Densho Digital Archive - Isao Kikuchi Interview (denshovh-kisao-01-0030)

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RP: Stepping back a little bit, can you tell us about your parents in camp? Did they eventually relocate, or did they still go to the...

IK: They relocated to, I think my father was okay, because he was working, he was, at first, the only dentist and then he was the head of the dentist, and there was a lot of work on that many people, 'cause I think there were three, four dentists in the place. Then he... and my mother was, she was quite flexible. She would go with whatever, as... she had the capacity. And she went out. Oh, my father went to... they both went out at the same time. I saw them in Chicago and then they left there and went to New York, where my father worked as a dental assistant -- not a dental assistant, but a lab, do lab work. And my mother worked interpreting -- not interpreting, transferring... what, what do you call? Teaching Japanese to the Navy.

RP: In New York?

IK: In New York, yes.

RP: And this would've been around 1944, '45?

IK: Somewhere around that. Like I say, I, dates didn't matter to me then, but they sent me fruit overseas that I really needed. And that was --

RP: What kind of food did you get?

IK: Well they sent canned fruit, and that, that went around the squad. Boy, I had about one bite of it, so I quit asking for that 'cause they were on... tickets of food, what do you call that?

KP: Ration.

IK: Stamps, anyway.

KP: Ration.

IK: So I suddenly realized that they were having a hardship over here, so I can't do that anymore. But that was, I thought, well, that was big of them.

RP: Did you, when you were discharged out of the service, did you meet up with them in New York or did you return to California?

IK: No, we were on, on the, whatever you call it, the, in a group to go... I was to be, see, I was first to be -- oh, part of first... on the draft card was my home in Los Angeles, so I had to get discharged out here, and I couldn't get, my girl was in Chicago, which I had to come out here first. So I didn't see my parents there. He was already practicing in Los Angeles by the time the war ended, or they were released and all of that. So he started an office in Little Tokyo again, and all new equipment, which was nice, and a very growing practice. My mother worked as a, with him at the office, was a receptionist, as all the wives were doing, I believe, at the time. But they were, they were, they had a growing business by the time I got home.

RP: They kinda picked up where they left off.

IK: I don't know how they started, but he, he had a very busy business because I think he was early in coming back here, because he got out of camp, and I think the other doctors stayed in camp. So he would be the first to come on back here and rebuild his...

RP: Rebuild his practice.

IK: Yeah.