<Begin Segment 8>

RP: Let's just go back a little ways, to your, I think you were probably about what, twelve or thirteen years old, you mentioned that you had, on trips down to Los Angeles, that you would stop at a place called Manzanar?

PF: Yes.

RP: What do you remember about that?

PF: I remember on the way home stopping and buying apples. And that they had been raised by the Japanese in the internment camp.

[Interruption]

RP: But during the time the camp was operating?

PF: (I don't really remember. I do) remember, oh, they were so good. I don't know what kind of apples they were. Delicious apples I think. And you bite into one and you had to wipe your chin, drooling, dribbling all down. They were so juicy. And then my husband and I made some drives around through there, oh, quite a few years ago. And we couldn't find anything like they have now. Everything is so well-marked and the beautiful things that the Japanese built there, it's wonderful. But anyway, getting back to when I was young, I went down there with a group of girls and I can't remember whether it was my mother's Sunday school class or the Girl Scouts. But it was a group of girls and we went to visit one particular girl. And how they figured out who we were going to visit, I don't know. But I remember she was so sweet. And her family, they were so kind and it was such a wonderful visit. And I felt so, oh, I felt so sorry, so sorry for them.

RP: Do you have a particular --

PF: But I didn't put them there, so, you know...

RP: You were in the barrack, her barrack room?

PF: Yes. I was in and it was just a room, just a room and I remember a blanket or a wall, some kind of a wall. And the whole family was in this one tiny area that was not much bigger than a cabin, eight by eight? Ten by ten? It was very small probably about the size of my dining room. So, it was pretty much wall to wall beds for the whole family. I don't remember if she had siblings. She may have been the only... anyway, she was the only one that we visited with. And she was American-born. She was not Japanese at all to my estimation. I didn't see it anyway.

RP: Did you ask her any questions or did...

PF: Oh, I'm sure we did, but I can't remember 'em. (...) I think I pretty much blocked that out. It was, it was so sad. (...) I just remember going there and seeing her and liking her very much. And I think I wrote to her. But I can't even remember for sure if I did that. I wanted to, so I hope I did.

RP: What was it that triggered that emotion, that sadness?

PF: Well, the fact that they, that the government had put them there. And they weren't our enemy. I didn't see them as the enemy. And they, we were told it was for our own protection. Well, what were they going to do to us? I couldn't see it myself. But then I didn't know anything about politics or government and how they worked and so on and so forth. And it was later that I found out that they, they took their property and everything. So...

RP: Did you visit any other parts of the camp while you were there?

PF: No, not that I can remember. No, not even the officer's quarters. I don't even remember seeing that at that time. We must have gone through that gate, the guard gate. But I don't remember that part of it at all.

RP: It was a pretty short visit?

PF: Yes, yes. I'm sorry it wasn't longer. I wish we could have gone, like you said, there were some that came and they, they had dinner with them and... but for some reason or other we were there just a very short time, 'couple hours maybe. And, never went back until much later and they were all gone. So, it was not a happy memory for me.

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2009 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.