Densho Digital Archive
Densho Visual History Collection
Title: George Fugami Interview
Narrator: George Fugami
Interviewer: Dee Goto
Location: Seattle, Washington
Date: June 15, 1998
Densho ID: denshovh-fgeorge-01-0006

<Begin Segment 6>

DG: What did he do when he was here?

GF: Oh, he had a -- as far as I know of what my mother told me -- he had a store, cigar store. And so my mother says, "Well, when I come to United States, I'm gonna help him out at the cigar store." So when she came over, he sold the cigar store. [Laughs]

DG: Now this is in Portland?

GF: This was in Portland. And he worked for some hotel, I think, at that time. And so my mother says, "Well, I can't be doing this," so she started housekeeping. Those days, housekeeping was something that they were doing quite a bit. These people that, instead of an apartment, they had housekeeping room, they rented the rooms. I know that's what she had when we were in Astoria. And she had a few Japanese people and some hakujin people in this... they cooked their own, they had a little kitchen probably, and everything. I don't know too much about it, but I was still in the second grade.

DG: So then was this a house or was this more like...

GF: This is a big house, a big house. And I can still picture the big house, great big house, and my dad was working at the cannery up the hill called CPR, Canadian... CPR... Columbia River Packing Company, and he was working there. And then at that time, the big fire in Astoria probably -- I don't know if you ever heard about it, the big fire in Astoria -- and it came pretty close to our place. But we evacuated to the cannery because they thought well, it'll never come up the hill, but it stopped, the fire stopped before it got there. 'Cause if it got there, there was a great big gas station, and that would have probably blown up, see. But fortunately we were all right. [Laughs]

DG: So this was after you were born then, so you remember it.

GF: That was after I was born. See, I was in the first grade. And I flunked the first grade because I couldn't speak English, because Mother always spoke Japanese so we couldn't speak English. So when I was in first grade they said, "Well, George, you better stay one more year in the first grade." So I stayed in first grade, I think, a year and a half. And then they says... well, when graduation come, all my friends were going into the third grade. He says, "No, you go to third grade now." I says, "Why do I skip second grade?" I had a funny incidence. [Laughs]

DG: Okay. Go ahead.

GF: You know, when I was, I think I was in third grade, I didn't know how to raise my finger one or two because you gotta to go to the bathroom, and I did it in my pants. [Laughs] And the teacher was pretty good. She says -- I can still remember -- she says, "I don't know who smells so bad," but she knew it was me, but she just said it that way, "but be sure to get cleaned up tomorrow." I still remember that. But I stayed in the third grade, and then I don't remember.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.