<Begin Segment 6>

HK: So, but as I said earlier, I thought that the renunciation was a big mistake. That we didn't really have -- we made our point already. And I don't know, they really wanted to make it clear, I guess, that we don't need this citizenship. And so I think it was started by some people who were going to go back to Japan anyway, and then we got kind of suckered into that so that... but, yeah, there were many times when I wished I hadn't done that. That was unnecessary, I think. But... and then being in Tule Lake was, you know, you don't dare say that you were in Tule Lake, because then right away, you know, they know, "Ah, you were there and you were disloyal, and you were a 'no-no,'" and so forth. So to kind of hide that all the time was a, was a real burden, yeah. But I find that people don't, have never, some people have never revealed that. And slowly I get to know people who were in Tule Lake. I came out, so to speak, in 19-, I don't know when it was. Pretty early, 1974 or '5, yeah, when the Sansei started this camp, trying to look into the camp experience. And somebody heard that I was in Tule Lake and they asked me to speak, and I spoke. That was in 1974 or '5. And I went to the second Tule Lake reunion, which was in '75, so it must have been around '74. And so... yeah.

EO: Who were you hiding this from?

HK: Probably from... well, I don't know if I should say myself, but from, from other Japanese, and then from people in California who knew about the camps, Tule Lake, they read about it in the papers, I guess. But I don't know. It was easy with the veterans, you know. They didn't care where you were, because they probably didn't know. And I went to school with a lot of veterans after the war, and made some good friends with some of them. But they thought that we were treated wrongly and they were for us. But I think it was mainly from other Japanese Americans. And they, in a way, to make themselves look better, would say that they had been east. You know, they were, they were loyal Americans. People, even people in Tule Lake, to make it look good, they, when they were released, they took a trip east on the government expense, and then they stayed there a short while and then they came on back to California so they could say that they were back east. I don't know, there was a great stigma of being in Tule Lake. Of having been "no-no" or disloyal because of all that bad publicity that Tule Lake had.

EO: So within the community...

HK: Yeah.

CO: There was a real shame with that.

HK: Yeah. And I think that's the reason I didn't go back to my old community. Because JACL, you know, took the leadership of resettling and so those who were in Tule Lake, in Placer County there were a whole lot of people from Tule Lake. And some of them had to live this down all the years, and they never talk about it. And they feel that they get along as a community. JACL. Of course, some people don't like the JACL so they don't take part in any of the activities, but it was the JACL that first, right after the war, they sort of made it easy for the Japanese with their public relations and activities and things like that. So I guess people joined the JACL and participated and they tried to forget. And in trying to forget, of course, they never talked about it.

CO: Of course, it was JACL that opposed restoring citizenship.

HK: I know. I know. And they opposed on the resisters, and the Tule Lake people. Yeah, they were responsible for all that. So I never joined the JACL, I had nothing to do with them. But if you lived in a small community as some of these people did, they had to join. And, and... yeah, they don't talk about it.

EO: So does it make you feel like a criminal?

HK: Yeah. Yeah. In many ways, we felt like we had done something wrong, yeah. So I didn't go back, and I went to L.A. and tried to be, you know, get lost, lose myself. And that's pretty hard, if you meet other Japanese Americans, they always ask you, "Well, what camp were you in?" you know. And then you're forced to say a lie, but I didn't like to lie. So yeah, that was that problem.

EO: I just want to take it a little step further for our audience about what it did to the community.

HK: The community.

EO: The divisions.

HK: Yeah. There, there was a division, and I guess it still exists. When you really come down to it, I was doing a play on this loyalty problem and I wanted to interview some veterans and I asked the museum people, and they said, "Well, it's going to be hard talking to some of the veterans." And so I didn't pursue that. I talked with a veteran who was willing to talk, and I really didn't get that. But yeah, some of these veterans won't talk to those who were in Tule Lake. And I, I was trying to get the whole picture, get their side, but couldn't because they wouldn't talk.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 1992, 2003 Densho and Emiko Omori. All Rights Reserved.