Japan and the California Problem Part 14

_Q._ What did they teach you there?

_A._ Taught me j.a.panese.

_Q._ The j.a.panese language?

_A._ Yes, sir.

_Q._ Did they teach you j.a.panese history?

_A._ I wasn't able to learn very quick.

_Q._ You were not very quick to learn, but they did that, teach the history of j.a.pan?

_A._ They tried to.

_Q._ Didn't they succeed with a boy as bright as you are, going to high school?

_A._ They were successful, but I did not succeed. See?

_Q._ You read the j.a.panese language now?

_A._ I can't read it; it is too hard.

_Q._ You really can't read any?

_A._ There are three different kinds of words and letters. I can read the easiest.

_Q._ In other words, you have adopted the road of least resistance with the j.a.panese language?

_A._ Sure.

_Q._ You talk j.a.panese with your parents?

_A._ In a simple, broken language.

_Q._ Do they talk English?

_A._ They can't talk English. They have been here quite long, but they have never had a chance to talk English.

_Q._ Let me ask you this; do you get along very well with them?

_A._ In my home?

_Q._ Yes.

_A._ Sure. They are my father and mother.

_Q._ (Mr. Siegel.) And you say that you don't understand the j.a.panese language sufficiently well to carry on a conversation with them?

_A._ I understand them, but that is about all.

_Q._ How do they arrange to get along with you, if you can't speak the language orally?

_A._ They just about guess what I am trying to tell them.

_Q._ In other words, you are always asking for money. Is that the princ.i.p.al idea?

_A._ May be, not any more, but I used to.

_Q._ When they talk to you, you understand them all right?

_A._ Oh, yes; I understand them.

_Q._ (Mr. Raker.) Would you tell us why, you haven't, or didn't, and haven't given more attention and worked harder to become familiar with the j.a.panese language and history?

_A._ That is a hard question to ask me just now.

_Q._ I know it is, but I think you know, my boy; tell us in your own language, in your own way?

_A._ Well, suppose we go to school five hours a day, the American school.

We attend j.a.panese school for two hours; that is overwork two hours, you see, and we don't get paid for over time.

_Q._ I guess you are about pretty near right, didn't I? You are the kind of a fellow that is going to be thinking a little about money as you grow up, and you are going to make it in Seattle.

_A._ I haven't got a business.

_Q._ (Mr. Raker.) What I was asking that question for, I am going to put it direct. I want you to give me your good frank answer, which I know you will. Is it your determination when you get a little older, and begin to think over the situation, that you want to become familiar with the English language and understand the American ways rather than to devote your time to j.a.panese ways and language?

_A._ Well, I want to be an American more than a j.a.panese. I was born here.

_Q._ That is one of the reasons you haven't devoted your time to the j.a.panese language. How old were you when you started?

_A._ I started the same year when I went to Grammar School.

_Q._ That was when?

_A._ Five years old. Five years old I started to kindergarten, and at six I started to Grammar School.

_Q._ So when you started to kindergarten did you start in the j.a.panese School?

_A._ No, when I was six.

_Q._ And you did that from the time you were six until you were fourteen?

_A._ I think that is right, fourteen.

_Q._ How old are you now?

_A._ Seventeen.