<Begin Segment 15>

LH: So in later years when you look back at it and you think about your situation being... imprisoned?

MN: Yeah. Yeah, I was a prisoner. In fact, I was a POW. I was a prisoner of war. If there was exchange of soldiers, American soldiers for people in the United States, I would have been part of that group. And isn't that amazing?

LH: Can you explain a little bit about that situation?

MN: I don't know much about it. You got to talk to the, technically, apparently I asked Tets Kashima, the guy at the University of Washington, and I said is it true that technically I was a prisoner of war and he said yeah, that was true. So I don't know really know what took place, but it was potentially true that if there was exchange, I would have been on it. My mom and dad did not give up their citizenship to Japan. They were not willing to disavow the emperor of Japan. They were very loyal to Japan. They thought the emperor -- they thought Japan was going to win the war. I mean, this was their country. They always planned to return to Japan. Now, we had different ideas, apparently. We had friends here and stuff. It wasn't really a loyalty question. We didn't know what loyalty to Japan or America was all about, but my parents were pretty -- I remember my mom saying she will die for the emperor and I was wondering what would the emperor want with her life? [Laughs] I guess it's not politically correct to say that your parents were loyal to Japan at that time, but I think my parents were. They had no reason to be loyal to America. America would not allow them to become Americans, anyway. Now, my father later on felt grateful, very grateful, for America to allow him to stay here and tried to get a citizenship, but he had a hard time learning the names of the thirteen original states. And we drilled him for a while, but he finally gave up. He was not a tenacious-type student. [Laughs] He was too fun loving, but he tried to become a citizen later on.

<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.