“Experiences in the shelter in Kin and life after the war”
“Experiences in the shelter in Kin and life after the war”
Fumiko Iha, 86 years old
(Place of birth: Gushikami Village, Okinawa Prefecture)
Because our school building was occupied by Japanese soldiers, we could not have any classes at school. Moreover, since our large house was also occupied by soldiers, we had only one room left for us, and my whole family was living in one room.
When we progressed to the fourth and fifth grades at our national elementary school, we started performing training exercises for escaping to an air-raid shelter. When the siren sounded, we moved into the air-raid shelter and got out of the shelter when we were told, “All clear!”
The Japanese soldiers took many things with them such as empty artillery shells left after naval gunfire, pot lids and sewing machines to use them as material to build airplanes.
When an air-raid alarm siren sounded, we escaped to a gama (a natural cave). My grandmother sang a song for us, which went, “When we hear an air raid alarm, let’s quietly move to an air-raid shelter. Follow the advice from adults as we are very young. Do not panic. Don’t be noisy. Stay calm.”
The Japanese Army ordered all people in our village to move to the shelters in Kin. Although some did not obey the order and stayed in Shimajiri in the south of the island, we moved on foot to Kin while under naval gunfire. I was carrying a two-year-old baby on my back and leading my father who had bad vision.
We kept moving while eating nuts from the trees along the road and sugarcane taken from fields and finally we arrived in Kin. The shelter had a wide entrance, but as we advanced deeper into the shelter, the passage became narrower. We advanced on our hands and knees and eventually found the open space where hundreds of people were hiding. It was completely dark in the shelter, we did not have enough candles. Therefore, we had one person leading us by candlelight and we followed the leader.
I still cannot forget that there was a Japanese soldier hiding in the shelter. When he saw us eating sugarcane, he asked us, “Would you give me some?” Then my father with bad vision said, “It is your job as a soldier to protect civilians. Why are you hiding here?” I remember him replying, “We have reached our limits and there is nothing we can do.”
Soon after that, the Americans came to the cave in which we were hiding. They started calling out and urging us to surrender saying, “Come on. Come on. Come out. Come out.” None of us responded and we stayed hiding in the shelter. Then they threw a hand grenade into the shelter.
We waited too long to come out of the shelter. I was unable to walk because I inhaled the smoke from the explosion of the hand grenade. The middle-aged man, who was one of my acquaintances in the shelter, hiding beside me said, “Even though we will be captured, we should be fine because we are civilians,” which calmed everyone down. We were sitting there quietly. Then the Americans came in and handed us some chocolates. We were taught that we should not eat anything the Americans give us since anything given by the Americans would be poisonous. However, as the Americans ate the chocolates before our eyes and showed that the chocolate was not poisonous, we became free from fear and ate the chocolate.
(After the war)
After the war, we came back to our hometown, but the life we had there was rough. We had to set up a tent in the middle of an empty, burnt field and live there. When we went out to find some food, we saw many dead bodies lying on the ground. We walked around the dead bodies and looked for food.
Potato leaves grew thickly and lushly around the dead bodies. We gathered the leaves that were growing further away from the dead bodies. However, that was not enough. We ate the fruits of Japanese sago palm as well and we were somehow surviving in this way.
As we did not have any supplies for daily life, we took a helmet off the skull of a dead soldier and brought it back home. We used the helmet as a pot. Even though the war was over, we had to do anything that we could to survive for a while.
Shortly after we became prisoners of war, I brought a part of a burnt pig back home which I picked up in a burnt down pigpen. I thought it would make a good meal for us. However, when we were about to start eating, we noticed that it was not a part of a pig but it was a human finger. Because there wasn’t a head attached to the burnt body, I could not tell if it was a man or pig.
My younger sister suffered from nutrition deficiency. I did not know what to do because our mother no longer had milk and we did not have any food. Then I went out to a rice field, caught frogs, boiled them in an empty can and fed her the soup.
My younger sister died from nutrition deficiency after all. After the burial, we faced another problem because the Americans built an airport where we buried her and we wanted to move her remains somewhere else. We gave some money to a second-generation Japanese worker at the airport and asked to enter the airport. We were given permission to enter the airport and gathered her remains. I kept her remains in an empty can and have kept it with me all this time.
(Looking back at the war)
War is so horrible that it is impossible to express in words. Neither TV nor news can show the reality of war to people in the current generation. I never want my children or grandchildren to suffer the distress which I had to suffer.
