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TI: But going back to your father, were there ever any complications in terms of documentation for him while he was in the United States?

JK: Well, of the, remember I told you it was a group of them that were in Mexico, they finished the one year contract? The history indicates that among them was one guy who said he was suffering a lot on making the trip and something to the effect that he got caught by the border patrol back in that era, and he got actually deported. And that happened as he was turning back apparently, somehow, and then years later they hooked up again and he said he regretted very much turning back and starting all over again.

TI: So he ended up living in Mexico while his, while his buddies went to the United...

JK: Somewhere, yeah, something like that. His buddies come on, came on into California.

TI: But for your father, I mean, just in terms of living in the United States, were there times when, because he didn't have any papers or a trail of coming into the country, was that ever a problem for him?

JK: To the best of my knowledge, no. Now, he's talked about the intimidation and the harsh reality of being an Asian immigrant... what's the word I want to use? It's not a good word, but just being a coolie, being a servant. [Interruption] And he kind of made it, those were not good years. There were great prejudices. Well, I'm sure you're familiar with the prejudice here on the West Coast, particularly with the Chinese, and so if you were an Asian you were pretty much stomped on and looked upon as a real servant class.

TI: You know, what's kind of interesting to me is, so your father did this over a hundred years ago, and in the United States today it's still an issue in terms of undocumented workers crossing the border illegally and working. I mean, what are your thoughts about that? I mean, is that similar to what your father did? Or what are your thoughts about that?

JK: I live in a very peaceful, very comfortable neighborhood in Carlsbad, California, a hundred thousand people, and most of my neighbors have Hispanic gardeners, Hispanic housekeepers, and every time I see these folks I see my mom and dad, 'cause that's exactly how they started in this country. I think you would call it servant class, if you're in the South it would be the Afro Americans, or the poor Irish folks that vacated their islands -- well, they got run out of Ireland, I understand. So what I, and then I got to the car wash, everywhere I go and live in -- in fact, this morning at our hotel, there were four Hispanic ladies there all talking in their own language to each other, okay, and that's what I call the classic servant class. And we in our Western society, we Americans, we flourish with these folks doing all these chores for us, okay? [Interruption] And of course, there's a great conflict because of that, because the people that are there that feel threatened. Yeah, from a national perspective, I hope that we can come to grips and treat the issue honestly.

TI: Right. And given your background in terms of a father who crossed the border undocumented, what do you think our country should do today? I mean, here we have millions of workers who are undocumented, who are, as you mentioned, working in lots of these more menial labor positions. How do we consolidate that nationally? I mean, it's kind of interesting from your background, if you had an opinion or perspective on that?

JK: Well, it's easy for me to say it 'cause I'm an old guy, you know? If we would all wash our own cars -- by the way, the car wash, right, all you see is foreign, folks from the foreign lands working there -- if you just look at who's doing the chores of America, okay, doing what I call the chores, not the automobile and the mechanic, I'm talking about the folks that just do the chores, okay? If you can't reconcile someone else doing that, if you teach your children to do it or teach the young kids to do it, if you can't reconcile that, then in my opinion, you just have to accept, either one, just straight away, guest workers, or accept them and find a path for 'em because we cannot live the way we do in our level of a society without them. And I've been to Canada, where I went into an airport and all the people who were doing the chores in the airport had turbans on. I go back East, how about to Connecticut, Boston, found a large colony of Brazilian illegal immigrants.

TI: So it's really this immigrant class that oftentimes will do many of, as you call, the chores that Americans who have been here longer aren't willing to do?

JK: Yeah. Well, yeah, between not wanting to and, I hate to the use the term, but too lazy to do it. I drove, a month ago I drove from Carlsbad -- you know about California, we have a great Central Valley that's the breadbasket of America, right? -- everywhere you look in the fields there, grape fields, produce, everything, right, they're all Latin American workers.

TI: And when you say kind of, sort of lazy or not willing to do this, many Japanese Americans, family-wise, have been here for over a hundred years like your family, would you put the Japanese American community in the same kind of boat in terms of changing over time, generation by generation?

JK: Well, in some respects, yes. I mean, I like to believe that my wife and I embedded into our children the culture that our parents did, and as far as I'm personally concerned, my father and mother taught me to work like a dog from morning to night. My children, they did extracurricular things in school, but they had to work. They wanted, in their case particularly, if they wanted some cash in their pocket they had to go work for it. My children, all three of 'em, they were indoctrinated, so to speak. And I, frankly, I feel that's part of the culture of the Japanese, the Japanese culture. There may be other cultures -- by the way, I have a buddy I went to college with, his ethnic background is German, he's just the same way. We laugh about it. "Boy, those..." but I call it the folks from the old world. I like to use the term, people from the old world, if they're from the peasant class or from the working class, they're gonna pass on to their next generation that idea that... and of course, and the Japanese, at least my family, my god, my mom and dad, boy, they just told you, "You go to school and you get an education, and boy, we'll be on your tail until you get through there." Yeah, so that's part of what I call -- and I don't mind telling you that, yeah, I take pride in being of Japanese ancestry. Yes, there was Pearl Harbor and a few other things, and I feel the pain once in a while when I think about some of the things that went on during World War II, 'cause that's my generation.

TI: Okay, so let's continue your story. This was kind of a tangent, but when you brought up the fact that your father was undocumented I thought that would be a good opportunity to talk about kind of current events.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.