Kazuko and her older brother about 1935
After looking at the comments relating to my Kazuko Ikegami post, I figured I’d prime the pump a little better than I did yesterday.
Kazuko Ikegami was born on March 29, 1929, in Tokyo, Japan. She was the oldest of four sisters. In Japanese culture, the oldest daughter was supposed to give up her own adult life, to care for her parents until they died.
When the war was over, Kazuko got a job in the Ginza Post Exchange. While working there, she was swept off her feet by an American Soldier. Not only did she break with tradition when she married this man, she brought shame to her family and herself, when she followed him to America.
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Kazuko is the mother of my wife. I’ve spent many hours over the last several years, interviewing her about her experiences before, during, and after the war. She told me things about the war that I’d never read about, or seen in movies. There is clearly a book or movie somewhere in this story. Whether or not, I can make that happen, remains to be seen.
My blog posts about the subject are not going to be presented as chapters of a book, but rather as short narratives relating to events that I believe you will find interesting. I can’t promise you when I’ll start posting, or how often I will do so…
Kazuko 80th birthday (2009)
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