Ayako Nomura Machida

AYAKO NOMURA MACHIDA
Family # 3808
Camp: Manzanar, CA
Address: 15-6-1

I remember December 7, 1941 (Sunday morning) very well. My mother had just made breakfast and the family was ready to eat. My brother came running into the kitchen to say that Japan had attacked Pearl Harbor and that the United States declared war. I shall never forget the expres­sion on my mother’s face when she heard this since Japan was her birth country. The center of our family’s conversation was about the war and what it was going to do to the family.

My brothers were in business for themselves so the going was not too good for them. Since they had to work until late at night they were constantly under surveillance with the neighborhood guards. They had to answer questions every night as to where they had been and why. We had a curfew and could not go anywhere after dark.

When I returned to school the next day, my classmates made fun of me and wanted me out of their classroom as they thought I was a threat and would harm them. The school principal talked to the Japanese in the school and asked that we consider quitting since there was so much animosity towards us. Needless to say, my “friends” were no longer my friends. They stayed away from me like I had leprosy. What made it worse was that the Ambassador from Japan waiting to see President Roosevelt had the same name as me and somehow that meant that there might be some relation to this person. The principal of the school peeked into our classroom and jokingly said, “I would be careful, class, as you have one of those among you.” I have never forgotten those words as it really struck a bad note with me – I could not understand why my being in school would be a threat. Now that I think about it, I think the administration was looking out for us so that things wouldn’t happen to us. I was at an age (15) when events such as this could be very traumatic and the vulnerability of imminent danger if I stuck around. My thought then was what did I do? I was born in the United States. How could I have started the war!!!

Then word came out that all Japanese must be evacuated out of the West Coast into internment camps throughout the United States. We were only allowed to take what we could carry on our backs. I remember people coming over to buy all of our furniture for next-to-nothing. My brother had just bought his first new car that he almost had to give away. People were very merciless and greedy. Signs started to show on the windows of business establish­ments, “NO JAPS ALLOWED.”

My family and others who lived in or around the area were the first ones to leave as we were living in the danger zone (near Lockheed). I think it was perhaps sometime in late April or early May that we took the bus (with windows covered and two MP’s aboard) to a place called Manzanar. We were each given a box lunch and made one stop to the unknown destination.

When we arrived in Manzanar, there was a greeting party of some more MP’s who examined our meager belongings. They actu­ally poked holes into our luggage with their bayonets when they could not get into it. They were not a friendly bunch. The treatment we received was very bad. They looked upon us as if we had committed a crime and that we were responsible for the war. When we finally were able to get through the check-in line, we received our assignment for living quarters. Each family member had a cot allotted to them and a hay filled mattress that we had to fill ourselves. The floors had a lot of holes in it that made sweeping very easy as all the dirt went into these holes as we swept. Later, as time went on, we finally had the floors laid with some kind of linoleum. We had to make our own tables and chairs with whatever material we could find. Some of the people who were creative made cupboards and dressers.

Once my family settled, all students received notices to contact their schools to get textbooks and assignments so we could finish the school year. I missed about six or seven weeks. We had to find teachers who would instruct us and give us our final tests, etc. These teachers were in college who needed credits to finish to get their degrees. Fortunate­ly, I passed into the eleventh grade.

High school in camp was a brand new experience for me. All the classrooms were barracks similar to our home. Most of the teachers were Caucasians who taught the basic classes, and the Japanese taught most of the science classes. The exposure that I had with so many Japanese was very overwhelming since the school I previously went to had so few Japanese. The competition was great. I had done fairly well in my studies until I had all this competition. There were many leaders among us who were very competent and popular and became officers of the student body. There was even a football team that competed with [Big] Pine High School. We won even though the boys from [Big] Pine were bigger and taller. Life at Manzanar High School was fun. People became very close friends and have remained so after 50 years. Many of the boys were drafted into the armed services after they graduated from high school. Many of the families moved to other parts of the United States as employment opened up to them.

I stayed with my family until they relocated to Idaho. After a short time, I started to apply for nurses training. I must have tried at least ten schools before I finally was accepted to a school in Illinois. Many of the schools were still afraid to accept Japanese into their schools because of the fear they had. There were 12 Japanese students in my class. We had escorts into town and had to be in the dorm by 8:00 pm. Some of the patients were afraid of us taking care of them. I had to wait a year before I could take my state board in California. By this time, my family had moved back to California to start all over again. I felt there was prejudice for quite a while and it seemed as though I always had to prove myself to be better or more competent than my peers.

Wind and Dust
This wind and dust I have to bear
How hard it blows I do not care.
But when the wind begins to blow –
­My morale is pretty low.
I know that I can see it through
Because others have to bear it too.
So I will bear it with the rest
And hope the outcome is the best.
– George Nishimura, age 16 (Manzanar, 1943)

Read this to learn more about the demographics of each of the ten facilities administered by the War Relocation Authority.

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