<Begin Segment 31>

DG: So let's see. So what months are we talking about that you went into the assembly center at Portland?

GF: Portland? That was in... let's see, we got married, must have been sometime in May, middle part of May or something. We went to Portland because we got married on May 1st, and we had the picture taken. They took us out. It must have been May.

DG: Now, quite a few people had the opportunity to go out and work like in Ontario from Portland.

GF: Uh-huh.

DG: Did you think of doing that at all?

GF: Yeah, we went to Spokane.

DG: So, and not go to Minidoka?

GF: No, no. A lot of people did that.

DG: Because right in Oregon, in eastern Oregon, there was a camp of Japanese.

GF: Yeah, that's right. Well, no. We never thought of going to Ontario or... there was another place.

DG: Now, they weren't free. They had to stay in that camp.

GF: That's right.

DG: They went to work there.

GF: Yeah, I see. I know there are... certain part of country, like in Spokane, you could go there. They give the choice that you can go inland yourself, but we didn't do that.

DG: Why didn't you do that?

GF: I don't know. We just thought well, go out there and you might get shot. You might get shot. You can't tell. You know, these guys are crazy when the war starts like that. They can't tell. Just like my wife when she was on the train coming over this way, or bus, whatever she rode on, one hakujin says, "What are you, Japanese or Chinese?" She says, "I'm Chinese." "Oh, God bless you," she says. I mean, I don't know how she thought that way, but I think she was smart to think that way because if you did, they might have hit her in the face or something or said something, but she says, "Oh, God bless you," she says. [Laughs] My wife told me that.

<End Segment 31> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.