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MH: Do you remember doing any really Japanese things when, early in your life like mochitsuki, that kind of stuff?

KG: Not really, not really. I think here again that's my background. I mean, when you live, you don't see another person that looks like you. You have to go at least twenty, twenty-five minutes away from where you live, and then it was only once a year, New Year's time that we got together. I bring that onto my parents. We didn't have too much -- we'd come, we would come down here, the Watanabe's doing the Fourth of July, and we'd have a one "whooping windig," yes.

MH: What do you mean by "whooping windig"? Tell me about that.

KG: They would get together. Somebody in the family would go after crawfishes. You know what they are? They would have buckets full of them, and we would be out there. In between, they would have all of these 4th of July things, all these fire crackers and whatnot. We didn't care, but all the boys there, you know. And then at nightfall, it would begin. They would start putting up those. And in the meantime, we wouldn't eat like a dinner-dinner. We'd have this crawfishes. They would have pans for them. I remember that kind of thing.

MH: And who cooked the crawfish and who --

KG: It must have been Mrs. Watanabe because Ruth and May wouldn't have been old enough. They would still be youngsters. But I think it was the young men that went out there like Ed and Fred. But I remember the crawfishes. Like I say, the childhood days of those is just --

MH: Okay. When night came, you said they would let the firecrackers go. Which way did they shoot off those Roman candles?

KG: Okay. They lived up on a sort of a knoll on the east side of the railroad tracks. There was the railroad track there, and they'd shoot them all into the, they grew celery. Their main product vegetable, celery, and they shoot them into the celery farm there.

MH: And you remember that?

KG: I remember that. Those days were something. Okay. The young people talk about mochitsuki now. Do you remember the mochitsuki then, the great big huge barn on the other side of the railroad tracks? I remember all those people coming there. I remember that.

MH: So you did mochitsuki?

KG: Yeah.

MH: What did they do in this barn?

KG: They did everything the old traditional way from what I understand, knowing no better in those days. That's the way you did it. There would be, there was quite a few men there. And they would take these wooden mallets, and they would pound into that. My mother was the chief turner. Those are the things that I remember.

MH: And what did you do?

KG: Nothing except move on the side. I don't think I was too old then. [Laughs]

MH: So you do remember mochitsuki, and it was always held --

KG: This was when we were still kids. I'm sure this is when we were little, yeah, definitely, we had to be.

MH: And this was held where?

KG: Huh?

MH: Where did they do this?

KG: In that barn on the other --

MH: Whose place was it?

KG: Watanabes and everybody got there. They all lived together more or less, the Yoshitomis and the Watanabes, you know. The only one that didn't live together was that, we called them the Keichan family, and they lived across, there's a lot about my childhood and that kind of thing. I don't know. I think I had a pretty good childhood.

MH: Can you remember any one thing that your mother and father said to you that has meaning in your life now?

KG: What was that?

MH: Is there anything your mom and dad said to you that really has meaning to you now?

KG: Not really. I think we got along real good with Dad and Mom. No, there's nothing that sticks out in mind about Mom or Dad. No, I think I was quite a brat, so I know that much. That's it. I think we had a good relationship.

MH: Did they tell you like, you know, you should work hard. You should work hard at school? Do they ever voice that to you? Did they ever say that to you?

KG: No. I don't think they were that kind of, no, they didn't, uh-uh. They didn't say you have to study this way or study that way. No, I don't think so. I really remember a very carefree life, no worries at all. I think they did all the worrying part even through a part of those years especially in the 1920, late '20s and early '30s, the Depression was pretty bad. I remember them saying well, we can't do this. We don't have enough money for that. We have to conserve. But outside of that, I think they shielded us pretty much from the hardship part of life. So I don't remember any of that. Every day was just like any other day.

MH: Okay.

KG: I think we probably covered every end of my life.

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