<Begin Segment 25>

RP: Did Manzanar, did your experience in Manzanar shape your life in any way after?

FH: I'm sure it has. I'm quite sure it has. In which way I couldn't say. I do know that... I don't know if there is a lot of people that still hold a grudge against the fact that we did go into camp. I think it was a good experience, and I think it's a plus. It's a positive thing that we went into camp, 'cause we, there was things that we didn't know about that we learned. Different things. Life, being together, being with the same kind of people together, because 've always been around... of course, my children now are married to Caucasians. I've been around Caucasians because I lived in the white area, right? So when you're with the same kind of nationality, I think you learn more. Maybe you learn your roots more. Is that good? Is that bad? It's got to be good. And I learned that you can't keep a grudge on your shoulder because someone or something or some country or whatever has done you bad. You got to go on with the next thing of life. There's more there out there than... why carry that burden on yourself? Go out and be happy. Be positive. Like they say, it's half full, not half empty, right?

RP: One last question, what are you... you recall your feelings of, about the attack in 2001, the 9/11 attack in New York?

FH: That was shocking. That was shocking. I was on the bus, picking up kids, doing my job, and this one child that we went to pick up, they, he's usually right there on the driveway, ready to get on. And he's in a wheelchair. And they didn't come out. I said, "What's wrong?" Bus driver and I are saying, "What's going on?" We couldn't figure out. And they were so wrapped up with that. It was about six o'clock in the morning. I don't know what time, New York time it was, but it was about six o'clock in the morning for us, somewhere between six and six thirty. And when he came back they were white-faced, you know. And I couldn't believe that anything like that could happen, but when you stop to think it, there's a lot of thinking that what they did, that was... they did a lot of thinking on that to get that going like that. And you think about Pearl Harbor, maybe that was Pearl Harbor in another way. It was, wasn't it? It was scary. And it, when I saw it on the TV and I saw that plane hit that building, and here, yet I saw that flame and all those particles flying everywhere. I expected the airplane to come out on the other end, go through the building. But it didn't. And it was kind of a shock. Because I think there's so much fantasy going on TV and movies, maybe I saw it in that view. But you stop to think about it... and then three weeks later I went to Nova Scotia. When we got into Newark -- we landed in Newark the first night -- and I asked one of the guys, I said, "Which way is New York?" He says, "Right that way," but it was hazy. You couldn't see anything. And then we got to the airport to go to Nova Scotia and there was all this military police all around, just trying to... whatever they were there for, they were there. We left, we came back one week later, and they had guns under their arm. It was scary. Because we had declared war by the time... it was scary. All these guns. I mean, they had, they had their finger on the trigger and they were walkin' around, 'cause if they had to they're, I guess they're gonna flip it right up. But that was hard to believe that it happened.

RP: Did anything come up for you in regards to the treatment of Muslims or Arab Americans after 9/11?

FH: Oh, "I hope they don't do that, what they did to us." Although, I guess the whole thing of the story is, what we didn't like was the barbed wire because, to me, I think even the so-called free outside world was under restrictions. Rations, there were all that. Maybe we were protected in a way. I don't know. Were we? There were some maniacs out there. But that didn't happen with the Muslims.

RP: Thank you very much, Fumi, for...

FH: Well, I don't know if I really helped you in anything or... but that's my, my version.

RP: Thank you so much for your time and your stories.

FH: Well I'm glad to have met you dear people. I hope you'll be at the, will you be there, Kurt?

RP: We'll be at the reunion.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.