December 7 1942 (Dictated by Michi to Joy)

Our business was doing fine and we were happy, but on December 7, 1941, Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, which started World War II. Then everything changed. All of a sudden,l the Japanese in America were treated as enemies and were so scared. It was a Sunday morning and we first heard it on the radio and we froze.

The Japanese couldn’t go anywhere without a permit. We had to make black curtains for our windows so the light wouldn’t shine at night. Everytime we heard a plane, we were so scared that Japan might bomb America, and we would get blamed for it.

My sister, Sachie, was staying with us and going to sewing school, but she hurried and went back to Utah. It was a good thing too, because we couldn’t travel soon after that time. The Chinese didn’t want to be mistaken as Japanese, so they wore a tag saying “We are Chinese.” Then, we, the Japanese living on the coast from the state of Washington to California, had to evacuate. In other words, we were being chased out. As soon as the war started, our business suffered because people did not come to buy produce from the “jap”, as we were called as soon as the war started.

We were told that if we had a place to go in Utah or somewhere else inland, there would be a voluntary evacuation period until March 31, 1942. We decided to go to our relation, the Shiki’s, who lived in Utah. The ones that didn’t have a place to go were put in concentration camps. My father, sister Lily, and brothers, Henry and Noburo lived in Seattle and went to a concentration camp in Idaho. It was called Minidoka and it was where they built barracks as concentration camp. It was a sad way for the Japanese to live. Those barracks had only 1 or 2 rooms and a family had t  live in that room. They all ate together in a mess hall because there was no kitchen for cooking. They just had a pot belly stove to keep them warm, and it was cold in Idaho. They had a fence all around the barrack and soldiers were outside, not to guard us, but guarding to see that the Japanese didn’t get out. The concentration camp was manned by the Japanese and whatever job they had, their wages was about 15 dollars month.