<Begin Segment 22>

AI: Well, so tell me a little bit more about Jack and the emergency eventually came at...?

KM: It eventually came, but it's one of these paneled, kind of a, they called it panel truck. And, you know, it's better than walking to the hospital, I guess. [Laughs] And I went. And he was the first isolated case in camp and so they put him in this abandoned post office building, which was first used in the, camp outgrew it so they had us move. And it was a small place, like the size of a, how you say now -- ? Like a barrack, of a half of a barrack, regular half of a barrack. And it had a divided into two portions, a little cubby hole. And then I was able to visit him with a mask on and through the cubbyhole, because they were afraid. And then I was visiting long enough that the nurse's aide came to bring his lunch. And the nurse's aide would just take it and shove it to him and go out. And well, I felt like she, he was a leper or something. And it was really sad. And 'course nobody would come to visit him because they were afraid to, that he might be contagious. Probably was. So I really forgotten how long he was in there. But eventually, the real hospital in camp two finally got built up and finished, and so he was transferred. That was a really big hospital then.

AI: But for some time, he was stuck in this...

KM: Yeah, yeah.

AI: ...isolated room...

KM: Yeah.

AI: ...in the abandoned post office?

KM: Uh-huh. But it was, it kinda hurt me, and it made me feel very sad, too, because when I lost all my friends that used to come and see me, nobody came. And then, especially when they, all the nurse's aide would go to any other wards, but they wouldn't come to the TB ward. And that's what really, you know 'cause we were all in together as a result of the war. All fellow member, and it, that kinda really hurt me.

AI: And why was that, that they were not coming?

KM: Well, they'd rather go to other wards because they didn't want to be -- I think they were afraid. But then there again, I really don't remember how long I helped. Those times just kinda...

AI: But then eventually the hospital was finished...

KM: Yeah.

AI: ...and he was transferred over...?

KM: So all the wards were all separated. And then you get kinda used to the daily habits. So it wasn't bad. And I, today now, after we got out of camp, my husband and I, oh frequently say, "You know, if this happened when we were outside the camp, it would've cost us a bundle," 'cause he was in there twenty months. So our first part of our marriage we were separated because of the sickness. So we were together three months under the circumstances of living with all these in-laws and by-laws, [Laughs] and then he got sick, and he, we were separated.

AI: For twenty months...

KM: Twenty months. Yeah.

AI: ...while he was in the TB ward.

KM: Then he came back, and after a year or so, then we had our first baby. And our baby was the last baby in camp. We literally closed the camp.

AI: Well, we'll come back to that again.

KM: Okay.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 1999 Densho. All Rights Reserved.