<Begin Segment 9>

RD: So in the sense that you were hanging out with your friends, you're listening to music, you're going to movies, did you feel like you were in an American town?

SY: Well, I thought it was just like any other town because we had a police force, we had a fire engine, or not a real engine, a truck, but we had a fire department. We had a block manager, we had warehouses, my stepfather was in charge of the rice and the beans and so forth. The mess hall people, the doctors, the hospital.

RD: And you had churches, right?

SY: Pardon?

RD: And you had churches?

SY: We had churches, library, a small library.

RD: But there were different religions, right?

SY: Absolutely. But probably the most people went to was the Buddhist church. And the reason for that is because of the parents that were mostly Buddhists.

RD: Was there any division between the Buddhists and the Christians?

SY: Well, they even had Catholic, and I don't think there was any dissention, it was only on Sundays. So to me, I don't go to church, but to me, it's a wonderful social activity It's great for the elderly to meet the other groups of people, it's good for the children, it teaches them the same things. So I think regardless of what church they go to, I think they don't do any harm, they do more good than... but as a kid, I didn't like the long sermon because we wanted to play. We had things that we enjoyed doing. And one of our favorite activities was playing marbles, and so I used to have holes in my pants and our parents used to sew 'em up, or my mother used to sew 'em up. And my last name is Yabu, and Yabu means "torn." And so my nickname was "yabureta pantsu," torn pants. And even when I see Aki Yoshimura, he always refers to me, "Hey Yabureta, how are you?" referring to the torn pants I used to wear.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2010 Raechel Donahue and Garrett Lindemann and Densho. All Rights Reserved.