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JK: And did you have Japanese, were you able to have Japanese school?

SI: Yes, we did.

JK: How did that work?

SI: [Laughs] If you ask any of my sisters, they would say we hated it. We did, we just really hated it. But my mother said it's costing us a lot of money to hire this teacher from Willamette to come to Independence to teach, and so, "You'd better appreciate it. Someday you're going to be happy you know it." And I really do appreciate it, because I can read a little Japanese, and I can speak a little Japanese.

JK: And how did he teach you Japanese?

SI: Well, he was a student at Willamette, so he could speak some English, and, of course, his Japanese was perfect. So he would come twice a week, Wednesday evenings, and half a day on Saturdays.

JK: And so did he teach you conversational Japanese?

SI: Writing.

JK: Writing? So you learned how to read and write Japanese.

SI: Uh-huh.

JK: Did you do any other Japanese celebrations with the community? Did you do New Year's?

SI: New Year's was sort of a family thing, each family would make their New Year's gochiso, you know. But we didn't go someplace or go to visit somebody else's home, just the men did. The men would go from home to home on New Year's, and the wife there would have prepared Japanese food. And my father would go and other people would come to our house, but the children stayed home.

JK: How did they get all this food for New Year's, the more traditional Japanese food?

SI: There was a store in Portland that was called Teikoku. Do you recall? No, you're younger.

JK: I'm learning from you.

SI: So Teikoku, did Matsushima own that store? I can't remember. But they had a truck, and once a month they would load it with Japanese and come clear down to Independence. And my mother apologized, she said, "I wish you wouldn't do that. We appreciate it, we like otofu and all this, but for you to travel all those miles on account of us," we were the only family there to buy his food. And he said, "No," his name was Matsushima, the man who came. Nice-looking man, and he comes in a suit, and he brings this food. So we had it.

JK: So you were able to have Japanese treats and special food.

SI: Uh-huh, but not too often.

JK: Do you have other memories of growing up as a child? Did you have responsibility for the family, or on the hop farm, did you have to help with the farm?

SI: You know, our mother didn't ever tell us to go out and work in the field, she didn't think that was for women to do. So, girls, and then my oldest brother, when he was sixteen, he went away to business college, so he wasn't there. So my father just hired help from Portland. Every winter he would come to Portland and round up some people and hire them to get his crop going. The hops grow one season, but at the end of the season you cut down all these dead vines and burn them, and there's nothing in the ground. Next year you start over again. You have to get these plants, put 'em in the ground, and he had to have workers, so my father would go back to Portland and round up some people to do that.

JK: So did you help your mom around the house?

SI: Yeah, I did.

JK: What were your responsibilities?

SI: We had wooden floors, we didn't have carpet in those days. And so all of us, before we went to school, she would have us sweep the floor or whatever, and then go to school. And then weekends we'd scrub the floor, so that wooden floor was shiny. You could walk on it with bare feet, you know.

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2014 Oregon Nikkei Endowment and Densho. All Rights Reserved.