll take the twenty-five dollars and put my own fifteen dollars on that. I took it back and said, "Hey, we made it, honey." I said, "Here's your forty dollars." But, and so I laugh like a, every time I see a garage sale I have a flashback to here the Kubota family's got to liquidate everything.

TI: Wow. So it brings back memories whenever you see a garage sale.

JK: Oh yeah, I see bad stuff. The only thing my mother saved was her Japanese dishes. And there's a story about that too.

TI: So go ahead and tell me the...

JK: Well, see, you know how some people lost their -- in our case, my older sister, the property was put in my older sister's name, so we maintained ownership of the property. It was this little house on Hamilton Avenue, right? Okay, we had no clue as to when we were coming home, so my mother said, "Okay, I would like to save my dishes." So she put 'em in, like, remember I told you these wooden crates, she just put 'em in there, in the crates, just kind of stacked 'em and put 'em in there. Well, so okay, now the war's gonna end, they're gonna leave Poston, okay? And the government, bless their heart, they said, "Okay, we'll make you a deal. We're gonna relocate you to Stillwater, Oklahoma, but we'll go back to El Centro, pick up the possessions that you have there." So they have somebody go to El Centro, go down in the basement of Hamilton Avenue, get those crates of dishes, nice Japanese dishes, as my mother put 'em in the basement. They came to Poston, every one of them were busted, 'cause they're glassware.

TI: So they weren't really packed for transport. They were just packed for storage.

JK: Just packed for storage.

TI: And so when they moved it everything broke.

JK: Everything broke.

TI: Your mother must've been, just been so disappointed when she saw that.

JK: Yeah. And I don't know if you have time, but that's the one thing I wanted, I thought, if it was appropriate, I brought this little book about my mother's sewing machine, and we don't have to talk about it, but anyway, I always talk about the Kubota family, in the war we left El Centro with family, one suitcase apiece, and my mother's sewing machine. When my mom and dad came back from the camps, they came back with one suitcase apiece, my sister's ashes, and the sewing machine.

TI: But the sewing machine probably really came in handy when you were at Poston.

JK: That's right. Yeah, my granddaughter made a, wrote a little story about it, so I'd like, if you don't mind, I'll even let you take it if you promise you'll send it back to me, but it's the story of Grandma's, Great-grandma's sewing machine.

TI: Yeah, we'll, 'cause that, from the stories I hear sometimes, people saying, "Oh, I wish I brought the sewing machine," because they could use it and there was so much time to do things. So that's interesting. I wanted to just ask, I didn't ask it earlier, but you mentioned, like, the homicides in the area. Was there a lot of fear amongst the Japanese community? Like did your parents say, "Jack, you have to be careful, come home at night," or anything like that?

JK: No, I don't remember any impact on our lives, as far as our daily lives were concerned. Well, it happened. Yeah, my mom and dad were pretty steady people. They never got, yeah, they never made a wave.

TI: Okay.

JK: Very disciplined people.

TI: During this time period, right before you left for Poston, it was your thirteenth birthday.

JK: Yeah.

TI: Was there any celebration or acknowledgement of your thirteenth birthday? Do you remember that?

JK: All I remember is my mom and dad never forgot any of our birthdays. She always did something special for us. Even in the depths of the Depression when we barely had enough to eat, she'd do something for our birthdays. Yeah, birthdays were special for all the kids.

TI: So for your thirteenth, so this is just days before you go to Poston.

JK: Yeah, I'm sure, I don't remember what we did, but yeah, I'm sure, I wouldn't, I'm sure my mama did something for me.

TI: And what would be kind of a special thing, growing up, that she would do?

JK: She'd always bake. She'd bake something. Oh yeah, she was a good cook. I'm sorry.

TI: So from the Imperial Valley, from El Centro, you go to Poston. Tell me about the journey. What was the journey like from El Centro to Poston?

JK: Well, we took a bus ride. I'm actually gonna make that trip here on May the 22nd of this year, on the seventieth anniversary. And if you'd like, I'm gonna, I'll give you the tape of my journey. It's gonna be one day later than we actually did it. In other words --

TI: So this'll be the seventieth anniversary of --

JK: The seventieth anniversary, I'm gonna go to El Centro the night before and then I'm gonna get up in the morning, I'm gonna go to the Buddhist church, and I'm gonna drive the route of the bus and go to Poston.

TI: So is this with others, or just --

JK: No, I'm gonna do it solo. My granddaughter wants to go with me, but I disappointed her. But I said, "No, I think I'd rather drive alone and then I'll just," then they're gonna put me in with a tape recorder and I'm gonna record my thoughts as I go along.

TI: Interesting. I'd love to get a copy of that.

JK: Okay. Well okay, I'm told 'em I'm gonna sing a song or two, you know. 'Cause I'm an old World War II guy, right? So you're gonna hear some old World War II guy songs.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.