<Begin Segment 2>

MN: I wanted to ask you, what language did you first learn?

KY: English, I would think. My parents would speak Japanese to me, and I would answer them in English. But I was just going to American school, probably until I was six, and then I started Japanese school until the war started (when they) closed up Japanese school. And I was very happy because I only had to go to American school just like the hakujins.

MN: Now the American school that you went to, do you remember the name of it?

KY: Not really. It could have been Grant, although that may just be a name that I think of, and may not be accurate. I was nine when the war started and ten when I went to camp. I don't have a lot of recollections from those days.

MN: Do you remember the American school, the ethnic makeup of your classmates?

KY: No, but there weren't too many Japanese Americans. As I vaguely recall, everybody else was white. I know there were no black kids, and I don't think there were any Mexican Americans.

MN: So since there weren't too many Japanese Americans in your school, how did you get along with the other students?

KY: Oh, I don't think I had any problems because I was Japanese American. If they didn't like me that was because they thought I was a jerk, which is fair.

MN: Can you share with us that time that, at school, they asked you to bring a recipe?

KY: Oh. Well, I don't know what grade I was in, that one of the projects that the teacher had was for all the students to bring a recipe from home. And my mother used to bake cupcakes. So I took a cupcake recipe in to school.

MN: Do you have any idea where your mother learned to bake Western-style deserts?

KY: No. As I said, my sisters were quite a bit older than me, so I'm sure when she had them and they were growing up, that's when she learned how to make American food. 'Cause when I was growing up, we had Nihonshoku, but every once in a while we would have the yoshoku with gohan. Like maybe stew or spaghetti. And this isn't Western, but my mother also used to make homemade chow mein, which was a treat. 'Cause she spent a lot of time preparing that meal, and the second day when the noodles and everything had absorbed all the flavor, it tasted better than the first day. But she would cook egg and shred it, so you could spread that over the top of the chow mein. And in our family, we always ate it with gohan, even though my Chinese friends used to tease me about having gohan with chow mein, because chow mein is supposed to be a snack.

MN: Now you mentioned that your mother cooked a lot of the Nihonshoku.

KY: Yes.

MN: What about when you were going to school? What kind of lunches did she make for you?

KY: I think she made sandwiches, but I don't recall ever having a meat sandwich. I think I had like butter and bread, perhaps butter and sugar, sometimes butter and jam, and butter and peanut butter. Of course, the best one was when there was jam and peanut butter in the same sandwich.

MN: How about when you were going to Nihongo gakkou, Japanese school, did you have the same lunch?

KY: I don't remember. And I don't remember whether I went to Japanese school after American school or if it was only Saturday.

MN: Which Japanese school did you go to?

KY: Hollywood Gakuen.

MN: Were they pretty strict there?

KY: I don't know. I was a well-behaved child, because I was sort of ingrained with the feeling that I couldn't misbehave because I would bring dishonor to myself, my family, and all the Japanese in the world.

MN: Let me ask you a little bit about your parents. What did your father do when you were growing up?

KY: Well, we lived in a four-plex. And until I found out differently, I thought we owned the apartment. But when I became a volunteer at the museum, I found out that my parents couldn't become naturalized citizens and they couldn't own property in the state of California. So they may have been managing the four-plex for somebody else, I don't know. We lived in one of the units, and the other three were rented out. I think my mother was a typical housewife of that era where she shopped, cleaned house, did laundry, and cooked, and looked after the children. To my knowledge, she did not work outside the home.

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