Looking Like the Enemy: My Story of Imprisonment in Japanese-American Internment Camps
by Mary Matsuda Gruenewald
The train ride out of Pinedale, though stressful, was at least a break from the monotonous routine of one and a half months in the camp. The old train cars were musty, dirty and creaky, just like the last train. As before, the windows were smoked and we could not look at the passing landscape. How I wished we could have seen signs of normal life.
Rocking back and forth on the decrepit seats, we were lost in our thoughts. Papa-san sat erect most of the time, occasionally leaning his head against the headrest while he intermittently sighed deeply and stared into space. Periodically his eyes glazed over and a frown creased his forehead. I imagined, He is feeling the loss of all he and Mama-san have worked so hard to establish. I turned away, unable to tolerate his loss on top of my own.
When I looked across at Mama-san she nodded her head and smiled as though to reassure me, yet I could see the sadness in her eyes. At times she sat with her hands clasped in her lap, her lips pressed tightly together, as she discreetly looked around at those who rode with her to the next unknown destination.
Papa-san, Mama-san, and I remained seated most of the time, but Yoneichi moved about the train car talking with people. When he came back to sit with us, his foot jiggled nervously up and down. Others dozed or looked about with dull eyes. We were all preoccupied with questions of the future.
My periodic trips to the restroom took me past several families from Vashon huddled together in somber silence. The Aoyama family sat with bowed heads. Mrs. Aoyama, one of Mama-san's closest friends from home, nodded to me each time I passed. The Ohashis and their three boys sat together looking grim and preoccupied. I raised my hand slightly and tried to smile at Ardith Kumamoto sitting with her parents and her three sisters. Ardith was a petite, pretty girl with big, dark eyes and long eyelashes. She and I had become good friends because we used to perform Japanese dances together back home. From the time she was in the fifth grade and I was in the fourth grade, we went weekly to Mrs. Nakamura's Japanese dance class. We would practice for performances in Japanese community events. It was the only time I could dress up and wear a touch of lipstick.
One time Ardith's father took us for a ride in their black, shiny touring car with the top folded down. In the 1930s, cars were still a novelty on the island, and getting a ride was a real treat. Ardith and I giggled as we sat together in the back seat anticipating our ride. First Mr. Kumamoto adjusted the levers on the steering column that controlled the fuel and ignition. Then he walked around to the front, rested his left hand on top of the radiator, and grasped the crank with his right. He gave it a brisk, firm turn, then another. After several cranks the motor took hold, belched, sputtered, and shook as Mr. Kumamoto sprang into the driver's seat. Black smoke spewed out the tail pipe then gradually changed to white as he readjusted the levers. The motor settled down into a rhythmic clatter and the car began to move forward in low gear. Releasing the hand lever and removing his foot from the pedal, the car shifted into high gear. The car leapt forward amid our cheers and we sat back to enjoy the wind on our faces. What an incredible sense of freedom! Ardith and I raised our arms and cheered wildly.
Seeing my neighbors' faces on the train took me to thoughts of Vashon and home. How I missed the island lush with evergreens, surrounded by the pristine waters of Puget Sound. I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply, imagining the crisp, clean air of Vashon. How I longed for a drink of pure, cool water from our well. How innocent I had been in that peaceful environment with the warm and satisfying relationships of neighbors, friends, and classmates. But in the midst of my reverie, no matter how hard I tried, I could not shake the dread. We are going to a "permanent" camp. Does permanent mean we will be "permanently dead?" If so, how, when and where?
It was fortunate that I had not heard about the concentration camps in Europe and the murdering of millions of Jews by the Nazis. While in fact we had it much better than the Jews in Nazi Germany, if I had known of their plight, I might have gone over the edge. Fear of being shot or killed was never far from my consciousness. I felt compelled to stay close to Mama-san, Papa-san, and Yoneichi, and always to be on the same train.
The tension in the air heightened abruptly when the locomotive blew its whistle and slowed to a stop. We had been riding for about a day and a half. I crossed my legs and tightened my arms about my body. This must be it, I whispered to myself.
