[Excerpts] ...

[...]

He sounded firm, but fair.

Then, he introduced the captain of the guards and interpreted as the stocky officer, with arms well down to his knees, stood stiffly to attention and barked his orders. He also wore a black uniform, and I learned later that it designated that he, like the young guards, was a member of the consular guard and not an officer in the Imperial Japanese Army. I wondered if they would prove to be as obnoxious as their khaki-clad cohorts.

He told us that the arm-bands we had been issued while under house arrest were not valid in camp. We would be assigned new numbers and new tags, which we were to wear at all times, and each morning, there would be a roll-call. Through the years, we were to find ourselves responding with a “Here!” to the guards shout of, “Yon hyaku kyuu juu nana, kyuu juu hachi, kyuu juu kyuu,” Ursula, me, and Margo, reduced to 497, 498 and 499.
Before we left the roll-call field, all the single men and women were told to report to the respective dormitory areas, and heads of each household to the administrative office compound to be assigned cell numbers—only they called them room numbers.

Meanwhile, most of the committee responsible for our orderly move to camp pitched in once more to organize work details.

[excerpt]

When the number came to an end, he asked conversationally if I’d seen King Kong’s latest bulletin.

“No. Why?”
“It’s a very stern message telling us that we’re never to sing Happy Birthday on the roll-call field again.”

Seeing a twinkle in his eye, I said, “You’re pulling my leg.” “Honest—but it did say we could sing God Bless America.” “Now I know you’re pulling my leg.”
“Come on,” he said, grabbing my arm, “it’s on the bulletin board. I’ll show you.” And, sure enough, there it was, emblazoned with King Kong’s chop, standing out from all the other notices on the board. I could see the deft hand of the Commandant behind the choice of God Bless America. He was obviously trying to soften the blow, all the while making King Kong take full blame—and making him look like a total ass in the process!

The singing of that childish song had started innocently a couple of months after we were in camp. Our kooky block mate, Gladys Tabor, wearing her usual floppy shorts, ruffled blouse, gobs of makeup, and a big Betty Boop bow, pranced up to Jock Allan one morning while we were waiting in line for roll-call, and said, “Today’s my birthday, whatcha got for me?” then she leant over and puckered up. Jock obligingly gave her a resounding smooch on the lips, while his wife, Emma, grinned, and Mark Tabor looked like thunder. Then Gladys, pretending to get all flustered, batted her heavily mascaraed eyes, and simpered, “Oh, Jock, you shouldn’t have!”

Dad called out meanly, “How old are you Glad- Eyes?”
“Twenty-nine and counting,” she quipped, turning her back on him and flipping her shorts in his face as she can-canned back to her place in line.
“Hey, let’s all sing Happy Birthday to Gladys,” Jock called down the line, and as he gave the downbeat, we all broke into the happy refrain. The idea took off like wildfire. With almost two thousand people in the camp, and only three hundred and sixty-five days in the year, there was no way a day could pass without someone having a birthday. Each morning after that, the block wardens would check their lines for “birthday babies” and the song would go up and down the ranks as each celebrant was honored, from the tiniest toddler to the oldest inmate. It was infectious, and it made the days start out on a happier note.

I looked at the incredible bulletin again and said, “Whatever brought that on?”
“I understand that every time the guards stepped onto the ball field with their clipboards, we broke into the darn song, and they thought it was something ridiculing them.”
“Couldn’t the Commandant explain what the song was about?” I asked incredulously.
“He probably did—but I think King Kong’s got his number!”

[further reading]
http://www.weihsien-paintings.org/books/MushroomYears/p_FrontCover.htm

[excerpt]

I had no trouble getting a job as breakfast cook in the hospital diet kitchen the week after I took my finals, as the committee was still looking for people to fill positions that had been vacated by the repatriated Americans.

Although some had been taken over by a contingent of missionaries from Chefoo, who came in after the Americans left, there were still a few gaping holes to be filled, and one was the unpopular early morning shift I applied for. I’d had a yen for that job ever since Margo had told me she hated her early stint at the hospital because, when she sent orderlies down to get the patients’ breakfast trays, more often than not she’d find that no one had bothered to turn up to prepare breakfast!

I couldn’t help thinking, what a glorious out!

I loathed roll-call. It was so demeaning.

If I could get the breakfast shift for the duration, I would never have to stand roll-call again! I was wrong, of course, as I was told I would get one day off in four, and a captain from another shift would take my place on that day. I got philosophical: One roll-call out of four wasn’t as demeaning as four out of four! And then, there was an extra plus. As I was the only one on the early morning stint, I figured I was considered a shift “captain”; of course, I never let it go to my head!

