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TI: So Nelson, I'm trying to, a little... clarify something. So earlier you talked about after December 7th, you went, from school you went back home. And you said things weren't too bad then, right after Pearl Harbor. And then you went back to school and you were there for... January, February, maybe three months, and then April you came back. It sounds like during that time, it was very hard on your father, that he was...

NA: Oh, yes, it was hard on the farm.

TI: So that was a difficult time when you were, actually, probably mostly at school, and your father was not leaving the house, very fearful. And so when you came back in April, when you returned home, what was the house like? Was it, did it feel a lot different?

NA: Oh, it was. I had to take a taxi. When I left, when I left San Luis Obispo, that's another story. When I left San Luis Obispo from school, I went to the police department because I was instructed by my brother to pick up a travel permit. I didn't know why, I didn't ask him any questions. But anyway, I walked to the police station and asked for a travel permit, and instead of a travel permit, they just made me sign a form stating I would never, I will never come back to San Luis Obispo again. And then from there, after picking that, signing that, the policeman let me go, and next stop was the bus stop, bus station. So I walked, I walked from the school to the police station and down, and then from there I walked from the police station to the bus depot and bought my own ticket with my own money for a ride home. But it was for Tulare, which was seventeen miles away. And when I got into Tulare, it was already dark, nine o'clock or something. I pleaded with the taxi driver, that was the only thing, only way I could get home from Tulare. So I pleaded with him, "Hey, take me to Lindsay," which was still seventeen miles away, and he, he hawed around and says, "Okay, I'll take you," because I told him, "You'll get paid, don't worry." And it was a good thing, to this day I thank him because he could have turned me in to the police department because I didn't know that the restriction, travel restriction and curfew was in effect. So right then and there, I could have been picked up. But anyway, it turned out that he didn't turn me in, so he took me home. And all the time I was going home, I says, "Oh boy, this is gonna be a good welcome home." So I go home, no light on the house, so I walked up to the door and the door was locked. It never was locked before I left for college. And so I knocked on the door and my brother answered the knock, and as soon as he opened it for me, he pulled me in and he said, "Hurry up, get inside," and then I told him my situation. So he counted out fifteen dollars or whatever the taxi fare was, in the dark, he counted it out. And he gave me the money and I gave it to the bus driver, taxi driver, and he went on his way and I went back in. And there was no explanation at all that night. I just went to bed 'cause everybody else was in their bedroom already, they didn't come out at all. They were petrified, because the following day I found that Dad was, Dad thought it was the FBI that stopped in front to come pick him up. And so that's why the house had no light on, it was dark. And so I found out quite a bit the following morning, Dad was petrified, and then everybody else, naturally, was petrified, and it was like that every night even after I got home, no light on after dark.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.