Writing Letters

Coming to California Learning Japanese with the MIS Meeting Hamako in Japan Miscommunications Writing Letters Meeting Mr. Amano Marriage and Returning to US Reception of Hamako by family

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Then about, that was about 6 months after I had arrived in Japan, she told me to go home, marry a nice American girl. Well, I felt kind of bad, and she got on the train and took off for her home in Fujisawa and so I didn't see her...I did go back home to Chicago but I couldn't...I wrote letters to her—cause I could use Kanji then and with Kanji and Romaji, English and all—I was able, we were able to correspond. But that...the letters all went to this Shizuko Naito in Radio Tokyo, who was my friend I tell you, and she passed my letters. I would write to Shizuko Naito, she would get it and inside the envelope was a letter to Hamako, my wife...well she wasn't my wife then.

So after 2 years of writing back and forth, and her father had no knowledge of this correspondence.

Date: January 26, 2012
Location: California, US
Interviewer: John Esaki, Yoko Nishimura
Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum

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