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AL: So let me ask you about the 442nd. There's a lot of stories that you hear about when the kotonks, you know, the mainland Nisei, met up with the Hawaiians.

AN: Uh-huh.

AL: Could you tell me about that?

AN: Well, actually, it's sort of maybe a little misunderstanding on our part, the Hawaiian people. We speak our own language, and the mainland Japanese speak their own language. And we thought because of their English, they spoke much, because the English was much better than most of us Hawaiians, and we felt maybe a little offish, the way they spoke, and we didn't quite understand that they were raised here in the mainland, and so their language was much better than we were, the Hawaiians. So it was a little misunderstanding. We thought they sound offish, but I wasn't, that's your way of speaking. And so we just, a little misunderstanding, we later found out that they weren't that way at all.

AL: So were you guys all mixed in together in terms of where you were bunking, where you were eating? Were the Hawaii guys and the mainlanders all mixed up together?

AN: Oh, yeah, definitely.

AL: Did you visit the camp at Jerome?

AN: No, I did not. There were several of 'em that did, and they came back and found out what the mainland Japanese Americans were, the families were going through. Then we Hawaiians had our eyes opened and found out what they're going through. And that made a big difference of us getting much closer to one another, and brought us more, that really brought us unity. Here we are from Hawaii, our parents were not treated like that, our family were not treated like that, but some of the boys were at the relocation center and saw that, and told us what they're going through. Then we begin to understand what they were going through.

AL: Do you know how many of the Hawaii boys went on that visit to Jerome?

AN: I don't know. I really don't know.

AL: Have you ever thought about if your parents had been confined in one of the camps, would you have still volunteered?

AN: Yes.

AL: Why?

AN: Well, because our parents' desire was for us to go and fight. There's no two ways about it. I think most of the parents that went to these camps and their sons and daughters also, they were told to go and fight, and they did. Because we had a whole slew of them come over and join us.

AL: Do you think there was a difference, as you were with these fellows soldiers, do you think there was a difference in the way people fought, whether they were volunteers or whether they were drafted? Could you tell a difference? Did you know who had volunteered and who had been drafted?

AN: Well, in our unit, the 442nd was all volunteers except for the 100th. But they had already proven themselves, so as far as I'm concerned, we fought together with the right attitude and that right spirit.

AL: So later units, then, did they include the guys who had been drafted out of the camps?

AN: Yeah, did the same thing. When they came over, they had the same spirit, they had the same feeling, and they fought that way.

AL: So you said you were in Company G. How did you get assigned to a company?

AN: I don't know, I just, one day I said, they said, "Okay, now you go to Company G, 2nd Battalion." In other words, they were breaking up the 1st Battalion. They didn't have enough people anyway, and so they were making room for the 100th to become the 1st. So I was just assigned, I don't know why.

<End Segment 14> - Copyright © 2012 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.