<Begin Segment 20>

SY: But so when you finally left, did you have any inclination, did your parents say this is, "We're leaving," or...

NG: I was just so happy.

SY: They told you and they said...

NG: I was really, really happy.

SY: You were really happy.

NG: Yeah. I mean, it was just, it was hard. Everybody else was doing things and we just... you know, and I wouldn't, I know my dad would've, but I just couldn't ask him, take me here, take me there. It just was too much. and so, yeah, I was very happy. I had no -- I'm sure my mom was very sad.

SY: Really?

NG: Yeah, I'm sure she was.

SY: Because she liked...

NG: It was safe for her. She had good friends there. She didn't have to worry about anything. And then, plus my dad now is venturing into a new territory, right? To open up his own business. But she was good, 'cause it was hard that first year. He worked it, with my uncle was not really enough money coming in for both families, and he was, that first year was hard, but she said, "No, this is what you wanted. They tell you have to at least stick it out three years, so we should stick it out." Then in the meantime, my uncle could not take that job. He decided to go work in the produce market, so then it was just my dad, so it was definitely enough money for my dad. They worked, he worked early, opened up at six and didn't come home until seven. My mom worked with him.

SY: And it was a garage?

NG: It was a, no, it was a gas station, Texaco gas station. But then he would do work, people who had... there was a garage. It was another, they had mechanics in the back, but for people who wanted, he would do extra work.

SY: And this was where exactly?

NG: In Sun Valley.

SY: Sun Valley, so, when your family moved back they settled in...

NG: Yeah, so we, in Pacoima, we, my grandparents lived in this shack. It was a kitchen and two rooms and a, two rooms and a bathroom. And so we stayed with them until we... my parents saved like forty thousand dollars. I mean, in that time, that's a lot of money for that time.

SY: That's pretty good, yeah.

NG: So, because there's no, you don't pay rent, you don't go anywhere. I mean, what else is there to do but saving money? Even though you're only making a dollar something an hour. But, so right after, we stayed with my grandmother for a short time until we bought the house, also in the, it's called North, no, it's called Mission Hill right now.

SY: So how, how had your parents ended up in Pacoima? I mean your grandparents, I'm sorry.

NG: Because they're all in the Valley, right, so --

SY: So right after the war?

NG: So right after the war they, they had a trailer, my grandparents, and they lived with their eldest son, which is the way it's supposed to be, but never in his house. His house was a shack too 'cause they were not renting or, selling or renting to Japanese at that time, so there was this little shack that they lived in. And my uncle had this, my auntie was absolutely wonderful, his wife, and so as long as she was alive everything was fine. But as soon as she died, then that's when things, it didn't, it didn't go well with my grandparents because my grandmother, they're simple people. They have just one way of doing things, and the Japanese, this is how we do it, and my uncle, he's a Japanese American. He doesn't want to do it this way, so right after his wife died, of course my mother, my grandmother wants him to go to Japan and find a wife 'cause he's got these three boys to raise. He says, "I'm not gonna do that." So more and more all kinds of friction like that, and so he just kicked 'em out, their trailer out of his property, and they took their trailer to my aunt for a while until they rented this little place.

SY: I see. And that's when you, your family came back.

NG: Yeah. As soon as we came back they moved in with us.

AK: What year was that?

NG: So '55.

SY: '55. So when everybody, you were the only ones, really, who left the family after the war.

NG: Right, yeah.

SY: And they all settled in that Valley area.

NG: They all stayed in the Valley. Yeah, they did, except, for my uncle who married. He was always in East Los Angeles, my Uncle Bo, the one that...

SY: Was in the army.

NG: Yeah.

SY: And so before the war all of their belongings and all of their things that they had, what happened to them? What happened to the, they were all renting houses, I assume?

NG: I don't think, yeah, I think they were all renting. I don't think they owned anything, yeah.

SY: And, yeah, you don't --

NG: And I think they got rid of their belongings just like everybody else. I told you that story about my dad, that the government said they'll keep it for you. [Laughs] And he says yeah, that's -- and he was talking to his friends, "Let's do that," and they said, "Are you crazy? They're not gonna keep it for us." And then for him to say "no-no" when here he trusted the government, but he was just angry.

SY: Yeah. He thought that, I think you mentioned that he didn't think that you would even have to go to camp, right?

NG: Yeah, he didn't, he felt the war's not gonna be long. Japan's gonna lose. It's gonna be very short.

SY: That is amazing that they switched, they answered "no-no."

NG: Yeah. [Laughs]

SY: So now that your grandparents' trailer was --

NG: No trailer now. There's no more trailer 'cause they had gotten rid of that trailer and bought, not bought, but rented.

SY: That's right. That's right, the house.

<End Segment 20> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.