Densho Digital Archive - Jiro Sugidono Interview (denshovh-sjiro-01-0010)

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TI: And so how frequently did you go to Japanese school?

JS: I think we used to go two or three times a week, right after school. We used to -- Japanese school was right there, right on lower Main, a block... (yes), right there by Union Street. That's where it used to be the, where the Nisei had a baseball field, then we had a big Toyo Hall there, where we had Japanese movies and everything, get-together, and in the front of it they had Japanese school. And they had a room for the teacher's family. It was pretty, they had about two or three rooms, it was pretty good. Then we, later on, we had two Japanese teacher, one was Mr. Motoki, he was Watsonville. Then later he went to San Francisco, and he was more, I think, born over here. But the other one was from Japan. But then, see, that Japanese school is right near the levee, and we used to always go to the levee first. [Laughs]

TI: So the levee to go, what, swimming?

JS: Pajaro River. But it's not like now; all that time we, prewar days, they have a, the river was pretty. Lot of birds, that's why they call it Pajaro, birds, birdy. But heck, now it's, it's all, it got bad because they dumped lot of things, everything there.

TI: But back in the '30s, you would go play at the levee before you would...

JS: (Yes), we used to go over there and, bunch of our, my friends like Fred Oda and the other guy, we used to go over there, borrow some corn from a farmer and go to the river and burn it on the open fire. Husk it all, we used to eat that, eat that corn like that. (Yes), we had a lot of fun, 'cause they had, the river was clean. We used to call it first hole, second hole, every maybe half a mile, 'cause big hole, see.

TI: A big hold you said, hold?

JS: Holes would be where you could swim.

TI: Oh, okay.

JS: (Yes).

TI: Like a swimming hole that you could...

JS: (Yes). So heck, it was nice. It was clean, it's not like now, water's not even moving because lot of tules and all that. (Yes), so that's why it was called Pajaro River, people from Spain saw that first thing. It's pretty flower and birds and everything, but people, I think, eventually destroy everything.