<Begin Segment 15>
RP: So, how did, how did the camp experience shape the rest of your life?
MK: Gee, that's hard to say. Because I was in there not too long. It gave me the opportunity to travel. I had never met anybody with feelings for the South. And I could understand when they started complaining that they were getting prejudiced against and everything. It, until I went to Indiana I didn't realize how bad it was. And when you just see them working but not in school, that made a big impression on me and I thought that's not right. And I doubt... you know, actually, I don't think I suffered that much because we went to camp. Because it, I got exposed to a lot of different things by leaving camp. And different people's attitudes and things that I didn't stop to think about before when I was young. I think it made me more tolerant, more accepting of how people are. I think, too, because I wanted them to accept me as I was, not as they expected me to be. And I think that's why we've all survived so well for one thing. So... and I hope the generations come... have learned something from it. Our children have.
RP: Did you...
MK: They accept a lot more things right away. They don't look for, they don't walk around looking for what people don't do. They just expect everybody to function in the normal way, like they do. They don't let the Japanese background reflect on how they think or what they do or anything.
RP: How about your own kids?
MK: Yeah. My own kids. I think they learned a lot from our generation. And I think that the hard part is that, like our grandchildren are only one-fourth Japanese now. They will probably marry Caucasians. And then it will go one-eighth. Well, it can, it will, it'll just kind of fade out I think. Our, my generation tended to marry... there wasn't too much inter-marriage there. My children, unless the parents pushed, they did not marry Asian. We didn't push. Our grandchildren, you see some of the Asian features in their appearance, in their mannerisms too. Because they can't help it, they're exposed to me. Our great-grandchildren, I don't see any Asian in them. But it's gonna be that way. In especially in the USA it's such a hodge-podge anymore. In a way it's good. In a way it's kind of sad because you see a lot of the culture disappear. But so be it. I mean, that's the way the world should be, just universal. So...
RP: Do you have any other questions or thoughts?
KP: No.
RP: I think on that note, that note of harmony we're gonna...
MK: I beg your pardon?
RP: We're gonna, we're gonna complete our interview. That'll be it. We want to thank you, Kirk, myself, and the National Park Service, for sharing your feelings and stories with us today.
<End Segment 15> - Copyright © 2011 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.