Mr. Peter Iwao Sano Talks about
His Experiences in Former Soviet Union
as an Internee after WW II Part II
-Experiences in Siberia and What It Brought-
Interview Date: September 10, 2014
Place: Mr. Sano’s residence in Palo Alto, California
Interviewee: Mr. Peter Iwao Sano
He is the author of the book, “1000 days in Siberia.” Born in Brawley, California in 1924. Later, he was adopted to his uncle and aunt’s family in Japan when he was 15 and gained Japanese citizenship. Drafted into the Japanese army during WWII, and then was taken to Siberia after WWII was over while was stationed in Manchuria. After he returned from Siberia, he came back to the United States, he regained his American citizenship and settled in Palo Alto. Then he worked as a draftsman of architectural drawing until retirement. Minako, his wife, is the translator of the Japanese version of his book.
Planning/Japanese Translation/Interviewer: Haruko Oshima Sakakibara
Born in Tokyo. She has been a lecturer of Japanese in East Asian Language and Culture at University of California, Davis since 1986. She published the bilingual website, “Japanese in Siberia” in 2015. Her uncle was interned in Siberia.
japaneseinsiberia.ucdavis.edu
Excerpts 2
Three things, as I read all other books, we suffered most was the shortage of food, the cold weather,
and the hard work. In my case, we arrived in Siberia at the end of September. November and
December in Siberia is really cold, and that’s when I suffered most with the cold weather.
When there was a chance people tried to steal food, but one thing in my case I do mention in the fact that the shortage of the food was not the way that the Soviets, it was not the methods that they were making us suffer. They themselves did not have food.One was Krasnoyarsk, a big city, and there I did the outside work the first winter and became sick and spent the next five months in the hospital.
And the second camp I was sent was a coal mine called Stalinsk. Work was hard, but compared to outside work, it was still in a warm place because no matter how cold it was, once you got in underground, it was approximately 65 degrees, so we didn’t suffer because of the cold.
I ‘ve heard other people say their parents told them to go to Japan and they objected. You obediently went. And once you were in Japan, you obediently, like a good Japanese, listened to everything the Government told you and became a soldier. Then when I read the very tail end your book, you mention that you started to demonstrate against the war in Viet Nam. You go on marches with your baby daughter and things like that. What happened all of a sudden?
When I came back, there was a bumper sticker that said, “Question authority. “
Another thing that happened to me was that I was attending a church in Palo Alto, where there is a leader and his son also went to the prison because opposing the war in Viet Nam. He, the teacher who was teaching at Stanford, was also teaching at a seminary in New York and he went to the south during the voting rights thing. I heard him what a dangerous experience for him to go to the South.
And I had nothing but admiration for him. That changed me in a lot of ways, so when I think about those days when I said “yes” to everything authority said, I began to question what authority said.
Interview 2
Sakakibara: I am continuing this interview to Mr. Peter Iwao Sano regarding his experienced in Siberia. Your were not really a POW when you were taken to Siberia because it was after the WWll ended. It was a sudden attack by the Soviet army that tricked the Japanese men in that area to be all taken to Siberia instead of going back home to Japan. Which English term do you think best represents your status during your experience in the Siberian labor camp?
Sano: Yes, I read this in other books too whether to refer to themselves as POW or not. But one thing I also know, so I should say it even bothers me is the fact that the Japanese don’t refer “surrender” a “surrender.” They call it “end of the war, shuusen. ” I just wonder why they keep repeating it that way--Not “shusen” but “haisen. “ That’s the way I feel, which is that they lost the war, but they keeping referring to it as “shuusen,” and it puzzles me.
Sakakibara: So you think actually it was “the prisoner of the war?” You think “horyo” is the right term?
Sano: Well, there were some who thought so, “Yes.” And there were some who did “hara-kiri” or took the gun and shot themselves. There were Japanese soldiers in Manchuria who did that.
Sakakibara: Is it when the Soviet attack took place?
Sano: Yes. And after the emperor’s broadcasting. I never heard the broadcasting for two or three days. I did not know Japan had surrendered till about three days after emperor’s broadcast. But I don’t know why they have to
Japanese government or anybody can’t think about “haisen” or “horyo.”
Sakakibara: Now I am going to ask you about various aspects of your experiences in Siberia. First, what experience made you realize that you were now imprisoned by the Soviets?
Sano: As I mentioned in my book when we came down from the mountain.
When I think about the dates now it was the day after emperor’s broadcast which we did not hear. We onto the train saw all the refugees. I did not know Japan had already surrendered, but we didn’t see any Soviet soldiers, either. Then about two days after that, we saw Soviet soldiers who passed as we were walking, marching to the big city of Hailar? And that’s when. as I mentioned in the book, I first realized we were prisoners and lost the war.