A soldier suddenly appeared at the end of the car. "Okay, everybody off," he barked. People slowly got out of their seats, grabbed their luggage, and began filing out one by one. I followed those ahead of me to the doorway, then stopped as I glanced out the door. This camp was gigantic. I was overwhelmed. The soldier at the bottom of the stairway shouted at me, "Come on! Come on! Move ahead! Keep moving!" He rotated his forearm in continuous circles, as if that would force me to move faster.
What's going to happen to us here? I wondered. I felt sick to my stomach and my chest tightened as I looked at a blur of black barracks separated by huge bare spaces. Later I found out that the purpose of the wide, bare ground was to create firebreaks between the flimsy wooden barracks. The firebreaks divided the camp into seven wards. Most of the wards were made up of nine blocks; each block had fourteen barracks. There were sixty-four blocks altogether. With approximately 260 men, women, and children per block we had a population of over 18,000 people at this new internment camp. I had no idea there were so many Japanese people living in America.
We had arrived at Tule Lake Internment Camp, located twenty-six miles south of Klamath Falls, Oregon. Despite its name I never saw a lake anywhere near the internment camp. Like Pinedale Assembly Center, this camp was encircled with a high, chain-link fence topped by three rows of barbed wire, all slanted inward. Soldiers with machine guns watched us from tall watchtowers located strategically around the perimeter. These lookouts were equipped with large mounted searchlights that continuously swept 360 degrees at night. The vast expanse of dreary, regimented, black tar-papered barracks were like the ones we had just left, only this camp looked ten times bigger and I felt one hundred times smaller.
My head whirled as my eyes tried to take in the scene. A momentary wish flashed through my mind. This is just a bad dream. I will wake up back home. It took Mama-san's gentle nudge from behind and her soft voice saying, "Let's go find where we will be staying," to make me realize this was not a nightmare. I stepped down from the train. Just then three young Japanese men walked by, raised their right fists, and yelled, "Tenno Heika Banzai -- Long live His Majesty the Emperor." In the midst of so much noise and tension, I barely noticed them nor had any inkling of what this signified for the future. People were milling all around us, shouting orders and flailing their arms as we piled up near the train. It was hot and dusty without any breeze to relieve the stifling confusion.
We were ordered to climb into waiting army trucks. A Nisei man drove us to our "space" which was 7404 C (block 74, barrack 4, apartment C) in the northwestern corner of the camp. The barracks here were similar to those at the Pinedale Assembly Center: 120 feet long, divided into varying sized "apartments," which were nothing more than rectangular rooms with openings above the seven-foot walls. These open spaces extended the full length of the barrack. Any sound made in any one of the living cubicles could be heard throughout the barrack.
When we got to our twenty-foot by twenty-foot space, I remarked to my family, "Look, the room is smaller but we don't have to share it with anyone else. That's good." Our parents silently nodded. Looking at the pot-bellied stove Yoneichi commented, "Must get cold here." That winter the doorknob would get so cold our fingers would stick to it. We would be plagued by the subfreezing temperatures, scarcely protected by the flimsy barrack walls.
The central part of the camp had already been occupied by Japanese-Americans who came first -- mostly from Sacramento, California. Those of us from Washington and Oregon were sent either to the northwestern section of the camp or the southeastern part. This would become significant later. I would quickly realize that I felt more comfortable spending time in our own area with those from the Northwest and especially from Vashon.
Once again we fell quickly to the task of setting up "home." Papa-san and Yoneichi went to find ticking and straw for our mattresses. Mama-san and I looked around our living space, wondering what we could do to make it ours. There were the familiar army cots and blankets for each of us. Aside from the stove and the light bulb screwed into a ceramic socket on the end of a cord hanging from the ceiling, the room was bare. It was just a space waiting for whatever drama was to be played out.
Mama-san said as she pointed, "Let's line up the cots along this wall away from the window. In case the wind blows the dust in as it did in Pinedale, it won't be as bad when we're asleep."
"Okay. This time we can put our stuff wherever we want to." I was glad we didn't have to share our space with another family. It didn't take long to set up our few personal things out of our suitcases.
My initial shock at seeing the camp for the first time gave way to depression as reality set in. We were going to be here for awhile, perhaps forever for all I knew. The drab surroundings and familiar still air of the hot evening crushed whatever small hopes I may have had after leaving Pinedale.
read the entire excerpt, The Last Dance in the Searchlight, at januarymagazine.com
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