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RP: Now you, once you got to Manzanar you were assigned to Block 33?

MY: Uh-huh. But when we got there we were just a big, in a big community, like, hall just, almost like this. It was a big, big, big assembly room and we just went in and almost, like, squatted and found a little area. We had our little suitcases. We each had our own suitcase, and my mother was carrying Kenji. He was just, he was a year, no, he was just a little over two years old, and so she was carrying him. And Aki, my brother just below me, he had his suitcase and I had mine, and so we had, like, a little area and then the men were directed to go to a certain area to get the mattresses. They had, like, canvas bags and you stuffed it with hay, literal hay. [Laughs] And my father brought back five of them, and we slept on that the first night.

RP: What was that like, sleeping on those mattresses?

MY: Dusty, but it was fun for me and my brother. We'd jump on it, up and down. Then my mother would yell at us to stop because the dust would come up, and she wanted to protect Kenji 'cause he was only two years old. And we were all very exhausted, so we really fell fast asleep. But before that we had to find out where the bathrooms were, and then the soldier said, "What do you mean bathrooms?" They said, "Oh, you're looking for the latrines." And they would point. [Laughs] I said, "What's that?" He said, "For the men, and that for the women." So my brother had to go into the latrine, the women's 'cause I was not going to go to the men's latrine and wait outside there. I said, "We'll just go ahead and use this one." And I had to show him how to go in there, and we saw just all the toilet bowls and the communal sink, and they did work, lots of cold ice water, mountain water. And so that was our introduction to Manzanar. Then the next morning, I don't even remember if we went to a mess hall for our evening meal, if we got boxed lunches, but the next day I think they took us to the barracks. 'Cause we got, we arrived here very late. We were here, got here about four or five in the afternoon, and then I know about two or three hours later the sun had gone down and it was dark. It was very, very dark. They didn't have all the lights up, and so to find the bathroom was quite a challenge. And no water was available. If we wanted water we had to go the latrines, the spigot thing, and I think we just had to cup our hands 'cause I don't think my mother packed any cups, to get water to drink. But it was a rough beginning, but it was easy for the children, I mean for me it was easy. Didn't have to brush my teeth, didn't have to change into my pajamas. I just wore the clothes that I wore on the train and went to sleep. And we had real scratchy, scratchy army blankets. They were just horrible. Didn't have to, we didn't have any sheets. They hadn't arrived yet. So that's how we slept.

KP: Was that first night on the floor or on cots?

MY: The floor?

RP: Did you sleep on the floor originally?

MY: Yeah, on the floor, the mattress was right on the floor, and then we'd bounce onto the mattress. I mean, it was still pretty hard.

RP: And then eventually cots did show up?

MY: Yeah, I think so. I don't remember that. I remember just very, I remember sleeping on the floor in the communal meeting place. And then when we got to the barracks, the barracks had no linoleum, lots of knotholes, and we would punch them out and then my mother and father became angry because, well, snakes can come up, scorpions, and so we're trying to find those little holes and things, put 'em back in there. They'd fall out. [Laughs]

RP: So did it come true? Did you ever see snakes or scorpions?

MY: No, no, no. Because Block 33 was on such an incline, when you, the steps going up, it was about four feet above the ground, and because we used to store the wagon that held the diesel oil underneath our barrack.

RP: The, you used the oil for the heating?

MY: Diesel, the heating. That was my brother's job. We had, like, four one gallon glass containers, and he'd have to go get the oil at the end of the block, beyond the wash house.

RP: The tank, from the tank?

MY: Yeah, the tank. That was his job. My job was to help with the laundry.

RP: And describe to us, what do you, the laundry room itself, what do you recall?

MY: The laundry room was just a big, like a cement room, and had, like, cement, gray cement washtubs, one for, to scrub your clothes, you had your washboard, and then another tub for your, to rinse it. And they were all along the walls. That's all I remember, but I remember having to help my mother, especially to wring the towels out. The, and the sheets, washing the sheets was a real chore, by hand on the scrub boards. And then we'd have to take it back; we had a wagon. We would take the laundry up in two big buckets, dry, going uphill on the wagon, that was easy. But once you had laundered all of your clothing, to put 'em into the bucket and bring 'em back down, carrying wet laundry is no picnic. Then we'd have to come down the hill because it was a hillside, then hang it up behind our barracks. We had laundry lines behind the barracks.

RP: Behind the barracks or between the barracks?

MY: Well, when I say behind, backside, it's really between the barracks. Yeah, and wintertime you'd hang them up, and what you hung up at one end, by the time you finished at this end, would be frozen stiff because it was so cold. And the wintertime, for my younger brothers, we'd bring, we had, like, a wooden pole, so we'd hang them up near the stove to dry off the diapers and also their nightgowns and everything.

RP: Inside the barrack.

MY: Inside the barrack. Yeah, 'cause we had one corner that we kept open just to hang our laundry. But it served a purpose of adding moisture to the air, 'cause you had the diesel stove going.

RP: How long would it take to wash laundry in the process you described?

MY: Minimum an hour, but I think when Eizo was, because of Kenji and Eizo we used to wash practically, she used to wash practically every day. And it was all, usually on the weekends that I would help my mother with the towels and the sheets. So laundry was a daily chore.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright &copy; 2011 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.