<Begin Segment 16>

WN: I wanted to ask you this question. How different and how similar a person were you from the time you left for the war and the time you just came back? I'm trying to look at what, how the war itself...

KM: You know, my reflection is that when I joined up and volunteered for the 442, I was rather a very happy-go-lucky, devil-may-care youngest boy in the family who was pampered by his brothers and sisters. Not a care in the world. Being younger, you were kind of spoon-fed with everything. And then, besides that, we had a big family. Not just one or two, but I was always taken care of by my brothers and sisters. And the one that affected me now that I think about it is the death of my brother, I think, affected me very drastically. At that point of time in training, even when I think about it, I became hard-nosed, I think. And you know, my thoughts were, "How come him?" He was, he could have gone to medical school right after he graduated, but he wanted to earn some money and not depend on the family. So he started to work as a paramedic and come to Ambulance Corps. And then before you knew it, the war broke out, and so his chance of going medical school was kind of lost forever. And as a matter of fact, that night that he and I discussed about volunteering, one of my argument was that he had already been accepted as a medical school in Tulane, he could go to Tulane anytime he wanted to, and that his future was to become a doctor. But he didn't, at this point of time when it became an individual choice of volunteering or not volunteering, we had an argument. But said, "I can represent the family," as far as the Miho family is concerned, Katsuo had power as a minister. And so between he and I, I was not attached to anything, I had no plans for the future. And so he, on the other hand, already had a goal to, he should volunteer, but he rejected that. It's an individual choice that had to be decided by him at that point of time. And so he said, "No, I want to volunteer." And top of that, he was scheduled to go to Tulane while he was in the army. From the army he was selected to go to ASTP school. And so all of his weight on me, when I'm in my moments that I was, especially when he died and I was alone with him, all came up. The first few days until my brother Paul came from Yale to join me before the funeral, it was a moment of, I don't know, change taking place in me, I think. Because I think I became a little bit more hard-nosed, more purposeful, more determined as a GI in my capacity at that time as a corporal.

WN: I guess eventually as a student, too.

<End Segment 16> - Copyright © 2021 Densho. All Rights Reserved.