<Begin Segment 27>

AI: And what about, can you tell me much about any kind of demonstrations? My understanding is there were some acts of even violence at times.

CN: We heard a lot and there was a lot of violence going on. Not so much in our block or in our, in our ward, it seemed. A lot of people in our block stayed from -- they were from Hood River and Bellevue and Tacoma -- and a lot of those people stayed on.

AI: So it was a fairly stable group?

CN: Yeah, uh-huh. So we didn't have the kind of experience that some of the other people had where a good many people from the other camps had come in and kind of taken over. So maybe that was, I think, that was the reason why ours was pretty stable. And we did observe a lot of this demonstration as they serpentined down the fire break, yelling and all.

AI: And did your father comment on this at all to you or have any opinion?

CN: Yeah. He was, he was worried about it, but I think this is after my mother died, and so he was not involved in any of those kind of things. I don't know what would have happened if he hadn't been grieving. And so we kind of, I guess I mentioned, we became very close. We coalesced as a family. Not that we were all, all that apart, but we, the three of us, really clung to each other and helped each other. We had friends. My sister had her own friends and I had mine. But, and my father played go and shogi and that kind of stuff with his friends.

AI: And did you have any kind of discussion at all about... I know at that time there was quite a bit of discussion among some people about expatriating.

CN: Sure, sure. Yeah, we discussed that, not that we would go back to Japan.

AI: So that was something that you and your father didn't really consider?

CN: No, nor my sister. Some of her friends were considering it.

AI: What were some of things that caused people to consider that?

CN: A lot of these people were Kibei, and they were very much -- and quite a few from Hawaii and California. I didn't notice any other Kibeis from Washington being involved. A lot of that was southern California and Hawaii. We were saying that it was because they were hot. [Laughs] So we were well aware of it because it was in the newspapers and people would... my sister worked at one of the co-ops and she would hear a great deal and come home and tell us some of these horrible things that were happening.

<End Segment 27> - Copyright © 1998 Densho. All Rights Reserved.