And when the gate was open and we walked in, it was closed behind us.
That’s when people had to see that we lost the war and we were prisoners.
Sakakibara: Would you describe the weather and how it affected the living and working condition?
Sano: Three things, as I read all other books, we suffered most was the shortage of food, the cold weather, and the hard work. In my case, it was the first winter that 1945 end of 1945 we arrived in Siberia in September. November and December in Siberia is really cold, and that’s when I suffered most with the cold weather. However, the coldest weather I experienced was when I was working at the coal mine. I was on the night shift which was from 4 pm to 12 midnight. That’s the shift and so when you come back to camp, it is past midnight. That’s when we walked through the gate. There was a thermometer hanging there, and I didn’t see it but the soldier next to me who passed said, “Well it is minus 63.” And that’s in centigrade. So in Fahrenheit, if my calculation is correct, that was minus 79 Fahrenheit. That was the coldest I experienced, but I often think about these other people who had to work outside. It was cold. In my case, it was just walking to and from the camp to the coal mine, which was not that far away in my case. But those people who had to work all day in minus 40, minus 50, or minus 60, it must have been terrible.
Sakakibara: How to secure food is one of the main topics in your book.
Would you share the stories about that too?
Sano: The shortage of food was one suffering we went through. I remember in Japanese saying, “Bushiwa Kuwanedo takayoji,” which means, a warrior even though he may be hungry, he uses a tooth pick to say “ have eaten enough,” and never admitted the fact that they were hungry because that was not a good warrier. That was all thrown out to the window and we fought over food, and when there was a chance you tried to steal food, but one thing in my case I do mention in the fact that the shortage of the food was not the way that the Soviets, it was not the methods that they were making us suffer. They themselves did not have food. I mentioned this in my book that when I went to the factory and saw the lunches Russian workers bring, it was not too different from what we were eating. Or when I go to the farm, I see farmers, I see farmers picking up something, and I found out later that they were picking up potatoes that was not harvested from the previous year. They were so hungry that they had to go out to the field and pick up the left over of last year’s crop. And they were taking back home and cooking left over from the last year’s crop to eat. So things were bad, but I guess, that was the first winter, and after it became a little better. It was never enough, but it was not as bad as the first winter in my experience. And when I read these other people’s experiences, they talk about how the first time since they were free, the Japanese who came back to Japan would eat what they call “hakumai-white rice, ” and how good it tasted.
However, another thing I do mention is that I came back after almost three years in Siberia, things in Japan was not that good either. It’s still Russian food, and the rice is Russian, they put potatoes in the soup, potatoes and rice cooked together, to cover up for the shortage.
Sakakibara: How many different labor camps were you sent to and what type of work were you forced to do? What was the most difficult work?
Sano: Yes, I mentioned that the coldest place I remember working myself was the first camp I was in; however, I was at two different camps. One was Krasnoyarsk, a big city, and there I did the outside work the first winter and became sick and spent the next five months in the hospital, but then when I came out of the hospital, I was able to find a better job, and I worked in the foundry, which was relatively a better place to work. And I also went to the collective farm in the country, and that’s where I had easy time and one of the reviewers of my book said “With the change of the circumstance, it was almost as if he was almost in a summer camp. “ And the second camp I was sent was a coal mine called Stalinsk. Work was hard, but compared to outside work, it was still in a warm place because no matter how cold it was, once you got in underground, it was approximately 65 degrees, so we didn’t suffer because of the cold. One good thing about the camp was that they had a Japanese boat builder who built the Japanese type bath tub, it was a huge bath tub that about a half dozen of us could get in together. When we came back from work, we all had the time to take a bath there in the Japanese style big tub. And of course we had all the coal because we were in the coal mine that we all had all the coal to heat the hot water. In some way, it was a good camp.
Sakakibara: You were critically ill with Malaria toward the end. How was the disease like that handled in the camp?
Sano: It must have been pretty common. I am sorry I don’t know the name of the pill that everybody I talk to mention it was yellow pill they passed out to me to take when I had this fever. However, as I was writing a book, that I felt perfectly well when I didn’t have the fever, so I kept spitting it out and I didn’t take it. And I think that’s why I had the fever at the right time when they were making a list of patients and I was able to get on the list because most of the other patients I came back with, at least from my camp, were mal-nutrition patients. And I was not mal-nutrition. Because of my fever, I was able to make that list. When I came back to Japan, I had that fever twice. I had a cousin who was a medical doctor, and he gave me some pills that he said one of his classmates who was doing some research on Malaria and he was working on this pill-medicine for Malaria patients. He said he didn’t know it would work but you should try it and it wouldn’t do you any harm and it may do you good. But I had the fever occurred twice after coming back to Japan and within two months I had fever twice happened to me, but that was the end. Whether it ran out or the medicine worked on me I don’t know, but I had not have that fever occur since then.
