Authors: Deborah Radwan
Rudy nodded to Yoshito who seemed to see something far and away out in a distance.
“Do you remember hearing in your history class about Pearl Harbor being bombed during World War II? It happened on December 7, 1941. It must seem like a long time ago to you, long before you were born. But I was ten years old on that day. My family lived in Salinas, California. We were farmers. My father and mother were
Issei
, born in Japan and came to America as young children. I had an older brother who was twelve and a little sister who was seven. My first ten years were very happy. I did not know then about the anti-Japanese sentiment that had sprung up in the first forty years of the twentieth century, especially in California where 90 percent of Japanese immigrants settled. I did not understand that the world was poised to hate us after December 7. My father and mother were longtime residents, and my brother, sister, and I were born here, were citizens. People only saw the shape of our eyes, heard our name, and wanted to believe we were part of the conspiracy against this, our country. Some people called us a ‘dangerous element.’”
Yoshito shook his head, still in disbelief that people could feel that way.
“Like Frederick’s experience in the South, there was much discrimination against the Japanese in the early part of the century, especially on the West Coast. In 1905, California passed a law that prohibited marriage between Caucasians and Mongolians, which is a name used to describe Japanese and other East Asians. In San Francisco, they segregated schools in 1906. Ninety-three students were affected and sent to Chinatown to learn. Of those, twenty-five were American citizens. You can see there was much fear and ignorance. It didn’t matter that those children were Americans.
“So when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, it was as if we had attacked Pearl Harbor. My father understood right away that there would be trouble. I remember him listening to the radio and telling my mother that we would pay for Japan’s actions. My mother did not understand, and neither did I as I sat on the floor playing, listening to them talk. Two months later, on February 19, 1942, the President of the United States, Franklin Roosevelt, authorized the internment of Japanese Americans. Do you understand the term ‘internment,’ Rudy?”
Rudy had a vague idea of what he was talking about but couldn’t articulate it. So he shook his head, almost afraid to hear the words. Yoshito continued.
“The order authorized the military to gather Japanese Americans and hold them in a camp together. While it was frightening and terrible, I think my father was almost relieved that something had happened. We had been waiting for the shoe to drop, and now it had. There had also been reported violence against the Japanese, and now at least we would be together as a family and in a protected area, my father said. There was fear in his voice though. I heard it, and it frightened me a bit as a little boy. I tried to follow my father’s lead. If he told us not to worry, that is what I would say to my brother and sister to reassure them when they became scared. ‘Just follow directions and nothing bad will happen,’ my father would say. We left the care of our farm to our neighbors and friends who were sympathetic and saw the injustice toward our family, toward our race. We also left them our most prized belongings, items handed down through the family. We were afraid looters would come into our home in our absence. Of course, we did not know how long we would be away. Surely this madness was only temporary. Little did we know, we would be gone for three years.”
“Three years?! What was it like being forced to move into the camp?” Rudy asked incredulously.
“In April, we were ordered to bring the barest of belongings to the school auditorium. We showed up in our best clothes with one suitcase each, containing clothes, maybe a blanket or some special item. My parents allowed each of us children to take one small toy or something that would give us comfort. My sister took a stuffed bear that she slept with every night. My brother took a deck of cards that we could play with. I took some drawing paper and colored pencils, but in between the pages, I hid a map of California. I had always loved geography, but now, more than ever, I wanted to know where I was going and how far away it was from home. Sometimes I would sit for hours looking at the map, and by the end of the war, it barely held together. It had been handled and opened and closed so many times that there were tears along the folds. I would trace the progress of our trip to the camp, plan our trip home, look for escape routes, and check to see how far we were from the closest town or mountain range. I needed a sense of my space in the world and measured the miles to home.” Rudy could feel the emotion and isolation in every word Yoshito said.
“That must have been really hard for a ten-year-old boy,” Rudy offered.
Yoshito looked at him. “Yes, it was. It was difficult for all of us. My poor mother worried about us children day and night, and my father worried about what would become of our lives—our future.”
