Densho Digital Archive - Fred Nagai Interview (denshovh-nfred-01-0015)

<Begin Segment 15>

RP: Let's talk a little bit about Block 14. Do you recall, do you know who your block manager was in the block?

FN: No, I don't.

RP: Did you have any dealings with the block manager?

FN: No.

RP: No.

FN: As I say, I was, I just was never was politically involved in anything so I mean...

RP: Now you also delivered food to the mess halls.

FN: Yeah.

RP: And did you get a chance to sample the meals at different mess halls?

FN: Oh, yeah. We... and they know us so we used to go see what mess halls got the best foods and they all knew us in the delivery so the cooks and the people that works in the mess hall eats first before, so I used to go get the best meals or eat two, three visits for meals. So, it was a really, that was a benefit you got from the... yeah.

RP: Right. How was Block 14 mess, chef?

FN: Oh, okay I guess. I didn't really get to know them real well. But the one time that I went to Manzanar and the mess hall, you saw that place where a little... we never had anything like that and I told you that. What it was, you know, you said it was to wash our hands and stuff but I said, "None of the mess hall had that." Do you still have that?

RP: Oh, yeah.

FN: You do, huh?

RP: Yeah.

FN: That isn't.

RP: But it's not right, it's not historically correct.

FN: Huh?

RP: It's not historically correct to have that.

FN: No, it's not. We never had anything like that.

RP: In your, in your, your memory of that helps support that idea.

FN: Oh, uh-huh.

RP:...

FN: And my wife says in her mess hall she never had anything... so none of the mess hall that I know of had anything like that so when I first went to visit that mess hall when I saw that, that drew my attention. And I asked you what it was for. And you said, "That's where you wash your hands." And I said, "Oh no, we washed our own hands before we went to the mess hall."

RP: In the, in the latrine?

FN: Yeah.

RP: Oh, uh-huh. Did you, do you remember having any, in your barrack room, do you remember having any furniture or curtains? Any improvements in the, in the room?

FN: I don't know. Maybe my mother made curtains and the furniture my dad made out of the scrap woods he picked up here and there. 'Cause I don't remember. Usually, there's no room for such things so we sat on the bed.

RP: There wasn't much room to store things either.

FN: No.

RP: Did you store things under your bed?

FN: Yeah, I guess so, whatever we had. As I said, we just went there with what we could carry so everything else we just gave it away so we didn't have too much.

RP: You talked about the oil stoves in the rooms.

FN: Yeah.

RP: You used to boil water in there to increase the humidity in the room?

FN: Yeah, uh-huh, yeah. But, I don't know. Some people used to cook on that but it's just a little round stove like that.

RP: Were the, were the stoves effective at all in keeping your room warm?

FN: No. You just have to hug it to get warm.

RP: Another, another improvement to the rooms was the addition of the plasterboard and the linoleum.

FN: Yeah, uh-huh. And the linoleum on the floor. Before it was nothing but big knotholes and cracks in the floorboards that when the winds came it just drew it, blew the dust in the room. But when they put the linoleum and the plasterboard, it made it more livable.