Fumiko Iha, 86 years old
(Place of birth: Gushikami Village, Okinawa Prefecture)
Because our school building was occupied by Japanese soldiers, we could not have any classes at school. Moreover, since our large house was also occupied by soldiers, we had only one room left for us, and my whole family was living in one room.
When we progressed to the fourth and fifth grades at our national elementary school, we started performing training exercises for escaping to an air-raid shelter. When the siren sounded, we moved into the air-raid shelter and got out of the shelter when we were told, “All clear!”
The Japanese soldiers took many things with them such as empty artillery shells left after naval gunfire, pot lids and sewing machines to use them as material to build airplanes.
When an air-raid alarm siren sounded, we escaped to a gama (a natural cave). My grandmother sang a song for us, which went, “When we hear an air raid alarm, let’s quietly move to an air-raid shelter. Follow the advice from adults as we are very young. Do not panic. Don’t be noisy. Stay calm.”
The Japanese Army ordered all people in our village to move to the shelters in Kin. Although some did not obey the order and stayed in Shimajiri in the south of the island, we moved on foot to Kin while under naval gunfire. I was carrying a two-year-old baby on my back and leading my father who had bad vision.
We kept moving while eating nuts from the trees along the road and sugarcane taken from fields and finally we arrived in Kin. The shelter had a wide entrance, but as we advanced deeper into the shelter, the passage became narrower. We advanced on our hands and knees and eventually found the open space where hundreds of people were hiding. It was completely dark in the shelter, we did not have enough candles. Therefore, we had one person leading us by candlelight and we followed the leader.
I still cannot forget that there was a Japanese soldier hiding in the shelter. When he saw us eating sugarcane, he asked us, “Would you give me some?” Then my father with bad vision said, “It is your job as a soldier to protect civilians. Why are you hiding here?” I remember him replying, “We have reached our limits and there is nothing we can do.”
Soon after that, the Americans came to the cave in which we were hiding. They started calling out and urging us to surrender saying, “Come on. Come on. Come out. Come out.” None of us responded and we stayed hiding in the shelter. Then they threw a hand grenade into the shelter.
We waited too long to come out of the shelter. I was unable to walk because I inhaled the smoke from the explosion of the hand grenade. The middle-aged man, who was one of my acquaintances in the shelter, hiding beside me said, “Even though we will be captured, we should be fine because we are civilians,” which calmed everyone down. We were sitting there quietly. Then the Americans came in and handed us some chocolates. We were taught that we should not eat anything the Americans give us since anything given by the Americans would be poisonous. However, as the Americans ate the chocolates before our eyes and showed that the chocolate was not poisonous, we became free from fear and ate the chocolate.
(After the war)
After the war, we came back to our hometown, but the life we had there was rough. We had to set up a tent in the middle of an empty, burnt field and live there. When we went out to find some food, we saw many dead bodies lying on the ground. We walked around the dead bodies and looked for food.
Potato leaves grew thickly and lushly around the dead bodies. We gathered the leaves that were growing further away from the dead bodies. However, that was not enough. We ate the fruits of Japanese sago palm as well and we were somehow surviving in this way.
As we did not have any supplies for daily life, we took a helmet off the skull of a dead soldier and brought it back home. We used the helmet as a pot. Even though the war was over, we had to do anything that we could to survive for a while.
Shortly after we became prisoners of war, I brought a part of a burnt pig back home which I picked up in a burnt down pigpen. I thought it would make a good meal for us. However, when we were about to start eating, we noticed that it was not a part of a pig but it was a human finger. Because there wasn’t a head attached to the burnt body, I could not tell if it was a man or pig.
My younger sister suffered from nutrition deficiency. I did not know what to do because our mother no longer had milk and we did not have any food. Then I went out to a rice field, caught frogs, boiled them in an empty can and fed her the soup.
My younger sister died from nutrition deficiency after all. After the burial, we faced another problem because the Americans built an airport where we buried her and we wanted to move her remains somewhere else. We gave some money to a second-generation Japanese worker at the airport and asked to enter the airport. We were given permission to enter the airport and gathered her remains. I kept her remains in an empty can and have kept it with me all this time.
(Looking back at the war)
War is so horrible that it is impossible to express in words. Neither TV nor news can show the reality of war to people in the current generation. I never want my children or grandchildren to suffer the distress which I had to suffer.
