<Begin Segment 9>
AL: So, Kimi, when you first got married, where did you all live? Did you live with your family or did you have your own place?
KO: No, in Japan those days I don't know about now but, still young girl, they don't leave the house 'til you get married. And average people's daughter, they don't go to work.
AL: Right, so where did you live when you first got married? Did you have your own place?
AO: I lived at my father's residence.
AL: And you both lived there?
AO: Yes.
AL: So when did you make the decision to come back to the United States and was that a difficult decision to make for you two?
AO: Coming back to the United States was not a difficult decision to make. At the time we were married I was still unstated.
AL: So you had no citizenship to either country?
AO: Yes. So when Gene was, our son Gene was born I still was not... I didn't have my U.S. reinstated, U.S. citizenship. And so before I was married I had my own room in the hospital and I had all my meals there. But when we became married then I went home and stayed in my father's home. And Gene was born, Gene had the privilege to be born in the U.S. military hospital, and when he was ready to come home then we went home to my father's home.
AL: So was he a citizen when he was born?
AO: No.
AL: How did he get his citizenship?
AO: After I was reinstated, then Colonel Duryea advised me to go to the U.S. consulate office and register him as being born as a U.S. citizen with my birthright.
AL: So, Kimi when you were thinking about coming to the United States to live, what did you think it was going to be like?
KO: I had no idea but I'd like to be with my husband. But we didn't have money to come, for two people passage was a lot of money then.
AL: So how long did you have to wait before you could come over?
KO: Six months?
AO: No, it was pretty close to nine months. Soon as I was reinstated I had to get together at least 400 dollars for ship fare and that was with the OSK Line.
AL: It's a shipping company?
AO: A shipping company and the name of the ship was Hawaii-maru.
AL: Hawaii like the street -- I mean the state, excuse me.
AO: The state of Hawaii.
KO: Now you know those days only rich people traveled airplane, but nowadays ship is very luxurious.
AL: I know, at that time it was what you could do if you couldn't afford anything else. So did you come across on the ship with Gene by yourself? Or did you go back to get her?
AO: No, after I was able to earn enough money for Kimi's and Gene's fare. And then on the same ship line they came over on Mexico-maru. They were the two newest ships and I think they were about four years old, very fast and from Yokohama to San Francisco, ten days.
AL: That's better than the General Gordon.
AO: Oh, the General Gordon.
AL: Was that fifteen? So where did you, when you came back to the States, where did you live and work?
AO: My sister Grace was already here in Los Angeles so she came after me. So I arrived on Sunday and so Monday I borrowed her car, I passed my driving test, and then the same morning I went to department of employment. See, at that time it's called the department of employment, and so they called two different companies and one company said that they had already hired someone. The second company said they hired someone but they were willing to interview me and this is called Western Car Loading and they're the rail trucking company. So on the East Coast they fill all the full cars with cargo type of freight and then they by rail to Los Angeles, and then they were put on Western Car Loading trucks and delivered.
KO: Western Car Loading had a dock.
AL: Oh, okay, so it went from a dock.
KO: And then unloaded off which is connected to so that's why he start working 'cause he knew how to type.
AL: So when you came back to the U.S., this is what, 1950 --
AO: '53.
AL: '53. And you had been out of... you left L.A. in 1942?
AO: Yes.
AL: Right, so you'd been gone eleven years?
AO: That's true, yes.
<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.