<Begin Segment 32>

EO: So in Leupp, you answered "no-no." Is that... how did you answer?

HU: "No-no," yeah.

EO: And so you were taken... what happened after you answered, "no-no"?

HU: Well, then Robertson doesn't say too much, you know. He doesn't object or anything. He just took 'em. And then I think about fifty-three of us, I think, I'm not too sure, fifty-three or forty-three of us, took 'em to the Tule Lake by Robertson. And we're stuck in Stockton for quite a while because the train was pretty busy to transport the soldiers, see. So Robertson, he spent his own money and went to the town and buy the Chinese food for all of us. [Laughs]

Then eventually we land in Tule Lake, into the stockade, all of us. And I tell you what the stockade... they had a bunch of people in there, already. And you know the Reverend Kai, see the way yonder, just a small tents there. And just wondering, "What's that?" I ask the people. He said, "Reverend Kai in there." He's alone, he been put out there, because he was the head of the negotiating committee in Tule Lake, the strikes stuff. And I know that Best used a lot of informers in the, inside the stockade. The stockade today is small but much bigger. They had a whole bunch of people there. And they're watching all the individuals, see. Robertson expect to, people been released into the camp but Best said no, he want to observe the people; get the information every one of them. So I been there for, I think, seven or eight days. You're watching, you know, because the strike is going on, and people sympathize with the Tule Lake people's strike; that way they talk with other people they could observe that some people were watching that and they give information to the administration. But I don't know really what the strike about, anything, so I don't sympathize or favor or against anything. So I kept to myself. And it was terrible in the stockade. You get a big plate of rice there. You know, you get squid, they small like that. You get one head for the side dish or one leg for the -- [laughs] -- just a soy sauce, that's all. And then you got a tsukemono is a, couple piece of carrots, that's all. They haven't got anything there, because the strike and the people from other camps, harvest small.

EO: This is the farming agricultural strike.

HU: Yeah, they got nothing. Chickens gone, hog is gone, no meat, nothing. Yeah, it's terrible. And they had a bunch of people there, old-timers, I hear they've been eating good, but not us. Well, my family is still in Manzanar. Then about eight or ten days, I'm not too sure, something like that, a week anyway, I'd been in there, and finally they let me out, and they give me an apartment. Kurihara went out the day before, and another... Sato, and another man, three men went out earlier. And I went out next day, and Best come over to my apartment, over there. I went into the apartment. I asked, requisitioned for the stove, 'cause Tule Lake in December, January, minus ten sometime, they get ice on the water pool in there, see. Very cold. But they said, "The strike now, you won't get nothing." [Laughs] Well, I get by, then Best come over and said, "You know, Harry, you went through a lot but please in here don't mix in politics; I'll try to bring your family as soon as possible." I said, "Yes, Mr. Best. I don't mix in any politic. I just wait to go back to Japan," I told him. "And nothing else," I told him. So he came over a couple of times, but, "I don't want to come too often. People think you're a stool pigeon or something right away out here, they're very nervous," I told him -- he said.

<End Segment 32> - Copyright © 1994, 2003 Densho and Emiko Omori. All Rights Reserved.