<Begin Segment 6>

MH: You talk about your children. Did they go to Japanese school? I know they went to a regular school.

KG: No, because Jean was the only one that was school age by that time. So in the meantime, Mother had come back too, so we were settled in that home. We stayed at the Tsubois' home 'til we found this other place. But they started school at the Holiday Park area. And then after we moved and bought that place, then we moved over there, but I can't remember just when that was, end of 1946 because we came back in '45, I think. I think it was in '46 that we found, they found us the place that was this, they say it is acceptable people, didn't mind whether we were Japanese or whatever. So that's what we did. We moved over there and Ronnie went to, Ronnie and Jean. Ronnie wasn't quite old enough to go, but Jean, they went to Buckman grade school. That's where they, and then onto high school from there.

MH: Did you at any point when they were going to grade school feel any racial discrimination towards them?

KG: That's really the part that, you know, the kids, the children never came back and said that anybody said anything bad about them. And like me as I say, my whole life, this is my whole life. Like I say, there was one instant, this was walking down the street in Portland. There was one woman that was, she worked in another department, but she just wouldn't, I don't know. She was a little hard to get to, and I remember, I met some very nice people there too. And this one woman, she was, we did a lot of things together, and I asked her about this particular person. She says, "Kena," she says, "forget her." She didn't know whether that woman was ready to accept me or not for some reason, but she didn't stay at the library very long. She moved on. I guess she didn't like the idea of having an Oriental there, I don't know. But most of the people there were very, very nice to me. So I can't say that I had any unpleasantness in my life, really.

MH: Now, where did your children go to high school?

KG: What did I major in in high school?

MH: No. Where did your children go to?

KG: Oh, where my kids went to. They went to Buckman. They finished there, and then they went onto Washington High School. That school is no more anymore. And then Jean went onto, I think she went to Willamette. And I know Ronnie went to Portland U., and they both finished there.

MH: Do you feel that they went on to college because of some influence that you might have had on them?

KG: What was that?

MH: Why do you think your children went to college?

KG: Oh, well, I impressed on them that they had better go on to college, otherwise, you know, their job opportunities wouldn't be that great. Neither one of them objected to going on and finishing their education which was -- I didn't have to "you got to." It wasn't that kind of a thing. I said, "It would be better for you if you did." So Ronnie finished in the engineering. And gosh, I think Jean just took a regular college course, I don't know. She didn't, she worked after school. That's all I can remember. She was working in the hospitals. She got into the, where they test things, you know. That's where she worked. She worked there for a while, so she must have been working, it's too long ago. My gosh, my eighty years are showing.

<End Segment 6> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.