I must have been on the job for about three weeks, and the new year was just around the corner, when I got up at my usual ungodly hour and reached for the basin of water we kept on top of the stove; I didn’t expect it to be warm, but I didn’t expect it to have half-an-inch of ice on it either! Well, I’m not going to wash myself today, at least not at this hour, I thought, as I brushed my hair and teeth, the latter without toothpaste and chattering so badly the toothbrush couldn’t keep up with them. Cramming on the clothes I’d worn the day before, some of which I’d slept in, I reached for my old fur coat, which was beginning to look mangy and very worse for wear, and slipped out of the cell.

[excerpt]

It was June nineteenth and headcount time on the roll-call field. I remember the date exactly, because as I was trying to ignore the indignity of the moment and savoring my day off, an outbreak took place that had guards suddenly exploding in all directions like firecrackers. After lots of shouting and yelling, one peeled out of the group and rushed off for King Kong.

We were all standing around stunned, and except for intermittent yelps from the remaining guards, the silence was deadly.

Finally, Jock went over to the warden of the men’s dorm section, where the eruption had taken place, and asked what had happened. After a while, I saw him nod, and coming back to our line, he whispered to Dad, “Laurie Tipton and Arthur Hummel have escaped, and the guards have just found out. Pass it down the line, but hold the applause.”

When King Kong arrived, he was livid with rage and had the nine men who were dormmates of the escapees pulled out of line and marched off to the Assembly Hall, where they were put under heavy guard. We didn’t like that, but there was nothing we could do about it, except pray that they wouldn’t be tortured to give out information about the escape.

The hall was put out of bounds, and they were held for eleven days on starvation rations, while they were interrogated mercilessly, but none of them could tell the Japanese a thing, because they hadn’t known of the escape—which took place on the sixth—till after it had happened.

The only crime they could be accused of, if it could be considered a crime, was that of covering up the escape by juggling places in the roll-call lineup to confuse the guards and buy time for Tip and Arthur to get well away.

When Gold Tooth couldn’t get confessions out of the men, King Kong put out an official press release that was carried in all the local papers. According to Dad, who translated the write-up, it said nine men had escaped, but seven had been recaptured. “That’s the Oriental way of saving face, or covering one’s arse,” he said wryly.

[excerpt]

There was one blessing that came out of that freezing winter: the Japs decided it would be quicker, and warmer, for all concerned, if we stayed in our compounds and the guards counted us outside our cells. That way they could check on any ill inmates as they took the count, instead of having us stand on the roll-call field till they came back with the tally. The only other people they had to check were the shift workers, like me, and that process was separate from the general roll-call.

It worked out a lot better this way, and went much faster. Jock would stand, looking down Main Street, and as soon as the guards started down Cellblock Twenty, he’d bellow, “All out Twenty-One!” and we’d come out of our cells and line up for the count.

His little daughter Kay loved to help him at these times and would jump up and down and sing out, “Hello, Mr. Japanese!” as the young guards turned into our compound. They seemed to love little children, and as cold as they were, they’d always smile and pat her on the head ... probably thinking of little brothers and sisters back home.

[excerpt]

Suddenly, during one of our long pauses, the silence was shattered by the clanging of a loud bell. It rang, and rang, and rang and our whole cellblock seemed to rock with the vibration of its clangor.

“My God! What’s that!?!”
“The bell in the bell tower!”

And just as suddenly as it started, it stopped, and the silence was ominous. I found myself holding my breath, unable to say a word, just listening. Then, Margo started to say something, but Ursula stopped her with a soft, “Hey, sssh...
l-i-s-t-e-n!” I found myself straining to hear once more.

“Footsteps. Someone’s running,” Ursula whispered. Then I heard them; they were coming closer. We heard Japanese being shouted back and forth between guards who were double timing up and down the roads and through the compounds.

Margo peered out of the window and whispered, “The guards are up and at it.”
“Think someone’s escaped again?” I asked. “Well, ringing the bell won’t bring ‘em back,” Ursula said, drily.

About half an hour later, after lots of weird, indefinable noises, Jock banged on our cell door and shouted, “All out for roll-call on the roll-call field!”

“What the heck...?” Margo started, as we clambered out of our beds, threw on some warm clothes, and trotted over to the ball field, with Mother and Dad making up the rear.

The internees closest to the field were already in line. Babies were bawling, kids were whimpering because they’d been dragged out of their warm beds, and everyone was in a foul mood. The air was biting cold. Half the internees turned up in inadequate clothing and were chilled to the bone. The only thing keeping them from getting hypothermia was their overheated tempers.

