Lucille Apcar

Shibaraku: Memories of Japan 1926-1946 Lucille Apcar

Early in the month of September 1945, a small band of American soldiers on a reconnaissance mission through the central mountain region of Honshu, main island of Japan, arrived in Karuizawa.

How they happened upon this tiny remote village remains a mystery, except as it turned out, Karuizawa offered the only habitable accommodation for miles in any direction. By the cessation of hostilities, due to unrelenting bombing attacks, almost every close by city and town stood in pathetic ruins.

Here they found us, a motley colony of ragged, half-starved westerners from almost every type of background, thrown together, huddled in drafty, uncomfortable shelters away from cities now ravaged by war. Priests, nuns, diplomats, displaced businessmen, stranded sailors, Jewish refugees, White Russians, Europeans and Middle Easterners, including of course, my own family, one of the few Armenians finding themselves caught in Japan at the commencement of hostilities of World War II.

The informal, easy-going, friendly manner of the Americans soon captivated all. Thus the occupation of a defeated nation commenced, and for my family and me, at least, changed our lives forever.