<Begin Segment 5>

TI: So Sunday school was all, was it in Japanese, the Sunday school and the services, or was it English?

DM: No, in English.

TI: And Sunday school, too, was it in English?

DM: Yes, English. 'Cause us guys were kids yet, so, you know, if they start speaking Japanese strongly, we wouldn't know.

[Interruption]

TI: Yeah, so that's why I was curious. Because a lot of times, there are some places were Japanese was always spoken, so I was curious, in the church, it was English, though. So were they like older Nisei that taught Sunday school?

DM: (Yes), some that are older.

JS: So when did you learn English? Did you learn English when you went to school or... when did you start speaking English?

DM: English?

JS: Uh-huh.

DM: Well, we speak English in Walnut Grove, but most of the time, small towns all Japanese, so they all speak Japanese. But at school, we speak English.

JS: I see. But since you were the youngest and your older siblings were already going to school, they were speaking English. Did they speak English at home, or Japanese at home?

DM: Well, half and half, you know, they speak Japanese, too. It's a small town, and that's all they speak is Japanese. So you know, but earlier time it was all Japanese. That was the bad part of it. I wish I would have learned English better before.

TI: But about your Japanese, you earlier said the Japanese that you used in Walnut Grove was kind of like a broken Japanese. So when you went to maybe other places like Sacramento or others, did the Japanese, was the Japanese different in other places?

DM: Well, when you go other places, we don't speak Japanese. But in camp, those people knew where we were from, 'cause we speak funny. [Laughs]

TI: That's why I was curious. So it's almost like a dialect, almost. Like a Walnut Grove, they knew that you were from...

DM: It's like a broken English, like, you know, some Japanese. We don't speak right, I guess. That's why I don't say much; I stay quiet. [Laughs]

<End Segment 5> - Copyright (c) 2009 Densho and Preserving California's Japantowns. All Rights Reserved.