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TI: So let's get you back to San Jose. So when you're done with the military, you decide to return to San Jose to go back to school?

YU: Right.

TI: And at this point, were, was the rest of your family in Japan?

YU: They had all gone back, yes.

TI: So you were, from a family standpoint, the only one left.

YU: Right.

TI: And what were you thinking at that point? I mean, so go to school, and what were your thoughts in terms of what you would do?

YU: Well, I was thinking of going to school, finishing up, but I had to, I changed my major because while in the service, when I went to Fort Warren, Wyoming, I had an opportunity going to personnel. The guy says, "What have you been doing?" He said, "You have all the qualifications, chemical, a lot of chemistry and engineering, calculus and everything." He said, "Why don't you, what have you been doing?" I said, "Well, I've been cleaning theaters and doing dishes." And he says, "Did you go through personnel?" "Oh yes." He says, "Well, you have enough on chemistry and laboratory experience that maybe you could be of help in our hospital." I said, "Doing what?" Said, "Working in the laboratory." I said, "That sounds good." He said, "Would you like to do that?" So I said, "Sure." So I went to the laboratory and said, "I'm reporting for duty." And the captain says, "Oh sure." He says, "Glad to have you," and says, well, gave it to the sergeant. The sergeant says, "We have, we want you to wash these dishes and this, this, this." It was all washing job. I said, "Okay."

So I got doing that, and I had Japanese friends, Niseis I got to know, and they said, "Yosh, you got to do this." First they were very cool about it, but as time went they got very friendly and said, "You got to do it this way. Do this, do this." And they showed me many things I had to learn, laboratory work. And it looked fun, so, "How'd you guys get this?" They said, "We went to laboratory school." I said, "So you think going to laboratory school, I can do that, be able to do?" And they said, "No, you don't have to go to laboratory. We'll teach you." I said, "Oh yeah?" "Yeah." Then, fortunately, there were two pathologists, young lieutenants, just got, just got out of school, I think, and the two of 'em -- and one of 'em was from Duke University and the other one was Stanford University -- and they said, I wanted to go to school, they said, "You don't need to go to school. We'll teach you." Says, "After you get your work done at about twelve or one o'clock," says, "report to us and we'll help you." So I would work and then finish up and go to the two lieutenants' office, and they say, "Well, okay, I guess I'll have Dr. Margolis teach today." And they would give me basic, "And so we'll stay with immunity, so we'll go basic." So they, basic laboratory, and I'd say, they'll say, "Did you understand?" I said, "No, I didn't understand." He said, "Well, when you inject something foreign into your body, it forms an antibody, and these antibodies fight whatever foreign particle come in." So they would draw the things for me so that I could -- "Oh, I see." And this is how I learned from two real nice people who, this fellow at Stanford knew about the Japanese being evacuated. Fellow from Duke, he didn't know anything about the Japanese. He knew I was a Japanese, but that was it. And the Nikkei soldiers there who had -- they were good med techs, they had graduated from Davis and all that, they were very good -- and they said, "Okay, Yosh, we'll help you along too." So I got all kinds of help, and so I knew more laboratory and about the human body than most average guys that went to the hospital in, army hospital training.

TI: And so when you returned to San Jose State and took biological sciences, I mean, it sounds like you already were probably already qualified to get your degree. You probably had all that information.

YU: Well, I understood it. I'd take, like hematology, and I knew all about it, I mean, I studied in class, but everything the professor talked about, I had already heard. So it made it easier.

TI: Yeah, so probably, when you returned to college, it was pretty easy for you.

YU: It wasn't easy, because we had, I had a wife and a little girl, so I had to support them too.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2012 Densho. All Rights Reserved.