<Begin Segment 18>

AL: What was Doug's family background? Was it, did he have both parents? Did he have brothers and sisters?

AS: Yes, and his father was like a pineapple crane operator. And his mother cooked for the boys in the pineapple. And he had like a brother and three sisters. So it was a stable, pretty stable family.

AL: Was he, was he close to them?

AS: Well not real close where he... what happened was that he didn't confide in them. Like when some children and come to their parents and say hey this decision, what do you think? He didn't, he didn't do that. But he did confide more in his sisters.

AL: And he's, is he younger or older than his siblings?

AS: He was the older of the boys.

AL: Do you recall the point at which you told him about your background or how he reacted...

AS: Well, he ...

AL: ... about your history?

AS: What happened, what triggered it especially was when we had interview in ninety, I believe it was '97, when our story appeared in the front page. And I gave, gave him the article and then people starting calling us for interviews. So that's when he became, he was aware. I didn't tell him too much before that.

AL: So did, he didn't ask where your birth mother or your birth father was or anything like that?

AS: Well, if, I just told him briefly. But I didn't tell him the whole story.

AL: What was his reaction when he heard the whole story?

AS: Well, he says, "No wonder you act...' [Laughs] "No wonder you act like the way you are." Yeah, it was kind of, it was new to him. Because he came from a stable family and all of a sudden the camp and... yeah, it was very different for him.

AL: Do you think it was difficult?

AS: No. 'Cause he like, he takes everything like oh, it's bad or good.

AL: I've heard, just culturally, that there is a stigma, at least some of the kids in the Children's Village talk about that there's a stigma in Japanese culture with orphans because you don't know their, basically their pedigree. They're not, what is it...

AS: "Purebred."

AL: Exactly. I was trying to think of the name. The, the different classes of people.

AS: Oh. Uh-huh.

AL: Did you have any sense of that in the Japanese American community, of being ostracized because your, your pedigree was not known or whatever? Did you have any sense of that?

AS: No. They didn't call me a... what do you call it? People that... "illegitimate" or "bastard." They didn't, they didn't call me those names.

AL: Right. I'm trying to think of the word in Japanese culture. Is it, not ina, the, the... eta? The, there's different classes of people and they're, that, anyway, that's what I've read about and talked to some people about. That they say, I think it's maybe some of older orphans, that other parents in camp didn't want their kids socializing or dating people from Children's Village because you couldn't be sure of what their background was.

AS: Oh, yeah, that's very important.

AL: You know, whether they might be hapa or have some illness in the family or whatever.

AS: Oh. No, I didn't run across that.

AL: Okay.

<End Segment 18> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.