<Begin Segment 8>

MR: When you were on your own and enjoying yourself as a young teenager in Hood River, what was it that you liked to do to get away from such a big family and enjoy yourself?

HY: Oh, well, my greatest pleasure was hunting and fishing. I used to do a lot of fishing in those days. And you know, in those days, fishing was so easy. Our equipment was relatively crude, you know. We'd use a bamboo, not a bamboo, a steel telescopic rod, go down to a little place called Indian Creek. In an hour or so, you catch all the fish you want, more than you'd want. You bring it home. People don't want to fish, not in Hood River not in those days, not trout, but you'd fish for it and a lot release it. Then later on as I got a little older, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, I got interested in bird hunting, so I did a lot of bird hunting particularly with a friend named Gerald Foster who everybody called "Fish Foster." Fish and I used to go out even before school in the morning and drive to Viento which is maybe five miles west of Hood River and go duck hunting, half an hour or so, and then we'd go back to school. We did a lot of hunting and fishing together. The, that was my greatest part although I love to read too.

MR: Besides going hunting with your friend and studying hard, were there extracurricular activities sponsored by the school that you took part in?

HY: Well, athletics. Athletics was the biggest one, and I did play high school baseball, made the baseball team and the tennis team, but I was only a mediocre athlete unlike my older brothers, some of whom were very good and made the squad four years in a row, but I didn't do that. But still it was fun. And the other thing, other extracurricular activities, this is strictly a Japanese thing, but they had an athletic organization called the Nisei Athletic Club, NAC, and they sponsored basketball, and I was no good at basketball ever, and baseball, and I'm okay at that. So in the summertime, we'd have a lot of fun doing that. And they would, not the NAC, but there were also Japanese American social functions particularly sponsored by the church, not dances so much because... you know Methodists were funny in those days. They thought that was a sin. Dancing was a sin and gambling was a sin and drinking was a sin and going to the movies was a sin. Oh, man, but that's the way they were in those days. But every now and then, there'd be, they'd have dances, and I was seventeen and, man, I was so dumb. I was green as grass and didn't know what women were for. [Laughs] So anyway, growing up was very interesting in Hood River in those days.

MR: And as I, as we have mentioned before, school and academics were very important in your family. What do you think it was that produced in you and your siblings this incredible drive to be the best?

HY: Oh, my father, my father and mother. They were, they weren't always needling us about that. But my father especially, he was very, very good in promoting his ideas especially with the kids because we got no defense. We'd answer, "Yes, Dad, Yes, Papa. Hai, hai, hai, yes, Papa." So when he'd tell us, we'd say, we'd try to do it. But my mother was much more gentle. She would kind of tell parables, says, "You could have your money lost, can steal your house, your health can be broken, but nobody can steal your education." She was a lot more subtle than my father. My father said, "Do it," say, "Yes, Papa."

<End Segment 8> - Copyright © 2003 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.