Discover Nikkei

https://www.discovernikkei.org/en/interviews/clips/405/

The hardships of life in Japan during World War II

Well, of course, the Japanese life was so different. The weather was so different. And I came down with a -- it was, I think, within a year -- I came down with pleurisy and it's called the wet serous, I mean, I had a lot of water collect in my pleura. And the doctors were scarce but anyway, I was hardly able to breathe. And I remember I totally lost, lost my appetite. I wasn't eating, my mother was really concerned. And the doctor did come to draw some serous fluid from my pleura and it kinda helped me breathe. But everything was black market. You couldn't buy an egg, you couldn't buy food, even if you had the money. We didn't have the money, but even if you had the money you couldn't buy.

So, I remember my mother came back and with her hachimaki (headband) she had this one egg cradled in her hachimaki and she says, Marion, Marion, look what I found, look what I got you. (When I was well), I could eat, sit down and eat three eggs at one sitting, but here, this precious egg, she was so proud, she was, she got this egg for me. She said, How do you want me to prepare it for you? Boiled egg, soft boiled egg, fried egg? And I didn't even want that.

So I thought, you know, I mean, these are the loving thoughts that you just... I haven't forgotten. Well, I, I'm, I don't know how it ended up being, but anyway, I remember that that's how scarce food items were.


Japan World War II

Date: August 3 & 4, 2003

Location: Washington, US

Interviewer: Alice Ito

Contributed by: Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

Interviewee Bio

Nisei female. Born December 30, 1927 in Seattle, Washington. Lived in Japan for fifteen months as a child, before returning to Seattle to attend junior high school. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, father was picked up by the FBI and taken to the Department of Justice camp at Missoula, Montana. Removed to the Puyallup Assembly Center, Washington, before being reunited with father at the Minidoka incarceration camp, Idaho. Family volunteered to leave for Japan in 1943 on the U.S. government's exchange ship, the USS Gripsholm. Attended high school in Japan, and participated in military and air raid drills. During the U.S.'s postwar occupation of Japan, attended Doshisha University and worked for a U.S. army station hospital library. Returned to the U.S. and enrolled at St. Mary's teaching hospital in Rochester, Minnesota. Denied redress because of expatriation to Japan, but succeeded in obtaining redress in 1996 after filing a class-action lawsuit.

*The full interview is available Denshō: The Japanese American Legacy Project.

Ota,Vince

The reason to stay in Japan after his third year

Japanese American Creative designer living in Japan

Herzig,Aiko Yoshinaga

Lack of political power led to camps

(1924-2018) Researcher, Activist

Kadoguchi,Shizuko

Choice to move east or go to Japan

(b.1920) Japanese Canadian Nisei. Established the Ikenobo Ikebana Society of Toronto

Herzig,Aiko Yoshinaga

Feeling imprisoned at camp

(1924-2018) Researcher, Activist

Herzig,Aiko Yoshinaga

Institutionalization as a bad aspect of camp

(1924-2018) Researcher, Activist

Herzig,Aiko Yoshinaga

State Department records show concern for treatment of Japanese American internees

(1924-2018) Researcher, Activist

Ota,Vince

Never being Japanese

Japanese American Creative designer living in Japan

Sogi,Francis Y.

Remembering December 7, 1941

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Sogi,Francis Y.

Meeting Japanese Americans from the mainland in MIS

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Sogi,Francis Y.

Awareness of concentration camps as a Japanese American

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Sogi,Francis Y.

Visiting family in Japan

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Sogi,Francis Y.

Being stationed in Japan during the American occupation

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Korematsu,Fred

Manhunt

(1919 - 2005) Challenged the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066.

Sogi,Francis Y.

Rebuilding Japan

(1923-2011) Lawyer, MIS veteran, founder of Francis and Sarah Sogi Foundation

Korematsu,Fred

The Final Verdict

(1919 - 2005) Challenged the constitutionality of Executive Order 9066.