So Far from the Bamboo Grove

by Yoko Kawashima Watkins

  Mother took my rucksack and the canteens. She drew me to the river and whispered to me to wash my mouth and face.

  Ko put Mother’s bundle on her own back. It was much too heavy, she said. Mother could carry Ko’s rucksack. And once more we were on the road, Mother pulling the rope. “We must hurry,” she whispered.

  I felt somewhat better now but I began to shiver. I whined. “I want Honorable Father!”

  “Walk!” said Ko.

  Normally I could walk to the station in forty minutes by this road, and I always met Father when he came home, but now it seemed as if I had been walking for hours. I prayed that there would be no air raid or other danger to flatten me on the ground. When at last I saw a faint light in the distance I asked Ko, “Is that the station?”

  “Right,” said Ko. “Don’t talk. Just walk.”

  Ko is bossy, I thought. But the light ahead gave me comfort. Maybe I could rest when I got there. I forced myself to a faster walk.

  When we came in sight of the station, flooded with light, the scene shocked me awake. Hospital trucks and army trucks jammed the grounds. Everywhere were soldiers and civilian medical teams carrying wounded soldiers on stretchers onto the platform. Other wounded were walking with crutches. Some were being led by nurses. Everywhere there was hustling, running, scurrying here and there to assist patients, adults and children.

  Mother tugged and we moved to the platform. She needed to find the stationmaster, but I had eyes only for the nightmarish scene, with two engines spitting steam and smoke. They looked ready to depart. Would they leave us? Would we get on? Behind the two engines stretched boxcars as far as I could see.

  The medical team was carrying patients into the boxcars. People were screaming. A voice begged someone to look for someone. A pregnant woman, crying, bowed to her husband, and a pale woman in soft nightclothes, holding her baby in her arms, sobbed as a man—her husband, I assumed—peeked at the baby and talked to her. She kept nodding. As we came near to them I heard him say to her, “Take good care of your life. I shall look after everything.”

  Mother could not find the stationmaster. She asked a worker where he was but he did not know. She was still pulling our ropes as she made her way among the patients. Our sacks bumped people and people bumped us. A stretcher handle hit my ribs where the police had kicked me and I cried out with pain.

  We went to the stationmaster’s room, but he was not there. Mother looked in the waiting room, also jammed with patients. One man was spitting blood. Some had fainted and were lying on the floor. Children cried. An old woman screamed and pulled at her gray hair. Amidst all of this the medics checked patients’ names and nodded to the stretcher bearers. Then the patients were carried out to the boxcars.

  “Where is the stationmaster?” Mother asked a medic in desperation.

  “Out there.”

  We found him, and he was talking to the army doctor, Major Ryu. The Major recognized us and we exchanged greetings. “I have permission to board the train,” said Mother.

  The Korean stationmaster looked us over. I trembled at the coldness in his eyes. “You don’t look sick,” he said. “The train is for patients only.”

  “Corporal Matsumura said he made an arrangement with you.”

  “Corporal who?”

  There was such screaming and yelling that the stationmaster could not hear Mother.

  “Corporal Matsumura! He said you are his friend.”

  The man looked at us. We were not going to make it. My stomach was misbehaving again.

  “Let them get on!” said the doctor. “I know this family.”

  Then Mother remembered the note. She took it from her pocket and thrust it at the stationmaster, her hand shaking.

  He read it. “Madame Kawashima, son Hideyo, daughters Ko and Yoko. Where is your son?”

  “He left this morning for the ammunition factory where he will work with the mobilized students.”

  Major Ryu spoke to the stationmaster now in a tone of authority.

  “Put them on the train. This is my order. Mrs. Kawashima indeed has a son. He was at the army hospital with them.”

  And at last the stationmaster gave in. “All right, you get on the women’s boxcar.” His voice was tired now.

  I heard Ko’s deep sigh. Mother bowed to Major Ryu and Ko and I did too, because he had rescued us.

