<Begin Segment 25>

KL: So this is the same neighborhood you had been in before the war. How had it changed, either in terms of how it looked or who was living there or both.

KM: It didn't look much different, because it was still agricultural. Then we had the dairy on one side of the field, and then on the east side of Grandview there was a nursery. There were a couple of empty lots or bean fields.

YI: Some of the old neighbors were still there.

KL: What was their response to your return?

YI: They were kind. They were good people. We didn't have any... even before the war they were nice people. We had good neighbors.

KM: Except the Mandemakers.

YI: Who?

KM: The Mandemakers, the Dutch dairy, Holland Dairy on the west side of Grandview, next door to the Rondos.

YI: Rondos? Oh, I don't remember them.

KM: Well, their son died during World War II in the Pacific, and of course they were very upset and sad and didn't like Japanese anymore.

KL: That was a change from before the war?

KM: Yeah. Because it was a little farming community.

YI: But on Mitchell Avenue, those neighbors were still really good, and they always inquired about our parents. They were really nice people, and we didn't have any... I didn't feel it, anyway.

KM: Complications.

YI: Yeah. Only my memory was at school. And after that, it was fine, it did work its way out. But just the very beginning was the prejudice.

KM: The only person who called me "Jap" was Ellen Rodemeister.

YI: Oh, really?

KL: Who was that?

KM: She was a girl in my fourth grade.

KL: You chuckled when you said that. How did you respond to her calling you "Jap"?

KM: I probably hit her. [Laughs]

YI: It's kind of like the N-word, you know, you just don't say that. And it would hurt feelings, for sure. And for somebody to say it, especially postwar, and we just came back out of the camp.

KM: I can see that, evil feelings. It's hard on the family. Somebody like Ellen, maybe her uncle died, or somebody like that. So my father was kind of a pacifist, so he tried to tell us to be good and not be hateful.

YI: He never discussed politics, so you really didn't know how he felt politically. I've always felt that he was liberal, I don't think he was conservative.

KM: I remember he was fond of whoever was in the office, Nixon.

YI: Well, he was respectful, that was the President of the United States.

KL: What, how did your mother feel? Was she similar to him in terms of being pacifist or trying to see behind people's comments, or did she have a different philosophy?

KM: She had a different philosophy in that we didn't know what it was, what she would base it on, or just go the opposite of her husband. But she never voiced an opinion that I ever heard. We all screamed and yelled about things, kids.

YI: I think those, like I said before, the women of that time pretty much followed whatever the husband said or did, because that was why they were here, to have children. But in the Asian home, the men dominated at that time. I'm not talking about today, but at that time it was...

KL: What was your home right after the war? Can you tell us where you lived?

KM: We lived in Mar Vista again. Went to school at...

KL: You said that Mr. Nishi had a former chicken coop?

KM: Oh, yeah. We had...

YI: That's where the cow came, that same building.

KM: The house that was got was a house that had been taken over by the chickens, and so it had to be cleaned thoroughly before we could move in. And it was just a chicken coop, I guess, that had been converted.

YI: That's why my father left early, so he could get it ready, and they had to spray it.

KL: So he did the cleaning.

YI: Yeah, getting it ready for us and painted it so we could move in. But we weren't the only family, there were two or three others, right? Shindens and the Yoshimuras.

KM: Waki.

YI: Wakis later. So whoever worked for Mr. Nishi usually...

KM: I don't know, I think so.

YI: ...usually ended up there.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2013 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.