<Begin Segment 42>

DG: So then you did what?

GF: Then I... I had put a deposit into the first boat leaving for Hawaii so we took the first boat to Hawaii, the Matsonian Line, and we went down to Sacramento or went to San Francisco. And I had a friend that was running a hotel there so I stayed at his hotel and went to Hawaii. I wanted to go to Hawaii because I never met her parents and what the parents would think about me, I don't know. It's too late anyway, but went to Hawaii. And so I told my boss, Homer, I told him, "Homer, if I come back, will you give me a job?" He says, "Oh, yeah. You're welcome back here. You can get your job back again." So I went to Hawaii and I told my wife maybe three months time I'm going to come back to the States again, but in the meantime I was -- I said, well, I better look for something to do. I'm getting tired not doing anything. So I stopped into this (furniture store), I saw an ad in the paper that they're looking for a salesperson. I says well, that might be up my alley, but they had a salesperson and a bookkeeper. I says I don't want to take care of books, staying behind a desk is not my kind of job. But, anyway, I went there and I got the job and this Chinese guy, Chinese firm, and he was very nice to me, oh, a real nice person. I says, "First of all, I have no place to live." He says, "Well, behind my" -- he had a big mansion -- he says, "I got one room that's, one cottage there that's open and you can have it." I says, "Well, don't charge me too much." He says, "$50 a month." "Oh, fine." So I rented this place and that's where my daughter, my daughter was born there. And afterwards he says, "My doctor son-in-law is coming back so you have to move." I says, "Okay." So I found a place, this reverend, this Hawaiian reverend, had a house up in the hills so I rented that one. And then after I says, this is stupid paying rent. I got a little money so I'm going to build a home, so I had a contractor named Bob Kaya. I says, "Hey, Bob, how about" -- we took Dale Carnegie together, you see -- "How about building a home?" He says, "Sure. Go to the bank and see if you can get any money." So I had a little banking with this guy named Kusunoki. I says, "Hey, I want to buy a house." He says, "Well, George, we can't approve that." He says well, okay. Then a hakujinhaole man came in the store and I sold furniture to him and I says, "Hey, I want to borrow some money." He says, "What for?" "A house." "Okay. Come down to the office." So I took all of the money out of Kusunoki's bank and put it in his bank. Kusunoki says, "What the heck, George? You do everything opposite." "Well, you didn't give me the loan so I got this loan from this other guy." So he built a home and then I built a home. See, we were building furniture there, too, see, and Bob says, "Well, George, I tell you, we'll give you Philippine mahogany lumber at my cost." I says, "Fine." So I says, "Bob Wo is going to give me lumber at cost." He says, "Okay." I says, "Well, it's $13,000 for a home." Cheap, huh? He says, "Well, we'll knock down $3,000 off and make it 10,000." [Laughs]

DG: Well, I thought Hawaii was on the expensive side.

GF: Oh, it was expensive. At that time it was 19 -- right after the war. It wasn't too bad. I went to decorate a home. They had a called Mikiola Track and they were building homes in there, and I went there to furnish a home. And this guy there says, "Well, you have a piece of property for sale?" He says, "Yeah, we got one of the up the hill there. It's sort of a triangle, angled off property." "But how much do you want for it?" He says $2,500 or something. He says, "Well, I'll give you $2,000 for it. What you say?" He says, "Okay, George, you can have it for $2,000." So I bought the property for $2,000, build a home for 10, that's $12,000. And when I sold that, I sold that for $18,000. Oh, boy, I made some money. [Laughs] But now I go back there they want a hundred thousand dollars for that house. Gosh, almighty. I says that's crazy, I should have kept it, but who knows the future?

<End Segment 42> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.