  By the time we found the women’s boxcar there were fewer people on the platform. Mother finally untied our wrists. Ko dropped her bundle on the platform, put both hands on the edge of the boxcar and pushed herself up. Mother handed her the bundle and then she told me to get on. But no matter how high I stretched and jumped I could not reach the edge of the car. Finally I held up my arms and Ko pulled. I thought my arms would be pulled off my shoulders. Mother grabbed my legs and pushed, but the canteens I carried on both shoulders jammed against the edge of the car. Ko had to let go and Mother made me drop the rucksack and canteens on the platform. Then, pulled and pushed once more, I finally rolled into the boxcar.

  Mother tossed my belongings, also her own, to Ko. Then she put both hands on the edge of the car and jumped, but failed.

  The train whistled three times. Frantically I pulled at Mother’s arm but she was too heavy. She tried again and made it to her chest. She was wriggling desperately to get in, when a medic and a nurse came by—and they pushed Mother into the car.

  We were aboard. Safe. I looked around. The boxcar was dark, without any light, and it smelled of machine oil. I could not see the patients’ faces, but my eyes gradually became used to the darkness and I saw that the people were symmetrically arranged on cheaply woven straw mats. There was almost no space between patients.

  I squeezed myself between the woman and new baby and the pregnant woman, folding my knees toward my chest. An aged woman stared into space, her mouth open. Some groaned in pain, some were crying for help. A woman’s hand waved in the air, wanting to hold onto someone. Mother reached out her hand and the woman gripped it.

  The pregnant woman was calling for water. I opened my canteen and gave her a capful. “Don’t waste your water,” Ko whispered.

  “But she was thirsty.”

  “You’ll be thirsty yourself,” said Ko without emotion.

  The train whistled once. I heard steam puffing. Then a female nurse and a male medic hopped onto the car, and the medic fastened a fat rope across the door. He stretched his body outward and waved his hand. The train whistled once more. There was a commotion outside. Someone was shouting and asking if there was any room in our boxcar. “There are a few more patients,” a voice called.

  The medic shouted, “We can take three more.” And three women were put on board, two on stretchers, one with her head bandaged. When they were on, the train moved, slowly.

  The nurse made an announcement. There were two large wooden tubs in the corner, she said, one for urine, one for bowel movements. In another corner were stacked boxes of items for medical care.

  The train increased its speed. The wind was blowing in strongly now, and the sky began to show pale pink. “We’re coming back home soon, aren’t we?” I asked Mother, so anxiously.

  She nodded reassurance. This would be just temporary.

  Ko went to the door and held on to the rope at the opening. The medic ordered her to stay away, as it was dangerous, but I heard her tell him she wanted to see our house. Then I got up and went to the opening too. I held on to Ko, as the wind was strong enough to blow me away. Over the wind Ko told me that we would pass our house very soon. I stretched my neck to the left.

  “There is the house!” Ko cried, and I saw faintly the dark red tiles of our roof. It came nearer, nearer. I saw the top of the old familiar willow tree, with the tall bamboo pole for our radio antenna. I remembered Father and Hideyo working on it one summer. House and willow looked very sleepy in the early morning air.

  The train passed by them. I twisted my head far to the right to watch. The red roof, the willow tree, the radio antenna drew farth
er away. Soon they were out of my sight. I returned to my place.

  Mother was crying, her handkerchief over her eyes. She did not want to see what Ko and I saw.

  The nurse and the medic were checking on the patients. When the medic came to Mother she asked his age. “Twenty-one,” he said. Her tears came again and she told him softly that she had a son near his age. At this mention of Hideyo my own tears came, thinking of Honorable Brother going home to an empty house.

  The train jolted on toward the south. When the pregnant woman asked for water I gave her another tiny capful from my canteen. Ko talked to all of the patients, sometimes wiping their faces.

  Somehow that day passed. When evening came I was hungry. I had eaten nothing since leaving home. I fumbled through my sack but Mother stopped me. The others too had not eaten in all that time, and it would not be fair to them if I ate.

  The dark enveloped the train. I could not see the flying scenes from the opening. I put my sack between my legs and rested my head on it to catch a little sleep, but sleep was disturbed by the wind and the moaning of the patients.

