Densho Digital Archive - Mas Okabe Interview (denshovh-omas

<Begin Segment 16>

KL: What was the inside of your place like at Crystal City? It was two rooms, how was it furnished?

MO: Bunk beds for us, and they had...

KL: Did all five of you go up to Crystal City?

MO: Yes, five of us. Our sister was still in Sacramento. And four boys in one room, my mother and father in the other. It was okay. It was cozy. I guess you'd say it was better than Amache, because everyone's together now. And then you make new friends.

KL: How did you make friends?

MO: Well, first you go to school. And then you meet... by then I was getting interested in girls. There's a lot of girls. [Laughs]

KL: You were starting to talk to them, you mean?

MO: Well, not really talk to them, but I knew they were there. Kind of starting to blossom a little, putting up.

KL: Are there classmates that you remember?

MO: Oh, yes.

KL: ...more than others? Who were your friends?

MO: Well, like we have these reunions, Crystal City reunions. Well, Crystal City was a smaller camp, so everyone in high school knew each other. So we'd take pictures, everybody knew everybody, seniors to freshmen, everybody knew everybody. So we were sort of close.

KL: How big was your class, the people that --

MO: I'd say thirty, forty in a class, it wasn't big. So we got to know each other quite well. We knew who the smart ones were, you know, the scholars, and who the jocks were. So I'd gravitate toward the scholars who helped me. [Laughs]

KL: So you were smart. [Laughs]

MO: A lot of them were very smart, and they would help, very generous with the knowledge. And the jocks used to play sports in camp. Used to have clubs, we used to... there were two main clubs, there were the Saints was one club, and the North Star, that was the other club. And we had our own club, we were kind of an offspring of these two. And we used to play sports against other clubs. And these two main clubs, the Saints and the North Star, they used to compete against each other in everything, basketball, baseball, everything.

KL: Did you play everything?

MO: Huh?

KL: Did you personally play everything?

MO: Yeah. I wasn't good, but I played. Because they were short handed, they needed people to play. But it was fun. And they had a swimming pool, we used to go swim.

KL: Did you do... did you do anymore sumo?

MO: Beg your pardon?

KL: Did you, did you still do sumo?

MO: No, not in camp. Not in Crystal City. There was no kendo, no judo, no sumo, I don't think. I don't think they allowed that, I don't know. Maybe they did. But we played ping pong and stuff like that.

KL: Was there a community hall, or where did you play ping pong?

MO: I guess we had sort of a rec. hall. And we used to compete against the Germans, they used to have ping pong in their group, and we used to have ping pong. So we used to get together maybe once a year or something like that, compete against each other just for fun.

KL: And the people who were in the German section, they were German Americans, right? So they were, there was no language... were those some tense rivalries?

MO: No.

KL: All just for fun?

MO: I think the only time we competed was in ping pong, but we never played basketball against them or baseball against them or anything like that.

KL: And the schools were separate, right, from looking at a map?

MO: Yes.

KL: Where else did you interact with the people in German section, or did you?

MO: That's the only recollection I have. We used to see them walking around, well, marching around. They used to walk around in brown shirt, you know, like they had these swastika kind of stuff on the shirt, they used to walk around camp. I mean, that's okay, the Germans. And we had, Japanese people had something similar to that, but not quite to that extent.

KL: Like a uniform thing, you mean?

MO: Yeah, we didn't have any uniform, but there were some pro-Japanese type people that formed organizations. That's why they were there, because they were pro-Japanese. And I didn't see too many Italians, they were there, but I didn't see them.

KL: What were your parents' feelings about the pro-Japanese organizations?

MO: Oh, I guess he was more pro-Japanese, too. He wouldn't tell us, but you could tell if he was pro-Japanese.

KL: Did he affiliate with any of the groups or join any?

MO: Well, yeah, he used to take part in... not military organizations, but like he used to take singing lessons, Japanese singing, and he used to belong to this group, and they used to practice all day long. And it used to drive us crazy. [Laughs] It's not melodic at all.

KL: What kind of singing?

MO: They call it shigin. I don't know if you've ever heard of it.

KL: I have, yeah. It's very, you couldn't not be around it.

MO: Yeah, and he used to sing all day long, and my neighbor used to be the teacher, and you could hear him singing, too.

KL: Did he sing by himself, then?

MO: Yeah, he practiced by himself. He's not shy. [Laughs] I don't know, I didn't know what was good and what was bad, but it kept him happy, I guess, occupied.

KL: Did he have any other activities or groups or anything?

MO: No, I don't think so. So that was good.

KL: What about you and your brothers? You were doing sports, but did you join any other groups?

MO: No.