Not-so-distant History

Going to Manzanar and seeing firsthand the conditions that many Japanese Americans

were forced to endure was both eye-opening and heartbreaking. It is one thing to read about what occurred to a group of people through a textbook, but actually being at a concentration camp that held thousands is a different kind of educational experience.

Someone offhandedly remarked when we were dropped “Imagine those buses leave and never come back for us”.

I didn’t have to imagine what life would have been like if that happened. I had read the testimonies and history of the Japanese Americans who were dropped off only a few decades ago. Just the thought of those buses leaving us in a completely desolate place and having no way to go back home made me petrified and sick. It made me wonder if those fleeting feelings I had for a few seconds were what many Japanese my age thought of for all the years they were locked up.

My knowledge of the camps and history of World War II seemed both distant and ever

present as I walked along the camp and saw their public toilets and watchtowers. I was already tired walking along the camp for a couple of hours, I couldn’t imagine walking inside this camp in this weather for two years. It truly felt like a prison with no respite or levity anywhere in sight.

Park for children at Manzanar

I truly couldn’t fathom not having a moment of privacy especially if I was an adolescent.

However, I was also able to see acts of resilience and agency such as the park that they

constructed for the children which included a bridge and a Koi pond. Whether or not they

actually had access to Koi or not, it does not matter. The simple act of creating a place for the people in the camps, primarily the younger generation, showcases their strength to endure hardships while also ensuring that their children were still able to properly live such as through recreational activities like school dances and basketball.

Walking in the camp made me understand what it meant to be hopeless, but also made me

understand what it meant to hold strength, especially the adults who made sure that the children in their community were being taken care of and living as close to a normal life as possible. This experience has truly reminded me of the fear that many in this country have against people who are different and how fear corrupts the mind in making rational decisions which leads to an internment of a whole group of people. It’s a lesson that must be remembered especially in our current day where there is so much polarization and division.

Manzanar was a time to reflect on America’s painful history while also understanding that what happened in the past can happen again in the future.