<Begin Segment 8>

SY: It's interesting that Pearl was someone who influenced you a lot growing up. How did she influence you? What sorts of values did she instill?

MN: Well, she was a beautiful woman. She was a blue-eyed blond. And when I went to school, I noticed that the girl that sat in front of me had long corkscrew curls, and I didn't look the same. She told me, she said that, "Even though you don't look the same as the other students in your class, you are an American citizen just like the rest of them. So you shouldn't feel any different than they are." Luckily, the kids in this class, they treated me just like everybody else. And so I never felt any racial prejudice all through school. And that was the kind of advice that stuck with me. "You're just like everybody else, you're an American citizen." So I always kept that in the back of my head. So all my business doings and things, I don't think I woulda had the courage to do some of the things I did, if I didn't have that thought.

SY: When you grew up in Lake City, it was a time when there were very few people of color. Did you ever wish that you looked different from the way you did?

MN: Well, I did, not because (...) I didn't want to be a Japanese. It was because all the girls had such pretty hair. So Pearl said, "When you're nine, we'll dye your hair blond." And so then (...) I felt all better about that. So, but when I became nine, I'd forgotten all about it. [Laughs]

SY: Did you ever begin to think that your hair was beautiful the way it was?

MN: Well, not until I was in college. Somehow, my hair grew long, and it was quite attractive. (...) At noon, I'd go to the ladies' room and there was always another girl there. And she had the most gorgeous red hair, and I thought, "What beautiful hair." And she used to say, "You have beautiful hair." Then she said, "Well, I go to the beauty parlor once a week." So I thought, hers isn't natural, mine is. [Laughs]

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.