<Begin Segment 11>

PW: Did you and your husband leave camp first, or did your father leave camp first?

YW: My husband was the first one that was allowed to leave. He got his clearance early, because he was a machinist, and like I was saying, the people that were back east were losing a lot of their people, especially farm workers or people that did machinery, they were all coming to California because this is where all the jobs were at that time. And so they were willing to hire anybody with some experience, so because my husband was very capable and qualified to do some of those things, he was picked up early.

PW: What year?

YW: I believe it was... oh, it was 1943, of course, that was when my baby was born. He got to see the baby once, and then he had to run, that's when he left.

PW: And how did you and your daughter end up leaving?

YW: Well, we had to stay behind because my baby was too weak to travel. They didn't think she would make it if I tried move her, so it was safer for her to stay in camp. She wasn't well enough to travel for three months, and like I said, she had a weak heart. I don't know exactly what they did for her, but I do remember that they did say funny things like, "Watch her diet." There was no such thing as watching your diet, you know, she just needed food. And I used to be allowed to get five bottles of milk a day, if I lined up and was able to get it, I was allowed to get the five bottles of milk a day. And one day I found an orange in there, and I thought it was because they thought I needed it, because I was sick, so I ate it. And I didn't know... and I got this one orange about every other day, and I thought, well, and I was eating it because I couldn't eat regular food. And then I found out I was supposed to be making orange juice and giving it to the baby. [Laughs] Life was so funny in camp. But the young people managed, they were happy because they had each other. They were open with each other, they came to us a lot, and I admit, they did not go to their parents, to the Issei parents very often because they didn't get any answers, the Isseis couldn't answer any of the questions. So they used to come to us and say, what are they going to do with us? Are they going to kill us? We couldn't even answer, we didn't know.

I was pregnant and I had two girlfriends, we were pregnant at the same time, our babies were supposed to be born about three months of each other. And we were so unsure of our future, like I said, we made a pact that if anything happened to one of us, that the other two would take the baby. We spent a lot of time trying to find hiding places in the camps where we can hide our babies if the time ever came. And we were trying to be very realistic, someday they're going to have to do something with us, they're not going to just open the gate and say, "You could go home," because they knew we didn't have a home to go home to, and besides, California was not open to us at that time. So we (couldn't) go home. Anyway... I'm losing track.

PW: Well, so that's a great question, your friends are wondering, "What are we going to do?" "How are we going to get out?" Do you remember when the leave clearance forms came?

YW: No. What happened was because my husband was able to get out, I kept asking every morning for permission to leave, and they said, "Well, your baby is not well enough." That was a good excuse, because that kept me in camp. And after three months, I said -- if she stayed in camp, I was sure she was going to die. So I said she was okay, that I would take the chance, I was going to see if I can get a permit to leave. And because I told them, "My husband has a job and he has a place to live," but he really didn't, he was living in a hotel. It was actually a rooming house, but they called them hotels. And I said, "He has a place to live for us," so I wanted the permit to go, and they finally let me go.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2019 Densho. All Rights Reserved.