Yoshiko Uchida's Personal Experiences

Yoshiko Uchida On December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor Hawaii was attacked by the Japanese. Yoshiko Uchida was a senior at the University of California-Berkeley. She and her family, as well as millions of other Japanese- Americans were uprooted from their homes and forced into internment camps. Yoshiko Uchida uses her experience living in the early 20th century as a Japanese American during the time of World War II.

Yoshiko Uchida tells us about her personal experiences growing up as a Japanese American to help bolster her stories. Yoshiko Uchida is the daughter of immigrant parents. Her father was a businessman and her mother was a poet. She learned to love writing and literature from her mother. She started to keep journals on her
“ For some years now, Mary had known that her Japanese face denied her certain privileges. White people had their own special world, and the Japanese Americans were not a part of it, except perhaps as servants, day workers, gardeners, or cooks” (Uchida 104). Mary felt that even if she did become successful in her career she wouldn’t be accepted in America because she wasn’t white. Many Japanese Americans felt like they weren’t welcome in their community because they were of Japanese descent. “ She wondered if Kiku was as lonely as she sometimes was; as many Japanese , never more than unwelcome intruders in this land, were” (Uchida 98). In the book, Uchida expresses all throughout the book of feeling like outsiders. They would feel uncomfortable being around those who are not Japanese and leaving their community. In the book, Hana’s daughter marries a white man, who is the son of immigrants. “Joe was the son of immigrants too, and he knew what it meant like to be treated as something less than other white Americans. He understood Mary’s guilt at being ashamed of her heritage and the Japanese ways of her parents” (Uchida 117). People of all cultures who immigrated to America felt ashamed of their heritage because they were not born American. They would try to assimilate and then eventually stop following the traditions of their people. Even the children who were Japanese that were born in America were punished after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. They were sent to internment camps with their families. In the book, Kiku, Hana’s friend, was astounded when she found out her American born sons were to be sent to internment camps with them. “ The boys were American citizens. They had done nothing wrong, except to be born to parents who were of Japanese birth” (Uchida 132). The sending of the Americans who were of Japanese descent proved that