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Christmas tree survives war, A-bomb
2007-12-23
Warren Nobuaki Iwatake's family has seen more than its share of calamity. Muzi.com News 10056467-0 (muzi.com)When he was still a child his father was lost at sea off Hawaii. With no breadwinner, his family was forced to move to Japan, where Iwatake was drafted during the war. He lost a brother when the bomb fell on Hiroshima. Muzi.com News 10056467-1 (muzi.com) But through it all one thing has remained constant. Muzi.com News 10056467-2 (muzi.com) The tree. Muzi.com News 10056467-3 (muzi.com) His parents bought it in 1937, and his family has brought it out every Christmas since, without fail, even when that meant risking arrest. Muzi.com News 10056467-4 (muzi.com) "This tree was a shining light, because it was a symbol of unity in my family," Iwatake said as he and his wife put the final touches on the frail, 3-foot-tall heirloom that is, once again this year, the centerpiece of their small, neatly kept apartment in Tokyo. Muzi.com News 10056467-5 (muzi.com) "We have put this tree up every year for 70 years." Muzi.com News 10056467-6 (muzi.com) ___ Muzi.com News 10056467-7 (muzi.com) Though he considers himself Buddhist, Iwatake was raised in a Christian tradition. He still keeps a photo of the tiny wooden church on Maui where he and his five brothers went to services and Sunday school. Muzi.com News 10056467-8 (muzi.com) Christmas was always a special time. Muzi.com News 10056467-9 (muzi.com) His father worked at a merchandise store, and Iwatake remembers the day he came home with a tree. It was nothing all that special, just metal-and-plastic, the kind of decoration that can easily be placed on a table, or in a corner somewhere. He got a string of lights, too, the kind with the big bulbs. Muzi.com News 10056467-10 (muzi.com) Soon after, his father died in a fishing accident. His body was never found. Muzi.com News 10056467-11 (muzi.com) Iwatake's mother had relatives in Japan, and took Iwatake's younger brothers there. Iwatake stayed behind to graduate from high school, then, in 1941, six months before Pearl Harbor, he moved to Japan as well. Muzi.com News 10056467-12 (muzi.com) "Things were pretty bad," he said. "There were war clouds hanging everywhere." Muzi.com News 10056467-13 (muzi.com) The United States and Britain were the enemy, and Japan clamped down on overt displays of anything Western, including Christianity. Though they had grown up speaking English, Iwatake and his brothers communicated solely in Japanese, and did their best to hide their past. Muzi.com News 10056467-14 (muzi.com) But their mother refused to give up on the tree. Muzi.com News 10056467-15 (muzi.com) "She was in charge and she wanted to put it up," Iwatake said. "During the war years, we had to do that in secret because in wartime Japan it was not welcome. We could have been arrested." Muzi.com News 10056467-16 (muzi.com) To keep the neighbors from asking questions, his mother found a place for it in the back of their house, on the second floor, away from the windows. Muzi.com News 10056467-17 (muzi.com) "We were afraid they would report it to the police, or become suspicious about why we were harboring Western things," he said. "But we were brought up in the American way of life. It is something that you cannot forget. It really is something from the heart." Muzi.com News 10056467-18 (muzi.com) The year after that first Christmas in Hiroshima, Iwatake went to Tokyo to study economics at university. At Christmas, he directed a school play, a nativity story, again keeping it secret so that the authorities wouldn't get involved. Muzi.com News 10056467-19 (muzi.com) Then, in 1943, he was drafted and sent to Chichijima. Muzi.com News 10056467-20 (muzi.com) ___ Muzi.com News 10056467-21 (muzi.com) Chichijima is a tiny island that virtually no one has heard of. To get there, you go out to the middle of nowhere, and turn south. Muzi.com News 10056467-22 (muzi.com) In 1944, Iwatake boarded a transport ship from Yokohama to assume his duties at a radio monitoring post on the remote crag. The ship was torpedoed and sunk by an American submarine, but he survived and was put on an oil tanker. Muzi.com News 10056467-23 (muzi.com) On the island, Iwatake's English skills were put to use listening in on U.S. military communications, and keeping watch over a handful of captured American pilots whose planes had been shot down on their way to and from bombing raids on Tokyo. Muzi.com News 10056467-24 (muzi.com) One day, he was in the hills digging bunkers when he heard that a plane had just been shot down. He saw a lone pilot on a bright yellow life raft paddling furiously away from the island. American planes provided cover, and the submarine USS Finback surfaced and collected him. Muzi.com News 10056467-25 (muzi.com) The aviator was 20-year-old George H. W. Bush, who would later become president. Iwatake met him years later and went back with him to the island. Signed photos of the two, smiling, are placed prominently about Iwatake's apartment. Muzi.com News 10056467-26 (muzi.com) But another American left a deeper impression on Iwatake's life. Muzi.com News 10056467-27 (muzi.com) Captured POWs were forced to monitor U.S. radio traffic. One of them was Warren Vaughn, a Texan. Muzi.com News 10056467-28 (muzi.com) "One night after a bath we were walking back and I fell into a bomb pit," Iwatake said. "It was pitch black and I couldn't get out. He reached to me and said to take his hand. He pulled me out." Muzi.com News 10056467-29 (muzi.com) Vaughn was monitoring the day Iwo Jima fell. Japan's defeat was virtually assured. Soon after, several naval officers called Vaughn and took him to the beach. "He turned before he left and gave me a sad look," Iwatake said. Muzi.com News 10056467-30 (muzi.com) For no apparent reason, Vaughn was beheaded, and his body dumped into the sea. Muzi.com News 10056467-31 (muzi.com) The atrocities committed against the POWs -- which included acts of cannibalism -- remained largely a secret for the next 50 years. But Iwatake said he did not want Vaughn's memory to die. Muzi.com News 10056467-32 (muzi.com) "I thought the best way of remembering him was to adopt his first name," Iwatake said. Muzi.com News 10056467-33 (muzi.com) ___ Muzi.com News 10056467-34 (muzi.com) Japan surrendered in August 1945, and Iwatake returned home in December. Muzi.com News 10056467-35 (muzi.com) "I used to think of those joyous days in Hawaii at Christmas, when we had food and treats," he said. "On Chichijima, we were starving." Muzi.com News 10056467-36 (muzi.com) But Hiroshima was even worse. Muzi.com News 10056467-37 (muzi.com) "Everything was bad, nothing was left," he said. "I couldn't even think of the joys of what I experienced in Hawaii." Muzi.com News 10056467-38 (muzi.com) Iwatake's younger brother Takashi had been in the center of the city attending school. His body, like their father's, was never found. Muzi.com News 10056467-39 (muzi.com)
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