<Begin Segment 14>

TI: I'm thinking about your father in particular, so right after war started, I was wondering if there might be a sense of relief, though, because here, if he were in the United States, he knew he was on the FBI list --

RT: He would've been taken. The FBI would've taken him right away.

TI: So it's almost like, I wonder if there was almost a sense of relief that, that he had avoided all that, that now that he was in Japan, that in some ways he might be safer than if he were in the United States.

RT: Could've been.

TI: But he never shared, you never really had a conversation with him about those things?

RT: No. All I know is, I don't know when during the war, but a fellow that he knew, I think from the Heieki Gimusha Kai, one of those fellows, returned to Japan. Wasn't there some kind of a ship that... and he stopped by our place and was probably telling my father about the life at Tule Lake or wherever he was, the camp that he was sent to, so maybe my father was relieved that he wasn't in the United States. He would've been separated from his family, I'm sure. And maybe he might opt to, opted to come back to Japan. I don't know.

TI: And then you mentioned, so after the war had started, that your family was sort of under surveillance in some ways. So someone would come by, so tell me a little bit more about that. Who, who would actually check up on the family?

RT: They would have a, they had a special police unit and I can't remember what they called it, but they would come by every, quite frequently, I think, at first, because we, like I said, we had settled down a week before.

TI: And what was the, kind of when they would check up on you, what was their demeanor or attitude when they would talk to, say, your father? Was it polite or was it more accusing, or how would you describe that?

RT: Japanese police, they were all very authoritative, very... no nonsense.

TI: And so when this happened, how did you feel? Were you, were you nervous or afraid, or how would you describe your feelings?

RT: No, because I knew they weren't doing anything like that. I know my, it was very annoying to my parents to be watched like that.

TI: And how could you tell that your parents were annoyed? What, was it something they said or how they acted? What, what would you say?

RT: I'm sure it was the way they probably acted after the officials left.

TI: Did, did officials ever come just to ask them about life in America and what to expect about Americans or anything like that?

RT: I don't think so. No, I don't know. I know that they were always checking our radio to make sure we didn't have shortwave.

TI: Okay.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.