Sakakibara: In your book, you mention special comrades who took good care of you and in different camps. Are you still keeping in touch with any of them? What did they mean to you?
Sano: One person who helped me a lot was Ota-Mr. Ota who was older than me because he already had a child that was going to college. He is the one who helped me a lot and I mention it here and there in the book. He was able to do it because in the first winter when I came out of the hospital after the first winter, he was working in the head quarters and had something to do with personnel work, and he is the one that arranged for me to “right places” and also to go to the farm. He is the one I was able to get in touch with. Now one thing that happened was that when I came back, in 1949, I received four post cards from fellow prisoners. One from Tokyo, one from Kagoshima, and one from Kumamoto, and another one from Shizuoka, but I never answered them because one of the letters because one of the post cards mentioned something like, “Comrades, let’s work for the good of Japan now that we are back.” It sounded a little Communist. Because I was planning to go back to the US, if I made the wrong contacts with these people, I might never go back to the US. I never answered them for the letters, four post cards, but I ‘ve always kept them. After many many years, I asked my sister if she would try to track these people down. After the surrender, a lot of the addresses have changed even though they may live in the same places, so it made it difficult to get in contact with them, but my sister was able to get in touch with this Ota in Kagoshima. So in my next trip to Japan, I arranged to meet him and I flew down to Kyushu, Kagoshima and I did meet him one day. I was able to thank him. Then my mother also, from the US, wrote to him to thank him because she has written some of the things I had written--not the book yet because it was not published yet, but I had notes written and I showed those Japanese notes. She read those things and was able to thank him, which I was grateful for. And then much later, I was also able to get in touch with the person in Tokyo, and he is the one who sent all these books, over 100 books about the prisoners. And then I found out that the other prisoners had died-the one who sounded a little like Communist. I didn’t think he was, but anyway, at that time the letter, post card sounded that way. And the other one, I wrote and his wife answered and I was able to thank her husband was able to do while I was a prisoner. So I feel a little satisfaction even, but I know I would have liked to thank Ota more than I was able to.
Sakakibara: He is still alive, right?
Sano: No, he died.
Sakakibara: Oh he passed away. He must have been so happy to see you in Kagoshima.
Sano: Yeah, he was happy.
Sakakibara: Oh it is good to know.
Sakakibara: Peter, I have the last questions for you. As you look back, how did experiences in Siberia affect how you have lived after that? And also I understand you are at age 90 now, and at your age, what kind of messages do you have for the future generations?
Sano: Now those are difficult questions and I don’t know if I had any wisdom to pass on. One thing, I had a very interesting experience about a year ago. I met a person who was doing a research on a Japanese American who went to the camps in the US. For some reason, he wanted to interviewed me, although I had nothing to do with that. We talked about a lot of things, and he had read my book too. At the very end, he asked a very simple question. With all my interviews I have never heard anybody asking me this question, which was, he said, “when I read your book, you said you went to Japan because your parents told you to go, and you obediently went. I ‘ve heard other people say their parents told them to go to Japan and they objected. You obediently went. And once you were in Japan, you obediently, like a good Japanese, listened to everything the Government told you and became a soldier. Then when I read the very tail end your book, you mention that you started to demonstrate against the war in Viet Nam. You go on marches with your baby daughter and things like that. What happened all of a sudden? “ I paused because it was the first time anybody asking me that. The only thing I could think about was that yes, when I went to Japan, it was like that. Quite an authority said that in this case the parents had the authority over you and if they said to do this, you do that. Not to do this or not to do that, and you do that. However, when I came back, there was a bumper sticker that said, “Question authority. “ Another thing that happened to me was that I was attending a church in Palo Alto, where there is a leader and his son also went to the prison because opposing the war in Viet Nam. He, the teacher who was teaching at Stanford, he was also teaching at a seminary in New York and he went to the south during the voting rights thing. I heard him that what a dangerous experience for him to go to the south. And they tried to get the schools integrated with the right for citizens to vote. He really went, really took in his life in his hand to do that. I knew he was very close because we went to the same church, but not only that, but our children were the same age. So because that kind of connection, I became very close to this person. And I had nothing but admiration for him. That changed me in a lot of ways, so when I think about those days when I said “yes” to everything authority said, I began to question what authority said. In fact, during those days, Minako and I talked about it, saying we are naturalized citizens we are in the dangerous spot if we opposed to war, oppose to do what the government is doing, but we had a good lawyer friend who said, “If that’s what you believe in, go ahead and I will protect you at the court with anything like that. “ So we have good friends with that kind of position. So your last question… I am not saying that my experience in Siberia has changed me but I think it was afterwards, that going through the suffering did affect me too.
Sakakibara: Thank you very much for your valuable experiences and talks.
Sano: Thank you.