G03C, Karen (Jia-lin) Hsu ‘99, Grandmother, 1916, Yokohama: Naka-ku
In November 1997, I interviewed my paternal grandmother, who is now 81 years old. She experienced World War II when she and her family lived in Yamashita-chō [Yokohama Chinatown] when she was in her 20s. She survived the harsh conditions of the war. I asked her several questions about her life at that time.
Q: Were you afraid during the war?
A: Yes, I was very scared. I was pregnant at that time, and so I was very weak. I worried about things like what would happen to my children if I die, and how would they survive? I was especially worried about the food that we needed to survive. Also, I was afraid that my husband would not be able to handle it alone. We only ate white beans, nothing else. We couldn’t go outside of Chinatown, so there was only a limited amount of food. For example, we only had two apples for our whole family each day. This was worse for us as Chinese, because we got bullied by the Japanese. My husband was a businessman, so he had to go to work at 4:30 am every day. This was to provide enough food for our seven children. I cooked the food with coal.
Q: How did you survive the bombing?
A: At 9:00 am on May 29, 1945, the bombing started suddenly. We had to get ready to evacuate. But I was pregnant at the time, and all of my other children were under eight years old, so it was very difficult. Your father was only two years old at that time. Also I had to carry rice just in case, and my husband’s suit. I remember that my husband went back into the house to get the children’s clothes. I was afraid that he might never come back.
Chinatown was in flames for almost an hour. The sky was totally black because of 600 B-29 planes that covered the sky. There were corpses all around, and they were burned black by the tremendous heat. To escape, people jumped into the canal between Chinatown and Motomachi. At Yamashita Park, the P-51 fighter planes flew overhead shooting at us, and bullets were firing everywhere, injuring a lot of people.
We were all hiding under a tree in Yamashita Park. Our clothes were all burned, and so we had nothing. Most people had run away. One night, four of my children had to sleep at the Hotel New Grand, and they got some food there, such as canned bread and crumbs from beans, without oil. Our neighbors shared food with us, such as eggs, noodles and potatoes. If I took the children out for a walk, people who felt sorry for us gave us oil and fish.
After the fires that started because of the bombing, it rained very hard. There were floods and a typhoon, so it was a disaster. We had no bath at the time, so we filled up a trunk with water and warmed it up with a wood fire. I also fixed the house using wires instead of nails and connected the wood together. This is how I survived, but many people lost their lives. Every day I couldn’t stop thinking about death that might come at any time.
On August 14, right before the end of the war, there was another sudden bombing raid. Because of the bombing, my baby was delivered earlier than expected. There was no food or electricity, and I gave up on her and left her to die. But she kept on crying for the next 40 minutes, so I found out that she was still strong enough to live.
Q: How did you protect your family?
A: Our clothes were all ripped and ruined. So I went to get cloth from the leftovers of the bombed clothing factory. I connected bits and pieces and sewed them together. There were lots of flies all over the place in the summer. People started eating the flies, since they were all over the food. Lots of people died because of this. Our whole family suffered from food poisoning. But then I got a leaf from a tree, boiled it in water, and drank it. To my surprise, it cured the food poisoning. All I wanted was health and safety, and nothing else.
After the war ended, the U.S. military occupation began, so my husband got a job as a translator, because he spoke English. Because of this we got free soap, chocolates, and milk. I got a job washing the uniforms for the American soldiers.