Densho Digital Archive - Fred Oda Interview (denshovh-ofred

<Begin Segment 10>

TI: Okay, so going back to, like, the Saturdays when people are there, did a lot of the kids of the farmers...

FO: Oh, they used to look forward to it, they'd tell me.

TI: So they'd be about your age, I'm thinking about the ones your age that would come to town.

FO: Well, the kids, the father would buy 'em ice cream or something like that, big treat. Then even like they go China-meshi and stuff like that. I guess Seattle's the same way? Folks come into town and go China-meshi.

TI: And sometimes when I've heard these stories, sometimes there might be some tension between the town people and the farming kids?

FO: Oh, yeah, we used to have that tension.

TI: And so what would happen when -- what kind of tension would there be?

FO: I guess the country people figure the town people act big or think they're better or something, I guess, I don't know. That's the attitude I figured they had.

TI: Well, was that sometimes true? Did the...

FO: Well, just like religion. Before, Christians and Buddhists were cats and dogs. [Laughs] Then after the war, no problem, but before...

TI: So before the war, the people who went to the Buddhist church, and then sometimes had tension with the Christian church people. And when you say they were like cats and dogs...

FO: Yeah, when they have sports, you know.

TI: Okay, so it's like sports teams, so you have the Buddhist team...

FO: When they'd play baseball against each other, or basketball.

TI: Well, so did you ever have sports teams between, like the city folks against the farming?

FO: No, no.

TI: Were there ever fights between the farmers and the city folks?

FO: Not that I know of. [Laughs]

TI: Yeah. Because we talk about it because, yeah, I talked to some farming people, and they would say, yeah, city people would, they'd be a little, they thought they were better because they were, sometimes they had better education, they talked better, and then so they felt that the city folks looked down on them. And a lot of times, the city folk did. So I was just curious if that happened in Watsonville, too.

FO: Same world over, I guess, huh?

TI: Yeah, it is, it's always kind of like whenever you have a difference, I think, where people think... there's always, they use that divide whether it's religion or where you live, sometimes, to kind of take sides against each other.