<Begin Segment 9>

VO: What do you recall about that time in terms of your family?

YM: I think the family really bonded. Not like before the war when my dad was working day and night, and he was more relaxed, and it was good for him.

VO: And you had been separated from him for almost two years.

YM: Two years, yeah. It was kind of like living almost in Japan, because everybody, the common language was Japanese because the Peruvians, they couldn't speak English. And so communication was all done in Japanese, except for people that spoke English.

VO: So you went back to speaking mostly Japanese then.

YM: Well, you know, I thought in my mind that we were going to go back to Japan again. So instead of... we had a choice of going to an English school or Japanese school, so I went to Japanese school for over a year until they ended the war. So I think I was in the fourth or fifth grade, and for a year, over a year, I went to Japanese school, and it was like Japan. People there made their own textbook, Japanese textbook, and they even bound them by hand and stenographed the pages and actually made books.

VO: At that time, were your parents still actively considering going back to Japan then?

YM: I didn't hear them talk very much about it, but toward the latter part of '45, I think, they decided they aren't going to go back.

VO: And do you feel it was mostly to reunite the family, or do you think they...

YM: I think so.

VO: Do you think they had any feelings about the United States and how they'd be treated?

YM: Well, I think the war was going bad for Japan. My dad used to take, read the New York Times. At that time, he used to get the Sunday New York Times and he used to read that. He followed the news pretty closely, so he knew that the war was not going well for Japan, and it would, Japan would be devastated anyway if they went back. So I think they, in their mind, they decided to stay.

VO: Were they able to hear any news from Japan from your uncle in Japan?

YM: No. I think through Red Cross you could have, but I didn't remember hearing or seeing anything from Japan.

VO: So when the war ended, what did they decide to do?

YM: Well, we didn't get out... when the war ended, it was in August, was it August of '45. We didn't... my dad went to several hearings, I don't know in front of who, or whom. But it was six months after the war that we were able to get out of camp. And they released us, and at that time, there was a Mr. and Mrs. Horagami, and the Tambara family, Asakichi Tambara family that left the same time we did.

VO: And where did you go?

YM: We went to a town called Uvalde, Texas, a good Texas cowboy town, to catch the train back to Portland. But I think they decided, the group decided that they were going to stop in Los Angeles and spend some time and talk to people about the possibility of residing there or starting a business in Los Angeles rather than coming back to Portland, because there was nothing to come back to. But I got to tell you about Mrs. Horagami. When we got out of camp, right outside the gate, she was jumping up and down on the bus, she was so happy. I didn't think Issei women were like that, but she was so happy to get out of the camp.

VO: How did you feel?

YM: I felt good, too, that we were finally going to leave. But really didn't know what was going to happen after we, wherever we decided to go to.

VO: Did you have many memories of Portland, and what did you think about... what did you think about going back there?

YM: Well, I thought that we were going home, the home we never had, but to go back to. But I was kind of looking forward to coming back to Portland.

<End Segment 9> - Copyright (c) 2013 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.