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BN: And then I guess the last thing I wanted to ask before we jump ahead is, did your parents get involved much in the local Japanese community in terms of church or other types of community organizations when you were here?

MM: There was a... I think they were Issei-aged family that kind of took us in and helped us for the first couple weeks when we came to L.A. And they were members of the West Adams Christian Church, and they encouraged us to go to church. And so we did that for a while as a family. And in fact, we're not big on rituals, Buddhist or Christian, especially my dad. But I guess we were encouraged to get baptized, and I remember being baptized in a Christian church. But even that experience for me was not always pleasant. There was some animosity by Sansei towards FOBs. People don't know what "FOBs" are.

BN: [Laughs] We'll add an asterisk if necessary.

MM: So I think they got involved to the extent that they felt an obligation to, but they were not naturally that sort of person. I mean, as soon as they could afford it, they were taking the Rafu Shimpo just to keep up with what was going on. I also know that, again, like many families that lived in the greater Los Angeles area, they had some connection to Little Tokyo, they came to Little Tokyo for groceries, all the professional and personal care services, from doctors to barber shops, everything in those days was sort of ethnically based, and people came here to get those things done. So to that extent, they were involved. But I wouldn't say that they got involved in any great extent. When I got into high school and I started playing basketball, there were a lot of Nisei men who organized these youth basketball leagues. And many of the Nisei fathers of my teammates participated and had like, tried to build a community around youth sports. My father, or my parents never saw me play basketball. I don't think they would know who all those Nisei parents were, except to the extent that, like, some of them would come and pick me up to take me to practice or a game, and they would say hello to each other then, that's it. So they were not that socially engaged.

BN: Were most of your dad's clientele also Nikkei?

MM: Clientele meaning...

BN: As a dental...

MM: Dental hygienist? Well, no, he worked for a company, and it was, as far as I know, it was, the owner was white, and I think the other workers were mostly white, too. And so it was kind of a generic...

BN: He was working sort of outside the ethnic sphere?

MM: Right.

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