Densho Digital Archive
Manzanar National Historic Site Collection
Title: Hikoji Takeuchi
Narrator: Hikoji Takeuchi
Interviewer: John Allen
Location:
Date: November 7, 2002
Densho ID: denshovh-thikoji-01-0008

<Begin Segment 8>

JA: Tell me about the day you left for Manzanar. What do you remember about that?

HT: Oh, yes. There again you know, when things are bad -- my mom used to be a firm believer that maybe, she used to say, there's an old Japanese proverb that says "there may be gods that throw you away, but there will always be gods who will pick you up." She was a firm believer, and she always, no matter what happened, how bad things got, she would always remind me with that phrase. And on that morning, when we left, we had all our suitcases out in the front by the street, because that is what we were supposed to do. All our belongings in front of the store, that was when God threw us. When we had to go out there with our suitcase, and then these people in a car came down and they were Christian priests, man and wife, they came down and said, "We're going to take you to where you're supposed to board the train." So immediately they told us to board and board the car that they had brought in. Mom picked up the suitcase, and the priest and his wife told my (mom) to let go of the suitcase and told her, told Mom to go into the car. They insisted that she go into the car because they would be taking care of the suitcases for her. And that's exactly what she did. She went in the car and the same thing with me. They insisted that we go in, and they would take care of the luggage. This is when I thought, "This is the God that picks us up," what Mom had always preached to me, this is it. I saw that.

You know, a lot of things that I don't like happened, but a lot of things made me open my eyes and my heart, a lot of things happened. They were so nice. So when we went down to the train, my mom had... what do you call it, the coins, rolls of coins, and she tried to offer it to the priest. She wanted to say thank you to him and his wife. But you know, he refused. He says, "This is not what we are here for," and I'll never forget it. And what burns me up is that I was never, I was so darn stupid, is that I did not ask for his name or what church he was from. To this very day, I regret the fact. I really appreciated what he did for us on that day, and I never got the chance to say "thank you" to him. This is one thing that I regret, that I did not ask for his identity.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2002 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.