<Begin Segment 2>

RP: Let's talk a little bit about your mother. Tell us her name.

NM: Her first name is Iki, I-K-I. And last name was Onishi, O-N-I-S-H-I.

RP: And was she also from Kumamoto?

NM: Yes. From the same area.

RP: And do you know how, how they met?

NM: No, I don't. And, I don't, I don't necessarily remember whether it was sort of a, one of those arranged marriages or not. But...

Off Camera: Shall I tell you what my grandmother told me? She said my grandfather went back to Japan. And I don't know, maybe it's when he took the brother, ashes back?

NM: Yeah, I think that's the first time he went...

Off Camera: And he saw her either, I keep thinking it's the school in the classroom and she happened to be there and she was standing up and she was the biggest, strongest looking woman in the room. [Laughs] So that's why... she said she was like a horse. He considered it a... she came from a samurai family. But, by that time, even samurai didn't have much. But, she said, yeah. And then the other thing, she says people would go by their house. And she lived with her uncle, huh?

NM: Yes, I think so.

Off Camera: I don't know what happened there.

NM: She was adopted by the family.

Off Camera: Yeah.

NM: Parents died early.

Off Camera: Yeah. So they would... as the people went by their house they would stop and bow every time. They had to stop and bow. Isn't that something?

NM: Because they, they were the shouya family, which means that they were the magistrates or whatever of that area. And in order to go from here to across the other way, other side, they had to bow and go, go walk ahead. Yeah.

RP: Just political etiquette at the time.

NM: Oh yeah.

RP: Uh-huh.

[Interruption]

RP: How about your mother? Had she attended much, or had --

NM: Education?

RP: -- had much education in Japan?

NM: She went to, I suppose through the elementary school. I don't know through what grades but after that she attended a sewing school. Which was probably normal for that, that period, for the girls.

RP: Uh-huh.

NM: Had to learn sewing and I guess how to become a good wife or whatever.

RP: What do you remember most about your mom?

NM: Well, she was a hard worker. I remember one of the things she did was to irrigate the farm that we had, which was about fifty acres. And at night I could see the light, lantern, bobbing here and going around so there she is way out there. Yeah, so she worked very hard and she was kind. I don't, I don't think she spanked any of us. In fact, I don't think my father did either except once I got spanked.

RP: Why?

NM: But other times they didn't...

RP: Why did you get spanked, Nellie?

NM: Oh, don't ask me that. [Laughs]

RP: Well I have to. You volunteered that information. Now we have to know.

NM: Because I wanted to go swimming. And for some reason my sister was involved in that. And so I couldn't go swimming, and so I hit my sister. She was innocent, but I hit her anyway. And so my father got me and spanked me real hard to teach me a lesson. But I don't, you know, hit other people just because I get mad.

<End Segment 2> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.