<Begin Segment 11>

RP: You went to Japanese school after public school?

AS: Yeah, after school we'd go to Japanese school and come home, got to go to music school up the corner. So we really didn't have to do much around the house.

RP: What other, were there other cultural traditions, Japanese cultural traditions that you were...

AS: Oh, we went to, Sunday was spent all day at church. We were really religious family. And all our entertainment in those days.

RP: Centered around the church?

AS: Church. The receptions and this and that, and that's who we were.

RP: When it came to holidays, what did you celebrate? Japanese holidays?

AS: Well, on Fourth of July we went to Terminal Island, that beach there. Brighton Beach, that's where all the Japanese went, I mean, they were allowed to go. We went there. It was a kind of nice thing. You didn't know, even these beaches, they were really, real prejudiced and all. But Malibu now, I remember Malibu in those days, they used to call it Port Los Angeles and we used to go camping there on holidays. Isn't that... I think, that was over there, I think it's Malibu now, but isn't that something, though? 'Cause that area was all not a closed area and all that.

RP: Are you telling me that there were closed beaches to Japanese? Japanese were not allowed?

AS: Oh yeah, yeah. I know. So the Japanese people didn't go. Not like some people. They didn't want us to go, we didn't go. Or places, most of them were pretty good, but a lot of areas, you know, it was like that. People don't know, but old timers like us knew. But we'd rather go where we're welcome and we're together, and they were all kind of nice, clean, so it was one thing. But, yeah, certain beaches, they were... oh, what was it? I don't know, 'cause I didn't go to those beaches that they didn't like us to go.

RP: Were there sections of towns or, like, Venice, for instance, that you didn't go into?

AS: No. Well, there're places kind of, but most places, department stores and all, they always liked Japanese people because they were clean at least, and honest. But a lot of place, if they didn't want us to go, stores, they said, oh, you know... what was it now? Like Beverly Hills wasn't that big thing then, but certain areas, yeah, they didn't... even my friend, you know Cheviot Hills? That was years ago, this fellow at church, he was a, he started with Disney, when Disney started. This young gentleman, he started with Disney, and he and his wife, they wanted to buy, build a house in Cheviot Hills, that was years and years, so she went around -- she was educated person, too -- and asked the neighbor, you know, "We're gonna... is it okay?" So the neighbor's okay, in Cheviot Hills, and so they built the house and they never moved in. the neighbors didn't want them. So they, rather than to fight it, I guess they never lived there. Isn't that something? I still remember that because he used to teach Sunday school and stuff at the church we went to and he was a cartoonist. He started with, this fellow, he started with Walt Disney. A cartoonist.

RP: Do you remember his name?

AS: Bob Something. I forgot his name. Bob. And he was a church member, and he used to do all the cartoons. We always had nice cartoons, and I still remember... I was kind of young, but I thought, gee, but he didn't push it. He just didn't live there. And now, you know how Cheviot Hill is now. Even Ladera Heights, I had another friend that had property up there. This is after... and they didn't want... Ladera Heights, you know how that is now. It's kind of "blackie" more, but... yeah, so they didn't fight it. Japanese people, they didn't want to fight it. Even if they owned the land. Well, you, you'll be really surprised. My father's land, he's about a block in from Washington Boulevard, ten acre there, and those little teeny houses there, I think they had a covenant that no Asians could live there, those lots. They're really tiny lots. Isn't that something?

RP: Right next to your father's property?

AS: Yeah, my father's ten acre, then one block from his place, ten acres to Washington Boulevard, that area there. Isn't that something? You wouldn't think so, the teeny weeny houses there. But they, I don't know, his land was one piece there, ten acres, but the people... you wouldn't ever think now that, you know... That's Marina, but now it's been discarded long years ago with all that, you know, they gave citizenships and all that. Well, my mother and dad, they were pretty old, but they got their citizenship. They were determined. I don't know, but people, my mother was only twenty-nine, twenty-one when she came from Japan, soon after she graduated college, so she's been here, was here a long, long time, but that kind of thing... isn't it, you wouldn't think that, huh? They had that covenant there. That the land from one block Washington to Berkeley Drive, that's where my father's ten acres... they couldn't live there. It's kind of hard to believe, huh? Cruddy little houses there. Real... twenty-five feet front houses. But stuff like that... it's, I don't know, it's...

RP: Where did you go to Japanese language school?

AS: We went to Japanese every day, every day.

RP: Was it a...

AS: Japanese at the church.

RP: Oh, at the church you went to? And it was, do you remember your teachers?

AS: No, no. I don't remember, that was long ago.

RP: How far did you get in --

AS: I didn't go far. I only went to seventh, seventh, I don't know, seven, book seven or whatever it is. I was really kind of young, and my sister, she did, she's quite a linguist, my oldest sister. She did -- and my mom, they wanted us to speak Japanese. We spoke pretty... that's how we spoke. We spoke Japanese at home because my mom wanted us to speak Japanese, and even at school. I remember Ninth Street School, all these immigrant kids... it's funny, we'd get in a cluster and we'd speak Japanese, and the teacher would come along and say, "Now, you speak English," so we changed to English. We didn't keep speakin', like now these Spanish kids, so we'd, we'd go both, but that's it. But now, here I almost forgot Japanese.

<End Segment 11> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.