<Begin Segment 12>

LT: So thinking about when you left camp to go to Chicago, that was a big change. Can you talk about how you felt and what you were thinking at that time?

DS: Well, Chicago, to me, was just another city. And the reason I chose Chicago was because my sister was there. I mean, if my sister was in New York, I probably would have gone to New York. And I figured, being there, I had to make my own way so I wouldn't have to go look for a job and go on with life. And I think that probably was my attitude all through this evacuation, that you had to accept what happened to you and make the best of it and go on.

LT: What was it like to be, though, out of camp, especially the first day or two when you realized, "I'm not in camp, I'm in Chicago, life is different"?

DS: Life is different. It was a wonderful feeling. It was like being released. I mean, you can do what you want, you could go where you want, you could eat what you want, you could shop. I mean, you were free. You were free, and that's the way I felt, that I was free to do whatever I wanted to do, whatever that was. And my world was very small. It was a very small world. And then my mother and sister were able to come out, and we were all together again. And like I said, you learn to accept what's handed you and go on with life.

LT: Being outside camp in the Midwest, were there others who saw you as, especially your mother, as a citizen of Japan and equated you with the enemy, knowing that we were still at war? Were there instances where you faced prejudice?

DS: I don't think so... yeah, now I take that back. Because we looked for apartments, and they wouldn't rent to us. I mean, they just wouldn't, you know, you're "Japs." They wouldn't even consider renting to us. And little things I think we experienced, but I don't think I ever let it mount up to anything, so I was, so I would think, oh, I'm a low-class citizen. I never thought of myself as that. I was an American citizen, and we took what was handed to us, and life has to go on. I never really experienced prejudices except where you wanted to rent an apartment and they didn't, they refused you. I don't think I ever really experienced times when I was told, "You can't do that because you're a Jap." I don't think I ever experienced that.

LT: Can you recount an experience going to ask about renting and what the person said and how you responded?

DS: Well, naturally we just took it, like, I mean, when they said, "No, we're not going to rent it to you," they may not have come out saying, "because you're Japs." But we accepted it; we didn't fight it. I think we probably thought that that's what they would do, and many times you were rejected because of that. But I don't think we let it bother us too much except when I got here, again, I don't think we went into rages because we were... I think we just accepted those things. And prejudice, I think, still exists in different ways even today. But I don't think you could let it bother you. I'm ninety years old, and I don't let things like that bother me. [Laughs]

LT: So how did you feel when the war ended?

DS: Oh, that was so great. I remember being in Chicago when the war ended, and I think I was downtown in the Loop, and people were just going crazy that day.

LT: What were they doing and saying?

DS: Oh, they were just dancing and yelling and screaming, and it was just pandemonium. I mean, people were just going crazy, I remember that. And I thought, "Oh, wow." I thought, "Wow, finally." That was a good feeling, yeah.

LT: I have to ask, so you said people were dancing and screaming, so what did you do?

DS: No, I wasn't dancing or screaming. [Laughs] I was there, but not dancing or screaming.

LT: Okay.

<End Segment 12> - Copyright © 2013 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.