Yoshito continued. “That morning at the auditorium, we checked in and we were tagged along with our bags—like we were Christmas presents being delivered. Buses were waiting to take us away to Civilian Assembly Centers. These were holding places or temporary camps until we were moved to our permanent camp, what they called relocation centers. There were two camps in California; one in Manzanar and another in Tule Lake. Manzanar is the most famous and where we spent those years of our confinement. You cannot imagine, Rudy, how terrible it is to be surrounded by barbed wire fences, your personal freedom taken away because of your heritage. We were not spies. That is what happens when fear takes hold—mania takes over.”
Rudy thought of his friends who belittled everyone, who wanted to control everything, take what they thought was rightfully theirs. Now that he heard these stories, it seemed like what was happening in his neighborhood and in his school today and that what pervaded his community was based on intolerance and fear.
“Manzanar was in the middle of nowhere. Fifty miles from the Nevada border near Death Valley, about two hundred and twenty miles northeast of where we stand today. Go look for it on a map, and you will see it situated near a city called Independence. Ironic, isn’t it, that our internment was just seven miles from a place called Independence?” Yoshito shook his head sadly.
He looked up at the sunshine and continued.
“It was very hot in the summer, very cold in the winter. Desolate, just some leftover groves of trees, remnants of more fertile days of decades past. It was a desert; not like here where everywhere you look you see flowers and bushes and fruit trees. We did maintain a farm for the camp, but other than that, there was not the lush vegetation you see where we live today. What I remember most vividly was the dust and the sand; dust and sand everywhere. The dust storms were horrible, like tiny needles hitting your skin if you were outside. Even inside, the dust seemed to find its way through the cracks in the floorboards, crevices in the walls, and knots in the wood. It would settle in our hair and get into our bedding and clothes. It was everywhere. I think those sandy—brown-colored memories may be one reason why working in this garden has filled me with so much pleasure. It is green and alive. I can make the soil dark and rich with just a little effort on my part. I know my friend Jacob has told you that I hear plants speaking to me, yes?”
Yoshito smiled and Rudy nodded, laughing to himself until Yoshito said, “It is true, Rudy. I do hear my plants speak to me. Oh, not conversation, but sometimes when I come out on a very hot day like to today, I will hear whispered murmuring, saying, ‘I’m thirsty.’ Other times when I come out and am watering the plants and the leaves are bobbing up and down, I hear them laughing as if they are crying for joy. It is a great honor that I am able to provide them that happiness and help them achieve their potential, which is to honor the Divine Creator with their great beauty.”
Rudy was staring at Yoshito. He could tell he was serious—and he had to admit that he believed him. These were not the ravings of a crazy man. Yoshito was as solid and grounded as they came.
“And I always welcome my plants into Eden and tell them how beautiful they are and how much they will love being here in this space, and I promise them I will be a good caretaker. I think they understand, just the way Ling understands when I talk to him. This garden, what you see, is so opposite of where I spent three very fundamental and life-changing years. I think for many years I felt as spiritually dried up as the hard, impenetrable soil I walked on. Then, as I started nurturing this space, I felt myself being nurtured. It has been very comforting and restorative for me. Do you understand, Rudy?”
Rudy nodded. He really did understand. Something similar was happening to him this summer. Every time he put the shovel in the dirt, or got his hands dirty in the soil working to free the fence from the ground, he felt healthier on the inside and out. In a way, he was proud of his callused hands, as if he had worked to earn a prize. He wanted hands like Jacob, rough, callused, and dry.
Yoshito continued. “Those years were long, and while I remember some individual days and events or particular feelings I had, the rest is bound together in one block of time. I think some things are better not remembered.” Yoshito stood up and began to walk toward the house. Rudy didn’t know if that would be the end of the story for that day, but then Yoshito looked back at him and said, “Let’s go back to the house and have something to drink to cool ourselves. The memories of the heat and dust have made my mouth dry, and like my green friends here, I thirst.”
Rudy followed behind Yoshito until they reached some chairs near the back door under a small patio. Yoshito brought out some tea, and Ling came and lay down on the cool stone floor as if readying himself to hear the rest of Yoshito’s tale.
