<Begin Segment 11>

KL: Did you guys have any Japanese or Japanese American cultural activities, or like a Buddhist church or a language school or anything that you were part of?

ST: No, we were too isolated out there.

MS: For anything like that, we would have had to come to San Mateo, and that was a long drive in those days.

KL: Did you grow up with a religious tradition in your family?

ST: Not really.

MS: Well, our parents were Buddhist, so basically, like Mom, huh, she practiced it on her own. So, yeah...

KL: What was her practice? What did she do?

MS: Well, she was Buddhist. And in her later years, I guess she was very happy to be able to go to church. And when she passed... she used to keep a daily diary, and apparently she had a lot of very nice thoughts that she wrote down. And the minister at that time asked to read her diaries, because he said she had so many nice things written in it. And I think he used a lot of her thoughts for his sermons.

KL: You've, I already have kind of pictures of your parents in my mind from what you've said, but I wonder if you would just tell us what was important to them and what were their personalities like.

MS: We already said Dad was very quiet, and didn't really interact with us. But I saw him cry twice. Once was, I guess it was Saturdays that we used to go fishing down at the pier. And there was a friend there that lived by the hotel there, and they had swings. And we would go there, Hattie, Mickie and I would go there, and we'd play on the swings. And this one Saturday, it was just the three of us and our dad, and he was fishing and we were playing, and when he got done, he came to get us. And I could see him, he was standing by the road watching us, and he was smiling. And I saw him, so I went to run to him, and Hattie was coming up with the swing at that time, and I ran right in front of her and I got knocked out. And the next thing I know, I woke up and he was over me, and I guess he figured I'd died, 'cause he had tears in his eyes and he was crying. And the other time that I saw that he was very emotional was when I left. And I think he knew that it would probably be the last time that we would see each other, because I was leaving to join my husband. He asked me to cut his toenails for him, which was kind of a weird thing. But it was, I think, just for me to do something for him personally, 'cause he kind of, he was kind of sobbing when he even asked me to do it. So it's kind of a strange way of showing that he cared, but I know it was his way of doing something personal with me. So those are the only two times that I saw him actually cry. So he had a heart. [Laughs]

ST: Oh, yeah.

MS: What do you remember?

ST: Well, I used to go to the market with him early in the morning. Then we'd stop by Taketoshi?

MS: Oh, in San Francisco?

ST: Yeah. And one time he took me to a movie on Broadway. There was two movie houses, and there was one that showed, you know, a cowboy movie, took me in there. After the feature ended, the lights went on, here comes these girls taking their clothes off. It was a burlesque show. [Laughs]

KL: How old were you?

ST: Oh, ten or twelve, I don't know.

MS: He got you out of there pretty quick then, didn't he?

ST: Oh, no, we sat through it.

MS: You kidding?

ST: Oh, yeah.

MS: [Laughs] I bet Mom didn't know about that. That's all you remember?

KL: That would make an impression.

MS: Next question.

KL: Okay.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2015 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.