Wow… this story definitely crossed several genres of walls for me. A story of a US soldier who coincidentally picked up a drawing and a picture of a Japanese baby girl that transcended time to reunite them fifty+ years later. That baby girl grew up not knowing her father at all but upon being reunited with the picture, she saw her father’s unspoken and unknown side: that her father had adored her and carried her picture to his dying field.
War has never been pretty. World War II was never an exception. If anything, it seemed to bring that point out even more sharply with two big powers. Iwo Jima was such a small island and losing several tens of thousands of soldiers seemed so tiny of a reason. Yet, what this story was able to do was to make this war so much more personal for these 3 people involved.
I fought back a load of tears as I read this story. Having allergies actually was a positive thing for once as it helped cover up the tears and the runny nose. This story also softened my heart about wars because it showed that there’s always a personal side to something so tragic and terrible.
couple of things
1. Was amused that Yoko is (or at least was) a Moonie – why is it that every Moonie I came across in one way or another a non-Korean?
2. America’s experience in places such as Iwo Jima, Okinawa and other islands where the Japanese literally fought to the last man and to the last bullet, causing tremendous amount of casualties was one of the contributing factors that lead to the decision to drop the atomic bomb (and even after that, large sections of the Japanese military still wanted to continue fighting)
3. Invasion of the Japanese home islands would have been bloody and I for one am glad that never happened.