<Begin Segment 4>

RP: And what do you know about her background in Japan?

TM: Oh, quite a bit because in 1930 we went to Japan to meet the grandparents. But we didn't do too much with my father's side. We stayed at my mother's side of the family. And we stayed there... in 1930, I was eight years old and we stayed for seven months. Uh-huh.

RP: What do you remember most vividly about your experience in Japan?

TM: Oh, I met all my aunts and uncles and I went to school there, Japanese school, yeah.

RP: And that was your first exposure to the Japanese language or you, had you already...

TM: No, in Terminal Island we all spoke Japanese. So, yeah, we spoke as... even when we got to Japan we didn't have too much trouble speaking Japanese. I guess our Japanese was very crude because it's a fisherman, fisherman's language. [Laughs]

RP: Uh-huh. Yeah. Did you get a chance to travel a little bit, too?

TM: Well, after that I went to Japan four times. Let's see, my first trip was in, I don't know, about '80, '85. Then I went, yeah, four times I went to Japan. But I've never gone to any other country. I've been to Alaska. That's about the only traveling, yeah.

RP: So on this trip in 1930, your mother, your father, you and your sister went?

TM: Oh, in 1985?

RP: No, the 1930 trip.

TM: Oh, yeah. All, all five kids yeah. There were five of us kids. My younger sister was, I guess, a year, year old. Yeah.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright (c) 2008 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.