Why can't I go back to Japan? A half-life of an orphan left behind September 28, 17:38

A girl born in northeastern China during the war to Japanese parents.

The war ended when she was seven years old, and she lost her parents and her younger sister during her evacuation.

After the war, she was left behind in China as a "remaining orphan".

She was the catalyst for her return to Japan on September 29, marking the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between Japan and China.

There is something I want to say to her, whose life has been tossed about by her war.

(Hiroshima Broadcasting Station Reporter Yaki Shigeta)

her glorious half life

In a room in a building in Hiroshima City, Chinese was spoken.

When I entered the room and handed my business card to the white-haired woman, she replied, "How do you read your name?"

Mizue Kawazoe, the orphan girl introduced at the beginning.

She turned 84 this year.

Kawazoe was born in 1938 in former Manchuria, now Jilin Province in northeastern China.

She lived with her father, a postal worker, her mother, who was pregnant with her, and her older sister and younger sister.

She lost one family after another as she began her evacuation in the post-war turmoil.

Ms. Mizue Kawazoe:

“Believing the story that if we go to Harbin, we can return to Japan, we started evacuating with the clothes we were wearing. Before long, the horse that was used to carry the load was also killed and everyone ate it.My sister died while being carried on my mother's back.Finally, we arrived in a town called Mudanjiang, and soon my mother gave birth to a baby. A few days later, when I woke up in the morning, my mother was cold.I wanted to make a grave for my mother, but instead of that situation, I dug a hole by the river and buried her. I was so frustrated that I cried the whole time.On the way, I left my newborn sister in the care of a Chinese man.I still don't know if she is alive or dead."

A lecture held in Hiroshima City this month.

The venue fell silent as she talked about her heroic half-life.

Occasionally, with tears in her eyes, she reads the manuscript she wrote about how she became an orphan.

Ms. Mizue Kawazoe:

“It was December when I arrived in Harbin. I was hungry, had no food, had no clothes to change, and my body was covered with lice. My father, my older sister and I were lying dead in the building where we had evacuated.One day, two Chinese people hugged me and my older sister. We took them to their respective homes.Four days later we heard that my father had passed away.The two Chinese men were kind enough to dig a hole with their own hands and make a grave for him.I I became an orphan after my parents died."

“I want to go back to my homeland”

In former Manchuria, a large number of Japanese were sent as part of a pioneering group or volunteer youth corps under national policy.

The number is said to be over 320,000.

However, just before the end of the war, the Soviet army broke the Neutrality Pact with Japan and advanced into Manchuria.

From there, the escape of the Japanese began.

Some people committed mass suicide out of despair.

There were also young children who were left behind as orphans, entrusted to the Chinese in hopes of saving their lives.

“I was bullied by the remaining orphans, calling me a ‘Japanese ghost.’” “I was hungry every day, and fell down many times while working in the fields.” I couldn't sleep at all."

"I want to go back to my homeland."

Children's wishes directed toward the east.

It will be decades before it becomes a reality.

“I am Japanese” letter to the embassy

Seven-year-old Kawazoe was adopted by a Chinese man.

He was brought up poorly but kindly.

When he was 19, he married a Chinese man and had a child.

On September 29, 1972, he was 34 years old when Japan and China restored diplomatic relations.

Knowing the possibility of returning to Japan, he sent a letter to the Japanese embassy and other places.

“I am Japanese,” he wrote.

Mr. Kawazoe:

"I always thought, 'I want to

go home.' Why can't I, a Japanese person, go home?"

Four years after the normalization of diplomatic relations, I was contacted by the embassy.

The following year, she returned to Japan for the first time with her older sisters, who had been living apart from each other, for the first time, but it took 20 years for her to return to Japan permanently.

Kawazoe was 54 years old.

“I want to learn my native language”

When I returned to Japan, I faced the language barrier of my home country, the Japanese language.

He could barely speak at first.

