<Begin Segment 26>

DG: What were you doing when you heard about Pearl Harbor?

GF: Pearl Harbor? I was skiing. I went skiing and went into a theater and got out and they said, "Japan attacked Pearl Harbor." Oh, don't tell me that stuff. We never, never dreamed of it. Myself and two other fellows -- Nisei boys -- went to the theater, and we couldn't believe it. But it's a funny thing, I was working at this grocery store. Gee, business just stopped. Nobody came in, but as time went by a lot of hakujin people came back again. They says, "It's none of your fault." So I thought gee, these hakujin people are pretty understanding. But it's not our fault, we didn't start the thing. It's our country that did it, not us. And these people said, "No, we sympathize you." In fact, one of the hakujin ladies came to me and says, "I want you to marry my daughter." I said, "I'm not going to get married. Why should I get married for?" [Laughs] But gee, the thing just quiet down. But when we went skiing and came home -- we went to the theater. As soon as we went in the theater, it wasn't started then, but as time comes I don't know. We came out of the theater and we heard about Pearl Harbor and we couldn't believe it.

DG: So in the six years from when you were in Japan, you became pretty Americanized --

GF: I was Americanized, yeah.

DG: -- by then.

GF: Because I came back to the same thing, but still in my heart --

DG: So did you think Japan was another country, or did you worry about Japan?

GF: No, I don't think I was, let me see now, how would I feel about that? I really can't tell you. I knew probably Japan was going declare war on United States, but I never thought -- when it comes right down to it, you can't believe it. You can't believe because I had been Americanized so much. With all the resources we have, how can they be -- Japan has nothing. And even they accumulated things within the ten, twenty, thirty years, it wouldn't last within the short while, see. And they may have the manpower, but you've got to have the resource for it, and I thought gee, Japan, they say that, but I don't think they're going to attack United States. Attack is -- America's too huge.

<End Segment 26> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.