  I was glad when morning came again. I asked Mother if I could eat something, but she shook her head.

  “But I’m starved,” I whispered.

  “Everyone is hungry,” she said. “We don’t have enough food to go around. We’ll be arriving in Seoul tomorrow and then we will cook something. Drink a little water.”

  The train whistled three times, warning that we were about to enter a tunnel. Then we were wrapped in complete darkness and smoke. Sparks flew in and landed on my bare arms and neck. I could not breathe. My body seemed pricked by thousands of needles from all directions. I coughed and the more I coughed the more smoke entered my throat. My chest was stinging. I held my breath. I opened my mouth a little to breathe. Now I was very dizzy and wondered if I was going to die. I called to Ko and she put her blanket over me and pushed my head to the floor. Then I fainted.

  The next I knew, the nurse was slapping my face. We were out of the tunnel. Mother was there, her face streaked with soot. Ko’s face looked the same.

  “Feel better now?” asked Ko.

  “My throat burns and my chest stings,” I murmured.

  “Suck on this.” Ko put something in my palm.

  “Where did you get caramels?” I whispered in wonder.

  “I am a great magician.” Ko smiled.

  The woman who had just had her baby sat up, holding her child, and brought out her milk-filled breast. “You have been such a good baby,” she said proudly. “You must be very hungry.” She brought her nipple to the baby’s mouth. The baby was sound asleep.

  “Wake up, Toshi-chan. It’s your feeding time.” So I knew the baby was a manchild. The baby’s eyes and mouth stayed tightly closed. She shook the child frantically and the tiny head flopped up and down. “Wake up!” the woman screamed.

  The medic and the nurse examined the baby and pronounced him dead. The medic crossed the name from the list he carried and told the woman he would take care of the body. I wondered how he would take care of the tiny dead baby. He ordered the woman to hand him the child but she screamed her husband’s name, begging him for help, telling him the medic had killed their son and was about to throw him away.

  Mother touched the woman gently. She glared at Mother for a few moments, then she sobbed. Mother took out her nail scissors and clipped the baby’s fingernails. I never knew a baby’s fingers were so tiny. She clipped a small lock of the baby’s hair, and she wrapped the clippings in tissue paper and handed them to the woman. The woman seemed utterly mad now. She grabbed the tiny parcel and crammed it between her breasts.

  The nurse tried to take the dead baby but the mother resisted. Then the medic yanked the baby from her and quickly tossed it from the train. The tiny body floated in the air like a rag doll for a moment and vanished.

  The mother’s eyes were fixed on the opening. Then she stood, stumbled over me, and, quick as lightning, jumped from the fast-moving train.

  A shriek trailed in the air.

  “Ah!” Mother buried her head in her arms.

  The nurse began checking the patients. She put her stethoscope on their chests and if there was no heartbeat she lowered the eyelids. She called the dead patients’ names clearly, twice, and the medic crossed them off.

  Then the medic told Ko and me to get up and make room. The nurse helped him drag the dead to the opening and they rolled the corpses outside. Mother’s eyes were closed and the hand over her forehead shook.

  There were lots of empty spaces now. I went to the opening, held on to the rope, and looked out. I saw many bodies, tossed out of other cars, rolling down the bank to the fields.

  The nurse announced that she and the medic were about to give everyone a shot on the thigh. There was no food and the shot would give nourishment. I asked the nurse if she was going to give me one.

  “No,” she said. “You are healthy.”

  Hunger was a pain in my stomach. I asked Mother if I could eat a little piece of dried fish. “I’ll die otherwise!”

  She nodded. When Ko saw me opening my sack she opened hers. She tore the dried fish in small pieces and shared hers with Mother.

  As I was chewing, the pregnant woman stared. I said, “Are you hungry?” She nodded weakly. I stripped the fish into small pieces, removed the bones carefully, and gave her some. I chewed even the bones, until they were soft, then swallowed them.

  Everyone wanted water. My canteen was empty. Mother poured a few drops on a washrag and let some patients suck. One woman crawled to the urine tub, put her hand in and sucked it.