“Even though I am Japanese, I cannot speak Japanese

.

On this day as well, I was working with the same remaining orphans to solve Japanese problems using textbooks and repeat the words that flowed from the CD.

"I have an important exam tomorrow, so I can't afford to be late."

When the instructor pointed out that he would be late rather than late, he carefully took notes and checked them over and over.

It is said that his dedication to study has always been there.

Passed a correspondence high school in Hiroshima City after two exams.

She studied from early morning until late at night and graduated in four years at the age of 72.

He returned to Japan without being able to speak Japanese, and has been studying hard since he was old.

All he wanted to do was learn his own language.

Memories of residual orphans who continue to speak

There is something I continue to do with the Japanese I have learned.

At the age of 75, Ms. Kawazoe began working as a storyteller to convey the war memories of the aging orphans left behind.

He received many letters from elementary school students who had listened to his lecture.

“When Mr. Kawazoe cried, I felt that he did not want something like this to happen again.

” “

The letter contained the children’s wishes for peace.

Mr. Kawazoe:

"I was happy. My children understood me, so I was really happy. No one knew about the orphans left behind in China. I hated the war so much that my parents died and I became an orphan. It would be great if everyone could understand what war is like.”

“Isolation” after returning home

On the other hand, there was "isolation" in the life in Japan, which was the wish of the remaining orphans.

In December last year, the Chugoku-Shikoku Support and Exchange Center for Chinese Returnees, which supports returnees in the Chugoku and Shikoku regions, conducted a questionnaire survey of households with first- and second-generation returnees, and received responses from 145 households. got

The result.

When asked about their interactions with their neighbors with multiple answers, 9% answered that they have close friends who invite each other, and 41% answered that they are close enough to talk while standing, while those who answered that they do not interact with them. also reached 13%.

As for participation in community activities, 33% answered that they had never participated in them.

Learning Japanese is particularly difficult when returning to Japan after reaching middle age.

There are not many people who can speak like Mr. Kawazoe, and there are people in their homeland who feel isolated because they cannot fit in with the community.

Yasuko Onuma (79), a leftover orphan who is learning Japanese with Kawazoe, is one of them.

It has been 26 years since she returned to Japan, but she says she has little contact with her neighbors.

Ms. Yasuko Onuma:

“Since I speak Chinese and am not good at Japanese, I have very few close friends and hardly any neighbors. Also, I'm not very good at talking on the phone."

Mr. Onuma still thinks that there should be a war.

“When I recall the living conditions of my cousins ​​my age when I temporarily returned to Japan, I can’t help but think that I should have been living like this. I hate war. If so, my family should have been living the same life as ordinary Japanese people.”

Takuo Murai, director of the Chugoku-Shikoku Support and Exchange Center for Chinese Returnees, is concerned that as the years go by, people's memory and interest in leftover orphans is fading.

Director Takuo Murai

: “In order to realize an inclusive society, I want people to know more about the history of leftover orphans. Hiroshima is very interested in the damage caused by the atomic bombing, but I would like people to continue to be interested not only in the 50th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between Japan and China, but also in the orphans left behind. I want you to continue to be tolerant without truncating

“Conversation, Not War“

It has been 50 years since the normalization of diplomatic relations between Japan and China.

Even after returning to Japan, differences in language, culture, and customs became major obstacles.

He was also prejudiced by those around him.

He says that Kawazoe is still glad to be back in his home country.

Ms. Mizue Kawazoe:

“I am Japanese. Fifty years ago, we were not able to return to Japan. Many things have happened.I came back to Japan as a wife of China.If Japan and China get along well, I feel relieved.War is really sad.I hope that no country will go to war. If there is a war, people will become orphans like me.I want people to have a conversation instead of a war.”

Hiroshima Broadcasting Station Reporter

Yaki Shigeta Joined the station

in 2007

After working in the science and culture department, I will

be in charge of reporting on war damage such as the atomic bombing, and I am currently studying every day.