(Japanese) One other special thing about Escobar was that there was Japanese organization which still exists today. What was even more amazing was that — Japanese language school had a really good programs. When I was very young, resident married Japanese couples taught Japanese at school. Classes were offered in the morning and the afternoon. If you spent the morning at an Argentinian, Spanish school, then you would study at the Japanese school for three and a half or four hours in the afternoon. So many generations received a fairly bilingual education, including me.
Because of that, I often heard, “Wow, the Nikkei in Escobar speak such good Japanese.” Or “your Japanese is pretty good.” That was really thanks to the older generations and our predecessor who contributed a lot of resources to Japanese education, even though they weren’t all doing very well financially.
Date: September 22, 2019
Location: California, US
Interviewer: Yoko Nishimura
Contributed by: Watase Media Arts Center, Japanese American National Museum
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