“I had slept the last several hours on the bus. As we neared, my mother shook me awake and told me we were almost to our destination. As I cleared my head and looked out the window, I saw a desert wasteland with mountains in the distance and the great Mount Whitney. Our bus then drove through a gate, barbed wire fences on either side of it, into a compound. After collecting our bags, we were led to our tar-papered barracks. Each barrack was broken into many units. Our family had one of these units, with other families in the other units. Each unit was only the size of this patio, Rudy. All of us slept in this room together for the first year and a half. My parents attempted to partition off sleeping space for themselves and for us with a hanging blanket, but some nights it was so cold that the blanket came down to cover us children. We slept on army cots and made makeshift mattresses with straw, and later as our clothes were worn and torn, rags. We were issued two blankets each, but in the winter, with the holes in the floors and walls, they just weren’t enough to keep us warm, and often we would sleep in our clothes. The summer, of course, was the opposite problem; it was difficult to keep cool.
“Although I remember having great fear the first year, I think for us children, it was an easier life. Of course we complained about the heat and cold and dust and sand, but on a good day, we would go out and play with other children, even eventually going to school. For my parents, this degradation and humiliation was not as palatable, and they had a fine line to walk of being too friendly with the camp administration and being too vocal about our conditions and treatment.
“The first year was the worst. Much of the work on the camp was incomplete when we arrived. Refrigeration was an issue; plumbing was an issue; there was no privacy, not enough supplies. I remember my sister crying once. When I tried to comfort her she didn’t want to tell me what was wrong. Somehow I managed to get her to tell me. She had had to go to the bathroom with a line of women watching her. The women did not have any stalls around the toilets, so there was no privacy, no way to be modest. My mother would take a blanket and try to wrap it around my sister while she completed her business. It was humiliating for my sister, and I imagine for my mother, but if my mother complained to my father, I never heard it.
“There were many other trials that first year. Early in 1943, the government wanted us all to sign a Loyalty Oath to the government stating we would serve in the Armed Forces to defend the United States if ordered; that we had unqualified allegiance to the United States, would defend her against any foreign attacks, and that we would foreswear any allegiance or obedience to Japan. This sparked much controversy in the camp. There were many who felt that if you agreed to the oath, you were traitors. Yet, if you didn’t, America would brand you as disloyal, and you could be sent to Tule Lake with other perceived enemies and be separated from your family. There were factions on both sides, angry and ready to fight for their point of view.
“At one point, trouble and dissatisfaction had been growing, and my father heard rumblings. He cautioned us to stay close to our barracks. My father was not a coward or unprincipled, but like Frederick’s father, he wanted no trouble and only thought about the welfare of his family. Then one day something happened that ignited the anger—the straw that broke the camel’s back. It incited faction leaders to make speeches that fueled the fire, which led to riots by early nightfall. When the speeches began, my father knew that would be the day to get through unharmed, and he and my mother ran to our usual play areas and rounded us up to come home. I almost thought I was in some sort of trouble for not completing a chore satisfactorily or for teasing my sister, as my father seemed so agitated and his grip on my arm was firm and rough, and his steps so fast and strides long, that I had to run next to him to keep up.
“When we got to our barracks, we were told to play indoors with no explanation, as my father paced the floor and my mother sat quietly at the small table with my sister waiting for time to pass. As the afternoon and then evening progressed and the sky deepened, we did not light our oil lamp that night but went to bed uncommonly early with no dinner. Again, no explanation was provided, and before long, no explanation was needed. We heard large groups of people running past our door; they sounded angry. I remember being frightened and my sister crying in my mother’s arms as she tried to quiet and comfort her. My brother and I lay in bed shivering, with the blankets up to our chins; our eyes open wide, watching shadows race past our windows. My father’s look was all we needed to know that we should not be asking questions but remain quiet. I think it was the time I was most afraid. Not surprisingly, the riots did not have a good ending. Many people were in the hospital with gunshot wounds and two young men died. Such a shame.”