<Begin Segment 4>

RP: What else do you recall in your early years in terms of social activities, or picnics, or outings, things that you might remember?

TH: I'm going to eat my own words, but I told you that was the only Japanese organization, farmers, but actually Japanese had another organization that they belonged to and that was a kenjinkai. Once a year, during the summer months, we would all go to the beach, or to a park and we would have a big picnic. As a kid we would go and try to drink so many soda pops to get full. That's all we drank, was soda pop and eat very little food. [Laughs] I remember that now.

RP: And that was a gathering of all the folks from Fukuoka?

TH: Yes. Also this group of people that came from Fukuoka-ken, and that's the state, but there's a county in place called Itoshima-gun and it's a county group and that was sort of stronger than the kenjinkai I thought, but then my parents are from that county so we had also separate picnic. And also there was the same two groups had a New Year's party. Every January, it didn't have to be January first, but within the month of January, they had a couple of New Year's party. And this is where my dad used to go and drink up sake.

RP: That was one of the traditions that folks tell us about was that the men would go visiting and have a little drink here, a little drink there.

TH: Yeah, and then it so happened that as a teenager I used to drive home from Los Angeles, believe it or not, on a rainy night. Of course, it was like one a.m. or two a.m. when there was hardly any traffic. I remember driving home from Los Angeles, East LA.

RP: That was on New Year's?

TH: Yeah, this is a New Year's party.

RP: Did you bring your father back?

TH: Yeah, my father was sort of passed out and I had to drive home.

RP: Designated driver.

TH: Uh-huh, maybe twelve years old. Really. I got licensed when I was fourteen years old. I had a valid California license with the restriction was that I could drive during the daylight hours but in the evening I had to have an adult with me. That was the only restriction and my dad and mother both went together to Azusa and we got a driver's license there. I think one of the reasons why they consented was that they thought we were going to drive to Manzanar, the Owens Valley, and there was rumors of that nature going on, and the way my dad health was, that he might not be able to make it all the way and so he had to have relief.

RP: That's an interesting way to get your license.

TH: Yeah, they consented and I had it.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2010 Manzanar National Historic Site and Densho. All Rights Reserved.