Interview with Hideo Takahashi

Hideo Takahashi talks about his family emigration history from Japan to Britannia Beach, BC. He talked about a law preventing his father from working underground and his mother's employment at a boarding house. After that, his family relocated to Vancouver and Hideo talks about schooling and then working for the Japanese consulate. After the bombing of Pearl Harbour, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) arrested his father because they thought he was Hideo, how his father became increasingly sick on the way to a jail in Winnipeg. His father passed away during this period of chaos and his mother had to pay for her husband's body's return. Eventually, the RCMP questioned Hideo and sending him to (Petawawa, ON or Angler, ON [unclear]) as a prisoner of war because he did not have a permit to work in the consulate. He reads from his diary an account of the gun fire, how it provoked the prisoners' defiance, how his hut was riddled by bullets, roll call, and how some prisoners went on a hunger strike. After the end of WWII, Hideo relocated to Toronto and worked on a mushroom farm in Port Credit. After that, he bought a house and worked in the unemployment insurance office.