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TI: So the family has to leave, and so I wanted to kind of get the family grouping. So you had your Shikuma grandparents, you had your family which was your parents, Victor and you, so there was four of you, and then you had Kenji's family, who was the same age as your dad. Do you recall Kenji's wife's name?

HY: Mary.

TI: And they had a son David?

HY: Yes, uh-huh.

TI: And then you mentioned Uncle Mac with his wife Hiroko, with...

HY: Daughter Esther.

TI: Esther, and then pregnant with Larry.

HY: Pregnant with Larry. And my first memory in life is being on the train going to Poston. I remember having a melted Hershey bar in my hand and my mother trying to clean me up, but Aunt Mary had bought Hershey bars for the kids. It was hot in the train and the Hershey was melting, and I guess I was creating quite a mess with that. Then I remember seeing soldiers on the train and I thought that was pretty cool, seeing soldiers with rifles. Yeah, that was my first memory in life, is the train ride to Poston.

TI: And when you think about it, it feels like... is it like a warm, fun feeling? Or how would you describe that feeling?

HY: Well, it was, the family was together. All the cousins and aunts and uncles, and we were all together. I think Aunt Hiroko had to go separately because she was pregnant. But when we got to camp, the grandfather and my two unmarried, Uncle Heek and Aunt Emi, were in the same barracks with us, with my dad and our family. Uncle Mac, because Aunt Hiroko was pregnant, was in another area with Uncle Kenji and his family, but we saw them all the time.

TI: When you say another area, so a different block?

HY: Different building, I guess.

TI: Different building but maybe same block but just a different... okay. And before we talk more about Poston, the government records indicate that first the family went to Salinas, the Salinas Assembly Center? Do you...

HY: I don't remember that.

TI: Any stories about Salinas versus Poston?

HY: I don't have any stories there.

TI: Okay.

HY: Yeah, I don't know if that was separate from the assembly in Watsonville, because that was at the Westview church.

TI: Well not so much where the assembly in terms of where they got picked up, but an actual detention camp. There was a temporary detention camp before they went to Poston, and there was the Salinas Assembly Center that people were held for generally a few months. And generally these conditions were even more desolate or crude than when they got to Poston.

HY: I don't remember that at all. I've not heard stories of that. Maybe my parents had gone to Watsonville by then to be with the grandparents.

<End Segment 10> - Copyright © 2022 Densho. All Rights Reserved.