  I was exhausted. I had not lain down since we got on the train, but now there was space for me to stretch. How good it felt to lie down. I decided to sleep.

  But the pregnant woman next to me began moaning. I changed my position. Her screams came periodically. I sat up.

  “Lie down,” Mother told me. “Pay no attention. Go to sleep.” I lay down again.

  Suddenly I felt wet warmth on my back. I whispered to Mother that the woman had wet her pants. Mother seemed about to tell me something but changed her mind. I shifted my position, and there was another scream.

  I knew the medic and nurse were at the woman’s side. The screams were so terrible that I thought they must be operating on her without a painkiller. Again I felt something warm on my shoulders, and this time it was blood, seeping through the cheap mat. Another scream. The nurse was encouraging the woman to scream, and to push. Then suddenly a baby’s cry burst out.

  I sat up, very uncomfortable in the wet blouse, and decided to change my clothes. “Not now,” Mother said. “When we reach Seoul we’ll find a public bath house.”

  All our canteens were empty now, so there was no water at all. The nurse carried the tiny manchild to the tub and washed it with urine. Then she found little clothes among the mother’s belongings, dressed the baby, and put him into his mother’s arms. Exhausted, the woman smiled weakly at her son, and they both went to sleep.

  The sun was almost down now and the air cold. “Put your blanket over the new mother and her baby,” Mother said.

  “No!” I protested. “I don’t want my blanket stained with blood.”

  “Yoko!” When Mother called me by my name she was angry with me. “Ko is sharing hers with another patient. That new mother will be shivering. Cover her! Now!”

  I put my fleecy blanket over the woman and baby, and the new mother opened her eyes. “Thank you,” she said in a faint voice. “I was cold.”

  The train’s speed was lessening, and soon we came to a halt. Oh, were we in Seoul? I was already picking up my coat and pulling the blanket from the woman and baby. The medic was holding on to the rope and leaning out. “Is this Seoul?” I asked.

  He did not reply at once. Then he drew his head in, saw me, and gave me a look that frightened me. “Go back and lie down immediately!” he said. He spoke to the nurse. “The Korean Communist Army is inspecting the cars!”

&nbs
p; He threw me, roughly, to the bloodstained floor, grabbed Ko, and ordered her to lie down. The nurse ran to the urine tub, picked up the placenta, dripping with urine, put it on Ko’s abdomen, and told her, “Don’t move!” She covered Ko with a large sheet.

  Mother was confused and asked the medic what was happening. “We may have trouble,” he said, and told her to lie down too.

  The nurse and medic were doing crazy things. They took off my bloodstained blouse and rubbed it against Mother’s and Ko’s faces. The nurse undid Mother’s hair and spread it against the mat. She told me to put my stained blouse back on and lie down. The medic was looking out through the opening.

  “Where is this?” Mother whispered to the nurse.

  “Wŏnsan. We stopped for coal and water, which they’ll give us because this is a hospital train. But the Communists are getting on.” She leaned over Mother to whisper, “You have helped us. Don’t worry, we will help you.”

  “Here they come,” the medic called softly. “Keep still!”

  I heard loud voices, and two Korean men, wearing Korean Communist uniforms, jumped into the car.

  “Are these all sick people?” one asked in poor Japanese.

  “Right,” answered the medic.

  “We are looking for healthy Japanese. A middle-aged woman with two girls, about sixteen and eight, and a boy, nineteen, got on at Nanam. The name is Kawashima.”

  The medic did not look toward us. “There are no such people here. These are all women and children.”

  “Let me see the hospital list,” the voice ordered.

  The other Korean Communist soldier was walking among the patients, poking at them with the tip of his gun. My teeth were chattering, my heart thumping. The soldier poked my side. “How old is she?”

  “Six,” answered the nurse. “Her back is badly wounded.”

  I was opening my mouth to say I was not six when something warned me for once in my life to keep my mouth shut.

  He paused beside Ko, under the sheet, and asked if she was about to have a baby.