<Begin Segment 3>

SO: So you went to Japanese school five days a week?

GM: Yeah. I think it was five days a week and it was held at the Buddhist temple there.

SO: So your day was, go to school, go to American school, go to Japanese school, and then did you have chores after?

GM: Yeah, we went home.

SO: And what were those?

GM: Mainly around the house type of thing. We didn't go out in the field because I was too young then. The house was kind of out in the field. It was next to a dairy farm. There weren't that many chores to do but I remember, maybe this was a little bit later on, that as kids we used to have to wash the rice for dinner, and of course, let it soak for a half an hour before my mother came home and cooked it.

SO: What was the process for doing that?

GM: Well, you measured whatever it was, usually two cups rice I think, washed it, rinsed , then you let it sit. Let it soak. One of the other chores was we had a Japanese bath and we had to build a fire underneath this tub to heat the water, and that's when my brother and I more or less did all this together.

SO: So the Japanese bath meaning, you wash yourself off first, and then...

GM: Get in the hot tub...

SO: And everybody uses it.

GM: Yes. Regular Japanese furo, I guess my father couldn't get away from that. I think that's built when you move some places.

SO: What was the summer like? Did you still go to Japanese school?

GM: No. I don't remember us in the summers. Summers were basically out in the fields, I think. I remember I used to run though the fields with an empty tin bucket, hitting it with a stick, to make noise to chase the birds away and that kind of stuff.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright ©2009 Densho and the Twin Cities JACL. All Rights Reserved.