<Begin Segment 3>

TI: So let's back up a little bit, so let's talk about your siblings. So in 1915, you had twin, were they brothers or sisters?

NA: Brothers, twin brothers.

TI: Twin brothers. And then after your twin brothers, what was next?

NA: Two years later, they had a daughter, and her name was Fusako, and she also was taken back by her grandpa to Japan, so the three of them lived in Japan until they graduated high school.

TI: And then after Fusako, who was next?

NA: Then came a boy, and in 1921, and his name was Harry, and then I came in 1923. And then in 1925, my sister was born, my sister May. And then we had a son two years later, but he was stillborn. And then another girl was born, and her name was Betty. And then the last was a girl, Marie.

TI: Okay, so two, four, six... it was a large family, with the first three, the twin brothers and your older sister, were sent to Japan where they were raised up to high school.

NA: Yes, up to, after they graduated high school, then they came back.

TI: And then your brother Harry and younger all stayed...

NA: All stayed in the United States.

TI: In the United States. So let's talk a little bit about your, your twin brothers and sister. So why were they taken to Japan again? Explain that again.

NA: I think that was the custom those days, that they get sent to Japan for their education, and sure enough, they got their education and came, and then they came back and they knew very little English. They remembered a little from infancy, but they were fluent in Japanese, and they were called Kibeis. So they were what they called Kibeis.

TI: And how did it feel when you met your older brothers? I mean, they were quite a bit older than you were.

NA: They were eight years older than me, and I was practicing up on my Japanese when Dad said, "Your brothers are coming back," and what would that be? Eight, eight plus... thirteen, twenty, would that be in '29?

TI: You mean the year?

NA: '30?

TI: Yeah, probably around, I'm guessing they were, 1915, they finished high school about, when they were about eighteen years old?

NA: Uh-huh, eighteen years old.

TI: So that'd be about 1933.

NA: Okay, that's about right. So 1933, when I heard they were coming back, I started practicing my Japanese that I learned in Japanese school. And when I first met them, I started speaking to them in Japanese. [Laughs]

TI: And what was their reaction when they heard you?

NA: I guess they were happy to see me as well as I was happy to see them.

TI: So although you had not seen them very much, there was a fondness, kind of a brotherly fondness for them?

NA: I beg your pardon?

TI: That you were fond or you were happy to see them, even though you had...

NA: Yes, right, we were happy to see them. And since they were eight years older than me, and my dad was quite a businessman, and so all these, all the years he was sending money back to Japan, to Grandma, who was taking care of the three, but on top of that, he was also saving most of the money that he was making selling nursery trees and working for Mr. Cairns. So by the time the boys came back, the twins came back, he had enough money to buy a farm. So he bought one, and up to then, he couldn't buy a farm because the Isseis, due to the California discrimination law, they could not own property. So there he had, he had money, but no property. So as soon as the boys came, twins came back, they were old enough, Dad said, "Well, it's time to buy land." So all these, money that he had accumulated, he bought a 10-acre piece farm, a 40-acre piece farm, and put it all in the boys' name, twins' name. And so now, Dad got his other dream. The first dream was coming to America, get rich quick and go back home, or to actually settle in the United States because he found out it was a land of opportunity, he was making all kinds of money. And so I'm... so here he was, he had all this money to buy all this lands, so he bought... did I mention the 10-acre piece and the 40-acre pieces? And then as the years went by, he had an opportunity to buy a pool hall in the, in town, so he bought a pool hall. And it had a beer parlor in it, and Dad liked his alcohol. And so I'm quite sure that's why he bought the pool hall, because it had the beer parlor, and he'd go over there and...

TI: And so when you said your father liked the alcohol, was it like, with his friends he would like to have...

NA: Socialize?

TI: Socialize.

NA: Right. It started out with sake, you know. In the years during the prohibition, the Japanese from Japan still had their liquor, they could make sake out of rice. And so Dad used to socialize by going to his friend and drink a sake and then he would invite others to come and to have social drinks with him. And then on top of that, after work, I guess he used to patronize that beer parlor after work, and he finally bought it. And then he bought another...

TI: Yeah, before we go there, I'm interested about the sake. So it sounds like farmers would make their own sake. Were there some that were known as better sake-makers than others? Did they ever talk about that, like, "This farmer had the best sake and this one didn't?'

NA: I didn't hear about that, but I knew, I knew some of the families where the father made the sake, the kids used to get into it and they, they would come, come to school. We all went to the same country school because it was more or less segregated. No farmer's kid ever went into town to go to school, we all had to go to a school two miles away out in the country, and that's where all the Japanese farmers' kids like me attended grade school, first to eighth grade. And it was only a two-room school, first to fourth grade was one room, and fifth to eighth grade was the other room.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Topaz Museum. All Rights Reserved.