Everyone looked accusingly at the other, assuming he was the only one left in the dark about what was going on. And Jock didn’t help matters when he whispered to each of us that we were not to talk to each other or make a sound. He carried little Kay on his shoulders and tried to keep her quiet as he delivered the individual warnings, but every time he bent over to whisper in someone’s ear, she would yell like a banshee. The situation would’ve been really comical if it hadn’t been bristling with would-be incidents.

Although I noticed only a few guards, their tempers were more frazzled than ours. The night was extremely dark, and the few internees near the perimeter of the field were the only ones who could be seen under the dimly lit lamp standards.

I wouldn’t have liked to have been a guard under such circumstances, and I wondered if they were fearful like we were.

We waited what seemed like hours. When finally the main contingent of guards came out of the guard shack, we saw to our horror that they weren’t carrying clipboards, but machine guns.

They placed themselves strategically around us, and I felt a sudden wave of real fear sweep through the crowd as the guards stared at us with cold, blank eyes, as though they’d never seen us before.

There were no instructions or demands. Just silence. Deadly silence, broken here and there by the whimpering of a child and the shushing of a parent.

The Commandant was nowhere to be seen.

Then, Ed Lewin came quietly down the lines and whispered to each of the block wardens, who in turn whispered to each of us. The message was simple. We would stand there all night, and all day if necessary, until someone confessed to ringing the bell.

Well, at least that was cleared up; we now knew one of us had rung the bell. But why? For God’s sake.., why?”

Another hour passed, and the older internees tried to sit down on the ground, but the guards shouted at them and they were held up between their more robust neighbors.

I looked at my family. Ursula and Margo were expressionless. Dad resigned. Mother defiant. I shrugged and looked up the line. The Collishaws were standing quietly holding hands. Towering Jim Tuck had a faraway look on his face as he stared over the heads of the rows of people, but his equally tall wife was beginning to crack. The Beruldsen’s were standing like Stoics, while the obnoxious Hatton clan was quiet for once, quiet and scared. Emma Allan had little Jeremy in her arms, while Douglas and Kay clutched at her skirt as they watched Jock silently walk up and down the line trying to look calm and unperturbed, smiling at those who needed encouragement.

Gladys Tabor, irrepressible as ever, gave him an outrageous wink, and nodding toward the guard at the end of our line, made an obscene gesture with her hand that I couldn’t help catching and smiling at. The Stones were silent; Deirdre holding her precious new baby, a look of terror in her eyes.

One of the guards had trouble with his automatic and let out a burst over our heads. That was all Mrs. Tuck needed. She snapped and started screaming, “We’re all going to be killed! We’re going to die! We’re going to die!”

Mother brushed my sleeve as she stepped out of line, marched up to her, and reaching up, slapped her hard on both cheeks. Her face crumpled like tissue paper, as Mother quietly hissed, “Shut up! We are not going to die! They haven’t kept us alive for almost three years to kill us now. They could have done it ages ago, if that’s what they’d wanted to do. Shut up! Stand straight (...) and don’t let them get to you!” Jock quietly led Mother back to her place in line, and the silence was complete.

A long while later, King Kong marched onto the field, flanked by Gold Tooth, who handed him a bullhorn, which he used to yell at us in Japanese. Ed Lewin quickly rushed up beside him and tried to translate, tossing the bullhorn back and forth between commands. “You are to return to your cells...there will be no rations (...) until the perpetrator of this monstrous act (...) turns himself in for punishment.” There was a rustle in the lines, and everyone looked at his neighbor, trying to figure out who had rung the bell. The wardens rushed up and down the rows whispering, “No confessions, absolutely no confessions!” We nodded in agreement, and after another interminable wait, we were finally dismissed and sent back to our cells.

Dawn was breaking when we got back to our compound, and not knowing whether the restricted rations applied to the hospital, I went to work. That turned out to be the last meal I fixed for a while. As the grain had been soaking all night, the guards let me prepare it so that it wouldn’t be wasted, then the rest of the supplies were hauled away.

Rumor went rampant in camp, the most persistent of which was that the war was over in Europe! We figured we would happily starve if that was the case, and to the Japanese’s surprise, our spirits went up instead of down. People with remains of comfort parcels and hoarded food meted it out to the children, so they wouldn’t go without, and we just cinched our belts tighter.

After almost a week of no food, we were walking zombies, but we never missed a roll-call, or let the Japanese know how badly off we were. On the sixth morning, we were told that breakfast would be served as usual.

I hoped we had won without a confession, but found that was not the case.

Peter Fox had turned himself in during the night while everyone was asleep, because he couldn’t stand seeing the people suffer for what, it turned out, he had done. He hadn’t been very smart, though.

When he confessed to ringing the bell, he couldn’t help telling the Japanese why he had done it (...) the war was over in Europe!

[further reading]
http://www.weihsien-paintings.org/books/MushroomYears/p_FrontCover.htm

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