<Begin Segment 24>

TL: Before the interview you had shown some pictures of people that you went to school with, and I'm wondering if you were able to ever stay in touch or visit any of these former friends?

HN: See, my sister and I went back in 1981, and we met about three of our friends from school. They came to visit. Then after that I just lost touch with them. I think most of them got married and --

TL: Moved.

HN: -- moved. So we never kept in touch. Then we went to visit my teacher.

TL: Which one?

HN: She was our sewing teacher, but she was my homeroom teacher in first grade -- I mean, not first grade, freshman. And then she taught sewing when I went to post-graduate. So went to visit her. Yeah. That's about all I, I haven't kept in touch with the friends over there.

TL: And what made your mother decide to just stay instead of joining or rejoining her husband? Because they stayed married, right?

HN: Uh-huh.

TL: They just --

HN: See my father went back to Japan in 1952.

TL: Okay. And so he rejoined her?

HN: Uh-huh.

TL: I see.

HN: Yeah. And then they built a home over there.

TL: Okay.

HN: But he was here until my husband came back, my father. So he saw our first-born, yeah. Then he decided, well, he wanted to go back. I think he started getting social security. That's why he went back. Because they were able to get their social security even though they lived in Japan. So yeah, he stayed in Japan 'til he passed away in 1960. Then my mother, well, she didn't want to come back anymore, since they had a home over there and her brother was there and all the relatives were there. So I guess she felt more like a Japanese -- well, she didn't have her citizenship either because they didn't have it earlier.

TL: Right. They weren't allowed to get it.

HN: Then she came to visit in 19 -- gee, 1974 she came over, and she met all our kids. Yeah. And then she came back again. We went back, my sister and I went back in '81, and then she came over in '87, and she met most of the grandkids then. And then she went back. And then she passed away in '88, 1988. So she was able to see all the kids and most of the grandkids. Just one grand -- yeah, the youngest, our, youngest grandchild she never met, but the rest, she met all of them.

<End Segment 24> - Copyright © 1999 Densho. All Rights Reserved.