<Begin Segment 13>

DC: And then he went back to San Francisco and started the business?

CM: Well, he started out as a... gosh, I don't know what they call it.

MM: Producer, miso producer.

CM: No, no before that. Well, they had worked at the labor in a restaurant. You know, they start from dishwasher on up. And then he built up a certain capital, then his first business he bought a laundry shop that took in laundry and all that. That was his first business. And then Mother come in there and they helped together. And after that, then he went into this miso business, manufacturing miso. And he was doing quite well, and then from there, that was 1925 that I was five years old. My folks wanted to see my grandparents, so we went back to Japan in 1925 and stayed there for half a year and then come back to U.S.

DC: So that's when you were a little boy?

CM: Right.

DC: Do you remember anything about being in Japan in 1925?

CM: Oh, yes.

DC: What do you remember?

CM: Oh, the steamship, as a, like a tourist there on a steamship, I enjoyed that boat ride, it was very nice. And to Japan, and I had no problem with their food, because we were Japanese, my mother was making Japanese food so it was very simple. But like I said, going back to sanitation system, that was a shocker because it's not like the American style and that was a little problem. But outside of that it was nothing at all. Being Japanese and being in Japan, you've got the same face, so we did all right.

DC: What was it like growing up Japanese American in San Francisco?

CM: I just have a short memory of San Francisco, I was just born there, but at the age of five, went to Japan, and when we come back we settled in Southern California, Los Angeles, right after that.

DC: I see. And did your dad continue his miso manufacturing business in Southern California?

CM: No, he discontinued that, and then he got into working for a flower grower and then got into the florist business. And after a year or so, he was able to start his own business.

DC: Was he a florist then?

CM: Hmm?

DC: Did he start his own flower shop?

CM: Yes.

DC: I see. Did you grow up helping in the flower shop?

CM: Yes.

DC: Did they do any flower arranging, like Japanese style?

CM: No. Well, it was strictly all American style, none of the Japanese flower arrangement thing. It was all retail.

MM: Tell them about when you had to deliver the flower to a funeral house. [Laughs]

CM: Yeah, that was quite an experience. For rosary there you deliver flower and they won't accept it at the front door so you have to go through the back door, you go to the back door you see all kinds of corpse, dead people, you know, they worked on, and oh that was, and that was late evening, that was really scary. That was the worst part of that flower business when you had to deliver to a mortuary late at evening, they want you to go to the back door.

<End Segment 13> - Copyright © 2012 New Mexico JACL and Densho. All Rights Reserved.