Densho Digital Archive - Tats Kojima Interview (denshovh-ktats-01-0004)

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TK: When we got to camp, all I remember is they told us, you know, "You go to Block 3." And then we unloaded and just, we went to where they told us to go. And of course, I think we registered, too. We gotta put, write our names, and... then we were... oh God, I can't remember the barrack we were in. But we were with... who was it? Terashitas, I remember Tosh Terashita was in there. And I think the Nishis were in there with me. First, you know, there's two and we were separated by a screen or I can't remember what it was. It wasn't a partition or anything, it's just a blanket or sheet or something that separated the two families. And then from there it was just camp. And I remember at camp all we did was eat and... it was April, so yeah, we ate, and there was a lotta dust. Oh, wait a minute. We were in Manzanar and it was sure dusty. That's all I remember, it was really dusty.

But, then we moved to Minidoka -- oh, we went, that's right, in the summer we were in Manzanar and then in the fall they wanted beet picker, beet harvesters. So, we picked Pocatello and -- it was Nakashimas that we went to in Pocatello -- and some of them went to Montana, and I still remember that. And at Nakashimas, we met Nakashimas and I remember Rito and Junko, and, the younger sister, and there was Rito and I can't remember the other person. Anyway, and then... oh, the Nakaos went with us. And they cooked for us and me and Toke Chihara, I think, was in that group. And then from there, the Nakaos and us took us to Minidoka to see the camp. And, they didn't arrange it, but we knew they were gonna arrange us to go -- through Paul Ohtaki and Bainbridge Review -- we were gonna go to Minidoka. So we went there to see the camp. And then we went back to Manzanar and then they brought us back to Manzanar and then they took us to Minidoka from there, I think. So it was in the spring that we came to Minidoka. That was a wet... we went from a dry dusty place to a wet, muddy... yeah. And then Minidoka, that fall, yeah, I went to school... was it '42?, it was '41, '42, '43, I graduated in Minidoka.