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MM: What was it like growing up? What kind of values and what kind of goals did your parents instill in each of you?

RK: Well, they emphasized education, so they really told us to study hard. And I still remember that. Of course, they both tried to learn English. My mother worked for haole families, Caucasians. In fact, she came to the mainland -- she worked for one of the families who liked her babysitting. And so when they went to the mainland, and I see pictures of her at Yellowstone, and so, a little bit more about my mother... because of this experience, at home, we had Japanese food, but we had a lot of steaks, hamburger steaks. We even had liver -- [laughs] -- and pancakes, pot roast, because this is what she had to cook for the, for the haole Caucasian families. And they both, because they had a lot of contact, my dad especially in the hotel, so they had passable English. And later on, both of them became citizens of the United States. And they were both Christians. Now Mitch, your original question was...?

MM: The goals and values --

RK: Oh, yes, yes.

MM: -- that they instilled in you?

RK: They were very heavy on education. So even if their English was limited, they couldn't help us much after a while with our homework, they insisted that we do our homework. And I still remember one day coming home from school. I was still in, in the second or third grade. And lo and behold, my parents had bought the twenty-odd volumes of the Book of Knowledge. I knew they themselves wouldn't be reading it, but they... I knew what the signal was. And I must say that it was very helpful for, to us in doing our homework.

MM: So they really emphasized and put the resources in supporting your educational experience?

RK: Oh yes, very much so. And to the extent, too, that... I took band, and I played the clarinet, and they went so far as to surprise me when I was in ninth grade by buying me a Selmer clarinet, which I thought was quite expensive. I don't know how they managed it, but, you see, everything was to try to help us in school.

MM: So that the value "for the sake of children" was very evident?

RK: Very much so, what they say, "kodomo no tame ni." [Laughs]

<End Segment 3> - Copyright © 2004 Japanese American National Museum. All Rights Reserved.