<Begin Segment 25>

TI: So you, you're back into your routine, so what, what happens next? What disrupts the routine for you?

MY: Disrupting of routine is toward the... oh, I guess the, one of the major issues that does come into my mind is the day Japan surrendered.

TI: So this is August 1945, August, about fifteen? August 14th?

MY: Fifteenth, twenty-first, I don't remember. There was deathly silence in the whole camp. I feel that you could have heard an ant move it was so quiet. It was such a shocking experience for the Japanese. Whether you were in camp or out of camp I don't think would have mattered. Japan surrenders -- was natural that they would surrender, they were losing the war -- but to hear the Emperor speak and Japan surrender was, at least for me, you don't hear Emperor speak. In my upbringing of two to seven, and even subsequently, I don't know anything would've supported that concept, but the Tennoheika addressing the whole public, impossible kind of a thing. But so be it. That happened.

TI: And so describe that. Did people assemble to hear this?

MY: No, there was no movement in camp, as I recall. Nobody was moving.

TI: And so how did people hear it? Was it on the loudspeakers or...

MY: I don't know. I don't remember. You raise a good point with how did we hear. I don't remember how that took place. I don't even remember where I was, whether I was working or what.

TI: But you just remember the deathly silence.

MY: It was the deathly silence, no movement in camp.

<End Segment 25> - Copyright © 2011 Densho. All Rights Reserved.