<Begin Segment 27>

TI: When you were in Japan, I think you got word that your father was not doing well. So can you explain that?

SK: Yeah, my sister got contact with the Red Cross, and they said, "Well, he's not going to live for very long, two months maybe." So the Red Cross -- that's when Red Cross really helped me. They got everything ready, flew home to Japan, from Japan, on a cargo plane. Took me sixty-four hours. They didn't have jets in those days, it's a cargo plane, so you sit on a bench.

TI: And sixty four hours because you had to do lots of hops to get to...

SK: Yeah, all the island, Kwajalein and then Hawaii, and the longest one from Hawaii home.

TI: And so when you got back, where was your father? Where did you meet your father?

SK: Well, they had to, the camp was closed already, so they came, I guess they knew the family from a long time ago, Tsuchiyamas in Monterey, so they went to live there in a shed in the back. And then mother worked in a cannery, Monterey cannery for a while, until they, until they came back to Watsonville.

TI: And how sick was your father when you got back?

SK: Well, he was in pain. It was getting worse and worse, and Dr. Koda said, "He's not going to live very long." And so my father asked me to go see Dr. Iscamp, and ask him if he could give me kind of thing to go to sleep. I begged him, but he says, "I can't do that. If I do that, I lose my license."

TI: Oh, so your father wanted some kind of drugs or something to just end, end his life.

SK: Yeah. He knew he, there was no future. But within two months, less than two months, he died.

TI: During that time, were you able to have any, any conversations with him?

SK: Not much, because he was in constant pain. The cancer was all over now. They were giving him painkiller, but it didn't really help.

TI: And so after, while this was going on, where was your brother and sister?

SK: My sister was in, with what's her name? One of her friends when she went to Wisconsin to do housework. And my brother, he was going to high school in camp, and then when I went to Utah, I took him with me, he went to school there. Then he came back, and then he got drafted. But he had a, he used to play basketball, and he cracked his elbow. So his elbow wasn't hundred percent, so they put him in limited service, so he didn't have to go overseas.

TI: So after your father died, then what happened?

SK: We stayed in Watsonville and started working.

<End Segment 27> - Copyright ©2008 Densho and the Watsonville - Santa Cruz JACL. All Rights Reserved.