<Begin Segment 4>
RP: Where did you go to school when you started school?
KN: Florin, Florin grammar school. It was segregated in those days and Japanese went to one school and hakujin went to the, another school so all the Japanese went to one, one grammar school. And we got all mixed when we got to high school. But then grammar school we all were, we're all Japanese.
RP: And Florin was predominately a Japanese American farming community.
KN: Yeah. Yeah.
RP: Do you remember any other groups, ethnic groups? Were there some Caucasians and...
KN: No... the shed that we shipped to was owned by a Caucasian. Yeah, and then they shipped the strawberries on a train to the eastern market.
RP: And what was school like for you?
KN: Huh?
RP: What was grammar school like for you?
KN: Oh, fine. All the Japanese went to the same grammar school. We didn't mix with the hakujins 'til we went to high school. Then, then we were all... hakujin and we never met hakujin 'til we went got into high school. 'Cause in grammar school we're all Japanese. There was a hakujin grammar school down the street but then there were hakujin there and Japanese here so we didn't, we didn't associate 'til we got to high school, then we all got acquainted.
RP: Did you have a favorite subject in school?
KN: Typing and shorthand. I was good at shorthand. I used that for my living after I got out of high school. I went to camp and then I was stenographer... some of these hakujin they hired, they don't know how to dictate. So they write in longhand, I have to correct it. They all come from, I don't know, Texas or Arkansas or someplace. And they never had a secretary to dictate to so they write in long hand then give it to me and then I'd type it all up.
RP: Did you have a social life at all? Did the family...
KN: In camp yeah, we had dances and... we had a lot of dances and movies that they'd bring in from the outside.
RP: How about in Florin when you were growing up, did you, did you go, did you go to Sacramento occasionally?
KN: No. Grammar, we'd go to grammar school and after grammar school we went to Japanese school. And after Japanese school, five o'clock, we went home.
RP: To pick strawberries.
KN: Next day, yeah, yeah.
RP: And so where was Japanese school located?
KN: In the Buddhist church grounds.
RP: And how long did you go to Japanese school?
KN: Eight years. I could read and write. I don't use it now but we all, we all had to read and write.
RP: And did your parents want you to go there?
KN: Yeah. They want us to learn 'cause they didn't use, they didn't speak English or anything so unless we learned Japanese we can't communicate.
RP: So you spoke mostly Japanese in the home?
KN: At home, uh-huh.
RP: Okay.
KN: 'Cause my folks don't speak English. They don't understand. You have to speak to them in Japanese. And we went to Japanese school to learn how to read and write so that's the way it was when we were kids. Now there is no such thing I guess.
RP: Yeah, are there Japanese schools still...
KN: I don't know. I think Sacramento has.
RP: Oh do they.
KN: But nothing in Florin.
RP: Did, there was another, there was a Methodist church in Florin too.
KN: Yeah, uh-huh.
RP: Did they also have a Japanese school?
KN: Yeah, I think they did.
RP: Okay. Do you remember your teachers in Japanese school?
KN: Yeah, our minister was the Japanese school teacher, a reverend, reverend, a church reverend. And then maybe they hired one Japanese school teacher, sometimes it was some doctor's wife or something that real good in Japanese. They hired her to teach us too. I forgot a lot.
RP: It's been a while.
KN: It is. [Laughs]
RP: Did you, did you learn anything else in Japanese school about Japan, the history or the culture?
KN: No. Just Japanese.
RP: Just the language?
KN: Just the language.
RP: So would you speak it with your friends too? Or would you speak English?
KN: No, we just spoke Japanese at home 'cause our folks don't, don't speak English. But then we spoke English at school and... although when we went to Japanese school we were forced to talk to, talking, use Japanese but then once you come out of there...
<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2011 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.