<Begin Segment 14>

JS: So your younger sister and brother, they were living there and going to school, but you went to San Francisco to live as a schoolgirl and came back?

BK: Uh-huh.

JS: That was your junior year when you came back to Isleton?

BK: Yeah.

JS: So you finished school in Rio Vista.

BK: Rio Vista.

JS: And what do you remember about going to school in Rio Vista?

BK: Well, when I first went back there and the principal called us in for assembly, all the Japanese, and told us to behave, something made me get up and tell him to go to hell.

JS: What made you get up?

BK: I mean, why is he telling us to behave? He should be telling the whole school to behave, and that we're not aliens, we're normal people of different color.

JS: Do you remember people, when you were in camp, ready to leave camp, did they give you messages about what to do when you had a transition back?

BK: No, uh-uh.

TI: So, Betty, I'm curious, when you told the principal to go to hell...

BK: Huh?

TI: When you told the principal to go to hell, what was his reaction?

BK: Nothing. Nothing.

TI: What about the other Japanese students? What did they, or how did they react? Did they say anything to you after that?

BK: I don't think they cared... I don't know if it's caring or what, but like my girlfriend was in the different stall in gym, and this girl, she was from a German family, and she would tie her shoelaces or open the shower curtain and tell everybody to come and see what a "yellow Jap" looked like. And I said, "Why are you standing there just crying? Why don't you go after her?" So I went after her with no clothes on. And I don't know where I got all this, being assertive.

JS: So it was mostly after camp when you found yourself responding to racism or injustice.

BK: Yeah.

JS: But when you went to camp, before, when you left, were you aware of, sort of, the racism or, in terms of the segregation?

BK: No. Because, like I say, in Isleton, I mean, Japantown was Japantown, and Chinatown was Chinatown, and the whites were over there someplace. So, I mean, you know, we weren't all mixed together.

JS: So there wasn't much interaction.

BK: No, uh-uh.

JS: And you didn't face that.

BK: No.

JS: So the only thing that was negative in terms of your interaction was walking down the street in Chinatown near the gambling houses.

BK: Yeah.

JS: So how did you, so did you understand why you were sent away? 'Cause earlier you said, oh, you were excited, because the first time you're gonna get to leave Isleton. When did it hit you that the Japanese were being removed, why the Japanese were being removed?

BK: I don't think it ever does.

JS: You didn't realize?

BK: Yeah. 'Cause when I see certain things, like I took our youngest son on, I think it was our centennial to Tule Lake pilgrimage, and realized then that I was in camp here. And my son said, "Why?" He's the one that's interested in my writing my book. [Laughs] So I don't think... because young as I was, I didn't, I just did things when it came to me, like telling the principal to go to hell.

JS: So you were surprised yourself of that response and where that came from.

BK: Yeah. Well, even with other nationality kids like the Filipinos, my girlfriend said, "How come you're hanging around with Filipinos? They're bad people." Well, because in Isleton, they were more like pimping and the crimes were against most of the Filipinos.

JS: Because at the time, they were mostly bachelors. There wasn't too many families.

BK: Yeah.

JS: But you did have a few friends that were Filipino from school?

BK: Yeah. One of 'em, I got reacquainted after we came out of camp, she was living in Stockton and went to her fiftieth birthday.

JS: How about any of the fellow Chinese classmates? Were you friends with them after?

BK: It was real funny because I went to our fiftieth high school graduation reunion, and all us Japanese sat in one... all the whites sat in another place, then all the Chinese sat in the other place. And I said, "Why are we doing this?" I don't know. I mean, you don't need security, so why are we doing this? And yet, you didn't feel like you're welcome, because one lady, Chinese lady, she came from San Francisco, and she talked to me, but none of the other classmates did. Because we never communicated anyway when we were growing up. I mean, we went to the same school, and that was about it. And even in school, you're just in the same class. I mean, you don't talk about social things, you don't talk about fun things, you just went to school.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright (c) 2009 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.