<Begin Segment 4>

LD: Where were you -- let's go all the way to, why don't you tell me a little bit more about what your life was like growing up in Hawaii. You know, like you didn't work on a plantation, some people worked on a planation. What was your life like growing up? You were just thinking back, and think about the main things in your life that you remember, what would you say? What was your life like as a kid? Did you work very hard, going to school, were you pampered, special treatment because you had seven sisters, only you, they all looked after you? How would you describe your life in the family and your life out and around? How would you describe your life? What do you really remember?

KY: Well, I guess my life, when I was young -- when I say young, grammar school age to junior high school -- I suppose it's almost like any other American kid, like football, baseball, joined the Boy Scouts and go camping, join the YMCA, go camping. I think I had a pretty full, enjoyable life as a youth.

LD: How much time did you spend with your father when you were young? How did he influence you? Was your father very important to you?

KY: My father was a busy man, having his own business, and he was expanding quite a bit, having a large family. We had a store and a restaurant, which were all long hours, you know. But it wasn't so bad because in the old days, why, like most of the Japanese immigrants, if they had a store, they would be living in the back, or we used to live upstairs of the store. So even though he was busy, we always ate together in the back of the store, the kitchen, so we ate together. And the family was pretty close in the sense that even though he was busy and long hours, we all used to see him and eat together.

LD: You'd see him easily.

KY: Yeah.

[Interruption]

LD: If you can describe, what was your father like?

KY: My father was, as I say, a very busy man. He was a disciplinarian, he was strict. When we were kids, he wouldn't let us go to the pool hall, he wouldn't let us play cards. And if we were, said to come home and strum an ukulele, he said, "When?" He said, "It's not good be playing ukulele." He used to really be strict on us like that. But he used to take us out to the beach, beaches with the kids in the car and so forth. He used to guide us quite well.

LD: How about your mother? What was your mother like?

KY: Well, Mom, my mother was a busy woman because, actually, with ten, eleven children and running a store, restaurant, she was really busy. But fortunately we had seven girls in the family, and they were all older than I am, so that actually eased the burden of my mother quite a bit. It was those days where you had no washing machine and things like that.

LD: What did you feel was expected of you? As the oldest boy, what did you think was expected of you?

KY: Well, I think... you see, my father was real strict on me. He was exceptionally strict because I was the first son, I suppose, in order to carry on the business. And he used to... say we used to go to Japanese language school, and football, like say a junior high school football game, if I wanted to go to a game, he wouldn't let me go. He said, "Go to Japanese school." He used to be strict in that sense, that he wanted us to really study and make something of yourself instead of doing things like that.

LD: Then you had to give up the football game.

KY: Yeah, well, I used to sneak out and go, and boy, I used to get a whipping from that. [Laughs] For cutting class. Gee, all the friends are going, so they urge you to go, so you sneak out sometimes.

LD: You'd sneak out from school?

KY: Yeah, don't go to Japanese school and go to a football game.

LD: Sometimes you'd get caught?

KY: Oh, yeah, then the school principal will call my father and say, "Your son didn't come to class today," then he'll find out where did we go and things like that.

LD: The principal would call?

KY: Yeah, the principal would call and say, "Your son was absent today." He knows there's a football game going on.

LD: So your father would beat up on you.

KY: He wouldn't beat us up, but then would really...

LD: How would your father punish you?

KY: Well, he'd just give us a good lecture.

LD: What did he say?

KY: He says... there's an old Japanese saying, they say that's not proper to do such a thing.

LD: How does he say that to you in Japanese? What would he say?

KY: Oh, he would say, "[inaudible]," which means that this is not a proper thing to do, it lacks in spirit kind of idea.

LD: Did you stop doing it then?

KY: Yeah, well, I didn't cut class too often.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 1985 The Center for Educational Telecommunications and Densho. All Rights Reserved.