Densho Digital Archive - Nellie Mitani Interview (denshovh-mnellie-01-0007)

<Begin Segment 7>

RP: What, what split the community into two groups?

NM: I think it was a religious matter. So it was the Buddhist group and the Christian group. They, around '39, or '31, '30... around '30, '29, '30, a woman minister came out. It was a Christian minister. Unusual at that time and even now I think it's unusual to have a woman in the ministry. But anyway, and so my father being the, that type of person, helped her out. She's a woman there, a stranger, and so, and so then we developed a Christian community.

Off Camera: A hakujin woman?

NM: No, Japanese.

Off Camera: A Japanese woman? Wow.

NM: Yeah, so it was unusual, yeah.

Off Camera: Yeah.

NM: And, I think now there may be one or two. But anyway, and then, so we rallied around her and there was already the Buddhist group. So, naturally (the community) split. We didn't have anything else more to do with the Buddhist group. And did whatever was guided by the Christian minister.

RP: And so your religious background originally was Christian?

NM: Yes, it was...

RP: Or it was Buddhist and then you kind of moved over?

NM: Oh, I don't remember doing anything especially Buddhist as a, as a religion. It's just that we were with that kind of group. But I was baptized at twelve, when I was twelve, around that time. So, after she came.

Off Camera: And Grandpa and several of the people built the church, right?

NM: What?

Off Camera: Grandpa and several of the people built the church.

NM: Built the church, oh yes, they built that church. Do I have a picture? Well, we have a picture somewhere.

RP: Was it a Christian church, Methodist church?

NM: Pardon?

RP: What type of church was it?

NM: Oh, a Methodist. We belonged to the, what they called the Japanese Provisional Methodist Church. Which involved all the... up and down the coast of the, of the states, all the Methodist churches.

RP: So you had a Methodist and a Buddhist church in the Mesa community?

NM: Yes.

RP: Did you also have a language school, too?

NM: Yes.

RP: That you attended?

NM: Yes.

RP: And where was that?

NM: That was in the, in Mesa. And I think it began at our home. No, no, I'm sorry. That's after the minister came. We had, she taught us at our home first before she had a house herself. And, anyway, it was a community school. And my father helped build the school. It was a brick building I think. So he was interested in that building kind of thing from way back. And I don't know whether he made the drawings for the building or something like, he had, anyway, involved that way. And...

RP: What was language school like for you, Nellie?

NM: Well, even in the early days, we went there to meet our friends and have fun. And later on I got to thinking everybody, everybody, my Caucasian friends, they have a good time on Saturdays. Here we had to go to school on Saturdays. It wasn't a weekday thing, but once a week on Saturday. And so I went there to play, enjoy myself. But now I regret it, of course, because I became an interpreter and my language isn't that good.

RP: An interpreter for who?

NM: Japanese-speaking people who came, well, from, from Japan and who needed to... oh, like business people, government people, who had to speak with their cohorts over here. So that's what I became.

RP: Did either one of your parents ever learn English or enough to communicate in English?

NM: My father did, of course, 'cause we, in the business he had to communicate. But it was more or less broken and he didn't really speak that much English, around the house it was always Japanese. And Mother hardly picked up any English. I think she understood, but I think she was too shy to try, to make mistakes. You know how it is with Japanese? Yeah, so she didn't use it.