Tag Archives: WWII

My name is Lisa

and I didn’t bomb Pearl Harbor.

As a matter of fact, I wasn’t even alive during WWII and you know what? Neither were my parents. But you see, even though this happened 72 years ago, you all keep blaming me in particular for it and I just don’t understand how you can make that sort of accusation. Scientifically, it makes no sense at all.

I hate the 2001 film Pearl Harbor that starred Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett. Us Japs killed off that babyface Josh and so many people went wild about this FAKE death. I remember when that movie came out, I was just starting my adventures in A.O.L. chatrooms. When I found out that there was a chatroom for an interest in Japan, my eleven year old self enthusiastically entered one of these chat rooms and when I revealed my ethnic background I was bombarded with messages like :

“YOU KILLED JOSH HARTNETT”

“GO BACK TO YOUR COUNTRY WE HATE YOU HERE”

“JAP, JAP, JAP, KICK THE JAP OUT OF THE ROOM”

Eleven years old. How can you accuse an eleven year old to have taken part in WWII?

In some ways, I relate to Sameer. I could never tell my family the sort of harassment I was facing when I was young. I only wanted to give them good news about my life. How can I tell my mom that her only daughter was being picked on because I am Japanese. Whether it was in school or on the world wide web, I just had to swallow that pain and hope for the best.

There are so many other harmful stereotypes that different people of different backgrounds have and it needs to stop. Please, stop. I am an American. Just like you.

Book Review: Strangers From A Different Shore (pt1)

Ronald Takaki’s anthology of Asian Americans covers A LOT of ground, including full chapters dedicated to each group. As you know, I don’t care for traditional reviews. In every book I’ve read, there is always something that sticks with me, and it is those somethings that I like to write about.

“Watershed of WWII” was the standout chapter for me. Many have said World War II was the turning point of the worlds modern age. Prior to the war the US was not the world power it is today, and a country’s strength was expressed through its Navy. Everything changed after the war. Airpower reigned supreme after the war. The US and USSR became the dominant forces. The nuclear age was born. Change was not lost on Takaki as he quotes Carlos Bulosan a Filipino American, “If I met him again,” says Carlos as he watches his brother leave for the Army after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, “I would not be the same. He would not be the same either. Our world was this one, but a new one was being born.” The weight of those words was heavier than anyone could have imagined.

The way “white America” would see these Strangers From A Different Shore was being forced to change. Thats not to say everything changed for the better–the myth of “military necessity” for Japanese internment camps is just one example. but people were forced to see, view… perceive Asian Americans differently. Quoting Filipino American Manuel Buaken, “No longer on the streetcar do I feel myself in the presence of my enemies. We Filipinos are the same– it is Americans that have changed in their recognition of us.” The battle for Batan earned the respect of America with Eleanor Roosevelt’s tribute to those who fought, “Fighting in Batan has been an excellent example of what happens when two different races respect each other. Men of different races and backgrounds have fought side by side and praised each other’s heroism and courage.”

So why, several days after reading so many different stories of troubles and triumphs Takaki presents did this particular section stick with me? Perhaps its because of my military background, seeing first hand the effects of war on peoples lives on both sides of a conflict. Experiencing the effects repeated deployments has on people and the way they are disregarded by the government of the country they were fighting for begins to change ones perspective; you see things differently. Either way time marches on and you do what you have to do to get by and help others do the same.

Lives of Asian Americans changed after the war. Lives of Americans changed after the war.

 

 

Hiroo Onada dies at 91

How interesting that I am seeing the story of Onada again. I remember coming across it on Reddit a couple years back and briefly read about this persons adventure in the Philippines. I even recall going to work and telling my friends about it just because I felt like this was a story like no other.

It made for a unique story because at the time because it seems as though many people were trying to communicate with Onada that the war had been over for 29 years but he refused to believe it, thinking that it was all propaganda. In one of the articles I read from over a year ago, apparently a helicopter flew over the jungle that Onada had possibly been staying in and just dropped TONS of leaflets over the jungle in hopes that they would find it. Stating things like “The war is over! Come down now!” but he refused to believe it because at the time of WWII, his commanding officer Major Yoshimi Taniguchi promised to him and Onada’s men that he would come back for them.

Then this strange layer was added when an explorer named Norio Suzuki was on a mission around the world in 1974 to find three things:  Lieutenant Onada, a panda and the abominable snowman. Suzuki seemed to be very specific that it needed to be in that order exactly. I guess I really love Suzuki’s story in particular is partially because the three things that he was on a mission to find seemed so random. Suzuki ended up finding and even befriending Onada and tried to convince him to come out of the jungle, yet Onada still refused.

It wasn’t just Onada was camping in this jungle either, he was still pillaging Philippine villages and harming people. The Japanese Government had to step in and relocate Major Yoshimi Taniguchi who had long since retired and was working at a small book shop. They brought him to the jungle and had them speak to each other and it was then that Onada had learned that the war was over.

He ended up receiving compensation for the additional 29 years he served in the military. In some ways people looked up to him as an incredibly strong, and loyal person and to strive to be like him but from what I remember reading from the old article, he became very depressed that when he returned back to Japan, so much had changed especially with how the youth were treating their elders and he was not very proud of his actions in the Philippines and felt a lot of embarrassment. He ended up donating a lot of money to the Philippine villages that he pillaged but they still do not forgive him.