<Begin Segment 3>

MA: So I wanted to ask you about San Juan Bautista and some of your earlier memories --

EY: Oh, yes.

MA: -- from living there. So what do you remember about San Juan Bautista?

EY: Well, I started the grammar school there, and then I went to both Japanese school and grammar school 'til I was fifth grade.

MA: And what was the name of your grammar school?

EY: San Juan Bautista school.

MA: And how many Nisei students were in the class with you at that school?

EY: Oh, there's about, more than a dozen in my class, but there was, all the classes were separated. Every class, we had eight classrooms.

MA: And who were your teachers? Were they mostly Caucasian?

EY: Yes, mostly. And then after regular school, then we walked about quarter of a mile down the road where the Japanese school is, and I went to Japanese school 'til the Depression really hit us and it all changed.

MA: How did you enjoy Japanese school?

EY: I did, I liked it. Because I had to always tell my folks whatever, I was the interpreter.

MA: Oh, you worked as an interpreter for your parents.

EY: I'm the eldest of the family. And that's why I had to go to both schools.

MA: So as the eldest, you probably had a lot of responsibilities.

EY: Uh-huh, interpreting.

MA: How many children were in your family then? How many siblings did you have?

EY: I had two, two brothers and... well, at the beginning there was two brothers, but a total of three brothers and three sisters. No, two sisters. I'm counting myself in. [Laughs]

MA: So there were five children.

EY: Uh-huh, yes.

MA: And you were the oldest.

EY: Yes, 'til the later part of the... there was a separate, I mean, a space 'til my last brother came. And that's when I had to, my father started his own farming, and I was responsible for it because I was the eldest, so I did all the farming work, driving and hauling and all that.

MA: Oh, this is when you moved to Watsonville, right?

EY: Uh-huh. When we start, for a while, we were sharecropping, and then we went on our own when I turned seventeen.

<End Segment 3> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Watsonville - Santa Cruz JACL. All Rights Reserved.