A02, Kinami Furukawa ‘85, Grandmother, c 1906, Yokohama: Naka-ku, Isogo-ku
In May 1984, I interviewed my grandmother about her experiences during World War II. She was born around 1906 and is 78 years old now.
I didn’t suffer or have much trouble during the war, compared to other people. I was about 35 years old when it started. My family lived in Isezaki-chō, which used to be the main street of Yokohama. My husband owned a draper’s shop there, but when the war started, we evacuated to another house in Isogo. It was surrounded by hills and mountains, and not many people lived in that area. Two of my older sons evacuated to my husband’s parent’s home in Nagoya. All of the children of elementary age or older were forced to evacuate to the countryside by the government.
I was scared every day. My heart almost stopped when I heard the air raid siren. Then I turned off all the lights and held my small daughters tightly in my arms and ran to the air raid shelter (bōkūgō). The shelter was like a big hole dug into the mountain, something like a cave. We usually stayed there for about an hour until we heard the “all clear” signal. Luckily, my house and neighborhood weren’t attacked. I didn’t even see a bomb dropped or someone get killed. My neighborhood was safe, but I heard that Isezaki-chō was terribly destroyed. There were dead bodies all over, people were injured, and the town was completely devastated.
My husband wasn’t drafted into the military, because he was not tall enough. In order to be drafted, young men had to be over 21 years old and be healthy, along with other conditions. A letter called akagami was sent to men when they were conscripted. Many of the young workers at my shop received akagami, and whenever anyone was drafted, we prepared o-sekihan as a farewell gift. O-sekihan is red rice, which we prepared to offer congratulations. We thought of o-sekihan as a military decoration.
After the war, my son returned, and all of my family were able to live together again. However, we didn’t have much to eat. Every day we received some food which was called haikyū (rations), including a small amount of rice and potatoes. Since we lived in the mountains, we weren’t able to fish. But I think we had a higher standard of living compared to others, because we were able to exchange our possessions for food from farmers, which was illegal. Money wasn’t worth anything at all. Cloth and clothing were worth a lot more. Since we owned a draper’s shop, we exchanged cloth for sweet potatoes, fish, sugar, and other condiments which most people couldn’t get.
We weren’t able to dress nicely during and after the war. We wore monpe, something like trousers. We wore dark colors so that we wouldn’t attract attention. Even after the war, we couldn’t go into the center of Yokohama, because there were many American soldiers, and we were afraid of being raped.
This is all that I can remember about the war. I really didn’t suffer that much. No one in my family died, and we had a rather luxurious life compared to others. It was very lucky that we evacuated to Isogo and that we owned a draper’s shop.
These were my grandmother’s experiences, and their house in Isogo is still standing. No one lives there anymore, but when I visit, I can still find the air raid shelter. I was surprised that she didn’t see anyone die or see the bombs dropped on Yokohama. I think she was very lucky.