E17, Aki Tamagawa ‘94, Yoshiko Tamagawa, Grandmother, 1919, Aichi, China, Hyōgo, Shizuoka
I interviewed my paternal grandmother, Yoshiko Tamagawa, on December 1, 1992. She was born in 1919 and is now 73 years old.
Q: How old were you when World War II began?
A: I was exactly 20 years old, living in Nagoya. That was the age when I married your grandfather. At that time, I had no idea that the war would be so devastating.
Q: What was your opinion towards Japan fighting in the war?
A: I wished that my country would win a successful victory.
Q: Was your lifestyle drastically changed?
A: Yes, you could say that it was. In the beginning, we all had supplies of food and clothing. Yet as the war continued, the materials decreased rapidly, and a system for exchanging tickets for garments and food was created. We would have nothing to eat or wear unless we bought it with those tickets. The days got worse for us to live. Rice became scarce, and we often ate seaweed cut up to look like noodles, or potatoes instead of rice. I moved to Shanghai in 1944 to live with Grandpa and my oldest son, your uncle. I was determined for all of us to survive despite the hardships.
Q: What kinds of clothes did everyone wear at that time?
A: Women stopped wearing kimono after the war began, in order to run faster and work more swiftly. We made ourselves monpe, which were kimono-like tops with pants for the bottom, and we wore those instead. Men wore kokumin-fuku (citizen clothes), which were yellowish in color, and soldiers wore their uniforms. All of us looked quite the same.
Q: Were you asked to do anything for the country?
A: Wives did not do much except to make bamboo spears to stab the Americans when they invaded. There were even practices to learn how to kill them. High school girls often made clothes for the Army rather than studying.
Q: Why did you move to Shanghai?
A: Grandfather was serving as a soldier in Shanghai to plan tactics for fighting. In 1944, he was transferred to his pre-war job at the Shanghai branch office of Yokohama Specie Bank [Yokohama Shōkin Ginkō, a bank specializing in foreign exchange and gold and silver bullion], which allowed me to join him with our son. Japan was in its worst state then, and sailing by boat from Kōbe to Shanghai took four days instead of the usual two days. Still it was a relief when my family was reunited.
Q: How were conditions in Shanghai compared to Japan?
A: Fortunately, the area where we lived was very pleasant, and the house was located near the Public Garden. There were movie theaters and shops. It was like a dream compared to the screams and death back in our land.
Q: Were you safe there?
A: We lived quite peacefully, until one night, when a Chinese man placed a time bomb near our front gate, which exploded at the entrance of our house. We were too close to the explosion to realize that the main door had been blown away. It wasn’t until we felt the strong gusts of wind blowing into our bedroom that we finally realized. Our blankets were covered with shattered glass. This was a shock, and we assumed that it showed that Japan was weakening.
Q: When did you return to Japan?
A: Within the same year, my son and I returned. We traveled at night, trying to avoid submarines or planes targeting our ship, and as a result it took seven days. I had packed a lot of food to bring from Shanghai, but it was all taken in order to get a room to sleep overnight at a hotel in Kyōto. By this time, the land was in ruins.
Q: Did you escape to a safer area?
A: In 1945, my four-year-old son and I traveled deep into the mountains near the Tenryū River, while I was pregnant. The air raid attacks had bombed Kōbe, and everything was burnt to ashes. Unless I evacuated to a safer area then, I believe I wouldn’t have survived.
Q: What kind of house did you live in, while you hid?
A: We lived in an attic room called okaiko-san (used for cultivating silkworms) at a farmer’s house. It was a small room, just enough to spread a few blankets, and because it was during the summer, there were so many flies and mosquitoes. We stayed there for about five months, and we left by the time that my second son was born, right after the war ended.
Q: What was Japan like after the war?
A: The country was left with nothing. There was not enough food for everyone, and as the soldiers returned and increased the population, many starved or died of disease. Sometimes the only food that was available was sugar. The farmers controlled the rice, but we could not get it without paying or exchanging our possessions. I myself gave up my wedding kimono for rice and potatoes. Everyone was desperate to survive.
Q: What had you feared most during the war?
A: The air raid attacks. We all watched the days go by nervously, and when the sirens rang, we hid ourselves in the hole that we had dug until a soldier came to announce that the bombing had stopped. There was constant tension. During the last few days of the war, the sirens were heard continuously. The Japanese were completely defeated, and I just prayed that such fighting would never occur again in the future.