Densho Digital Archive - Misako Shigekawa Interview (denshovh-smisako-01-0013)

<Begin Segment 13>

RP: This is tape two of a continuing interview with Misako Shigekawa, and Misako, you were just about to share a story with us about after the war, after Pearl Harbor.

MS: We were, oh, about, we were, another couple and I, it was after war broke out and everything was kinda quiet, so we went to a movie. Coming back, why, we got accosted a Filipino man. You know when Japan invaded Philippine? So he came after us with a knife on the way home from the movie, so we, so the fellows took us home. The two went out to look for him, but they never found him. I mean, what did we have to do with the war? He came after with a knife, so we ran and he told us girls, get in the house and stay there, so they, my husband was big, so they were gonna catch the fellow, but they never found him. He got scared, I think. But yeah, that was awful. People thought... what do we have to do with the war? But I tell you another funny story, we were near a naval station -- that's the reason we had to leave there, that naval station -- so one night, it was after war broke out, I still had the store 'cause we didn't get, leave there 'til a few months later, so one night there were about four sailors out there. And then my husband went out and he says, "What's going on?" He says... there are Japanese people living there and it was dark, it was at night and it was dark to go back to their station, so they were scared, they were afraid they'd get beat up, so my husband escorted them, and he told 'em, "You guys," said, "You think you can go fight a war and you can't face the dark?" [Laughs] He teased them. They were scared that Japanese -- they wouldn't dream of hurting those people 'cause we were scared for our lives 'cause we didn't feel we had anything to do with the war, even the Issei people.

RP: Right.

MS: We were all scared to death to see what happened to us. Our lives were at stake, but they were saying didn't mean anything. People took their money out of the bank and put it, they hid it, and a lot of people never recovered some of that. They didn't have time. They left piano, they left refrigerators and all the furniture and somebody, after we left, got 'em all.