<Begin Segment 6>

RP: So you were roughly about nine years old when you were removed?

KE: No, I was eight, so nine, in September I turned nine.

RP: About eight?

KE: Eight, on the top half of eight. [Laughs]

RP: I know you were really young but did you remember when you had to leave your home?

KE: I can remember we had to go from Milwaukie to the Gresham fairground. And kind of when you think about it, it's kind of the long way around. And our neighbor, well, our landlady took us to the Gresham fairgrounds. And as you know, you can only take X amount of personal belongings. Then we went... they put us on buses and we went to the assembly center.

RP: So Gresham had a much larger Japanese community.

KE: Yes, they did by far.

RP: Did either town have any Japanese stores?

KE: Milwaukie did not and I don't know if Gresham did or not. They had, on our case they had a gentlemen that went around to each home but I don't know what the timeframe was but he would bring things like tofu and things like that. And also there was a Jewish clothier came around and sold, you know, articles of clothing. And that's was marketing in those days.

RP: What are your memories about the time that you spent at the Portland Assembly Center?

KE: Oh, we were there, what, three months so it's very vague.

RP: It was one large building, wasn't it?

KE: Right, and if you've ever been there, it's a wonder we didn't get burned out. 'Cause it was a... where the feed lot and all that was, they just put two by six or whatever there and laid boards over that. So it wasn't really the most ideal conditions and there was no doors they had a canvas over the entrance and I think probably the room is no bigger than this where we're sitting right now. There was seven of us in there and no top. So I imagine it was... if you lay plywood, six foot plywood and just make a whatever around that and that's how it was.

RP: But the building itself was wood?

KE: Yes, and that building is still there. It's now called the Oregon Expo Center or Portland Expo Center.

RP: Have you gone down there during --

KE: Yes, they had one year they had a... I don't know if you call reunion or anniversary there and we were actually in the building. They had a program there. Later years they had small, you know, Day of Remembrance days they had celebrations there. And also, oh, you need to go down there, they have Valerie Otani designed a torii gate, there's three or four of them, did you hear about that? Remember the tags that you were looking at? She made, they're out of stainless steel and they're hanging from the gate.

RP: Mari (Watanabe) mentioned that yesterday.

KE: Yes.

RP: We were talking about that. So do you remember these tags?

KE: I do not, I can't really recollect, but that's the size of the tags and there's what, roughly three thousand of 'em hanging. So when you come next time that would be a....

RP: Couple other reminisces that other people have shared that you might recall in respect to the Portland Assembly Center experience was the mass number of flies?

KE: Yeah, and I can't remember those small details.

RP: How about the typhoid shots?

KE: Oh, don't talk about those. I don't know if you ever had that type of shot.

RP: I don't think so.

KE: Your arm hurt for a week because it's not... well, in today medicine they're very refined but in the old days it's... your arm felt like somebody shot it.

RP: For a kid your age it must have been just devastating.

KE: Well, yeah, everybody had the same problem. You had to get shots and when I went in the service they had the same series of shots and I thought well, thinking back then, oh the arm's going to hurt but it didn't even bother. I mean, there was a little swelling but that was about it. So that's how much they improved the procedure.

RP: Do you remember the mess halls in Portland?

KE: No, I don't but my mom always said that in the assembly center they made the families eat in a family group even if we were eating on a bench site type of setting, you know, park bench type of seating. But they required the as much as they could families eat as a unit. And that's all I can remember about the camp eating.

RP: In Milwaukie you kind of were somewhat isolated on the farm there with other Japanese families but then suddenly you're in the assembly center with three thousand other Japanese Americans.

KE: Right.

RP: Did you have some of your former friends in there or did you pal around with other kids?

KE: Well, we palled around with people, you know, we had a summer school so you kind of associated with one of the young people and then of course they had an arena park where they played, or outside where you played with your people in your same age group so you got away from the... you always found somebody to play with.

RP: Do you have any lasting image of guard towers or barbed wire?

KE: No, nothing, just stories you hear about.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.