Densho Digital Archive - Isami Nakao - Kazuko Nakao Interview (denshovh-nisami

<Begin Segment 20>

DH: Most of the time, I mean, it wasn't pleasant, but it wasn't that rough. I didn't really talk to you about describing your experiences at Manzanar before you left to work outside the camp. Do you want to describe what it was like to live at camp, what your day-to-day routine was like.

KN: I didn't quite get it.

DH: What was your day-to-day routine like at Manzanar?

IN: Day-to-day thing?

DH: Yeah. What was the day like.

IN: Well, to operate the camp they had various jobs, and I decided I'm going to get whatever job I could get, and they paid us sixteen dollars a month. And I helped at the warehouse unloading trucks and so forth, the rations that were brought in, and I worked at the butcher shop for a while, and that was the extent of... and we had our regular hours, but we tried not to work too hard. [Laughs]

DH: What was your typical day like, Kay?

KN: Well, I got a job at the hospital, which I really liked. I lived on Block 3 and walked to Block 44 to the hospital to work, but it was really enjoyable. I was a typist clerk. We had, in a barrack, we had typist clerk on one side and stenographers on the other end and it was a public health department. And the Isseis would get a job at the mess halls, and they had to have food handlers permit so they'd come in for a physical and everything. And Isseis and the Nisei doctors were having a very difficult time communicating, and I would be sitting there listening. And I'd get very, very jittery and nervous because they were not communicating well. So I just jumped up and I start to interpret and ever since, I started doing that. And I really enjoyed it and I learned lots of Japanese words, the medical terms, and so it was very educational for me. And I really loved it because originally when I graduated high school I really wanted to be a nurse, but my guidance counselor said, "You are too weak and you cannot stand on your feet eight hours a day," so... but anyway I really enjoyed working at the hospital and met lots of nice friends.