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VY: So what happened when you had to leave your home? Where did you go?

KI: Well, we went to Puyallup, which was called "Camp Harmony," as a temporary transitory camp before we would be sent to a permanent camp. And my memory, I do have a memory of it. Seattle was overcast and was dark, it seemed gloomy and rainy. And I was with my mother because I remember sitting on her lap. And people on the bus didn't say much that I recall. It was scary. I remember the emotions and it was, like, not good.

VY: Did you feel scared yourself, or did feel like your mom was scared?

KI: Well, my sense is that the event of being, if you will, deported from your home was a big deal emotionally. And my mother is, in a manner of speaking, was a high strung, very sensitive person. And she oftentimes would get very emotionally upset, and I can't help but guess that, at the time she was upset, there I am sitting in her lap, and she's not happy because she does not know what's going to happen. And so, if you will, her sense of fear must have affected me. Because it was a big... I mean, for my parents, it was a big deal. And as a child of four, it was an emotion event not one where you can recall details.

VY: It's more, sounds like it's more visceral, more memories, of feelings.

KI: Yeah. And I can't quite articulate it, but the sense of it gets lodged in memory as a bad dream.

VY: Do you want to talk about your dreams now, or do you want to wait until...

KI: Well, I don't know exactly when I first had the dream, but the fear that I felt occurs in this dream. And in the dream the setting is dark and I'm on this street with this large building. And an ominous sound in the background, some sort of drumming or humming, but it was the sound of fear. And standing on this street looking at this building, I didn't know... in my dream, I didn't know what was happening except that it was fearful. And in the dream, a woman appears, and I think it must be my mother, but it's just a woman no details, just a figure. And the woman, I believe, tries to calm me. And that's about the content of the dream, except that I would wake up sweating. And I remember that very distinctly, it was uncomfortable. But the same dream, the same scenario, occurred repeatedly. So I had this dream I don't know how many times, but I think I had this dream for years, maybe up to the age of ten or more. So I don't know when it began, but it's a dream that I do remember vividly. I remember sweating, waking up, and not knowing what to make of it. And being young, I didn't even ask my parents or tell my parents or brother anything about it, I just was there. And it wasn't something I was prepared to talk about, because I didn't have the vocabulary or a way of dealing with it except to experience the dream again.

VY: So as a child you never told anybody about the dream?

KI: No.

VY: And then you just, at some point, starting having them less and less and then you didn't have them anymore?

KI: Well, the way it happened was at a college reunion, I said I was happy to go on with life without nightmares. And people said, "Well, you were only four, you were too young. You couldn't have had that," and sort of, I doubted it. And this stimulated me to sit down and rethink, and I said, "Oh yes, I had that sweat dream repeatedly, that was what I must have been referring to.

VY: Oh, that's interesting. So later in life, you talked about it, your memories, but people said no, you were too young, that you couldn't have remembered that, so you started to think, "Oh, maybe I didn't remember that," but then you remembered these dreams.

KI: Yeah. It was one of those things that you talk about. There was no way of putting your finger on it. And when someone said, "You couldn't have had those, you couldn't have had those nightmares," it made me think, oh, I did. But I forgot that it was repeated over and over again. Because that dream persisted into the postwar years.

VY: Why do you think you had these dreams? Why do you think they kept coming back?

KI: Well, I don't know when it first started. And it must have ended when I was close to ten or maybe a little older. But then they disappeared, and so what is there to talk about? Because I come from a family where talking about fears and dreams is simply not, if you will, part of everyday talk. So it's a personal experience, not a collective one.

VY: Do you think when it comes to childhood memories and dreams, do you think that these things are exact memories of things that happened, or do you think they're more, kind of a combination of feelings and memories?

KI: I've read some stories about memory, and this occurs in lawsuits where people talk about what they remember. And the defense lawyers have to figure out how to counteract these statements. And one of the ploys is that memory is faulty, and that what you remember isn't exactly what happened, and it could be the exact opposite. And so, in a manner of speaking, testifying about a memory could be, in effect, lying. And you could see why defense attorneys would like that. Well, in my case of this thing, I remembered the dream; it was so vivid. And recently I was looking at pictures my mother saved when I was four, and in one of the pictures I saw this building. I said, "Gee, what was that same building I saw in my dream?" And so this isn't a hundred percent way of convincing myself, but finding the pictures I drew as a four-year-old seemed to correlate with the dream, and that gives me a greater sense of comfort in saying I had those dreams, I'm not lying.

VY: It's so interesting because at that age, memories of that time are sort of a kind mixture of feelings and dreams and things that really happened. And it's hard to know what actually happened and what you were dreaming about, which doesn't mean that it's not all real to you as the child because you're, as a child you're perceiving everything a certain way. But then, so you knew you had these feelings, these thoughts, these dreams, but you weren't, sounds like you're saying you weren't certain what was real and what wasn't. But then, later on, you find these pictures that you drew that you forgot all about, that you drew at the time that you were in camp, between the ages of four and seven. And these pictures seemed to validate what these memories were.

KI: Yeah. It isn't, if you will, a hundred percent sure, but it gives me a sense that I'm not lying about the dreams.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.