Chieko Kiriake

Waiting for Peace Doesn’t Make It Come

7. A New Start

Some second graders in the West Class stayed in Oko Elementary School either because all their family members died and could not come to pick them up or because their houses were burned.  We prepared three meals a day for them and treated their wounds.  Rice porridge was served at every meal, which was made with barley, potatoes, and weeds we picked around the school at places which had not been burned.  Mrs. Otsubo, a homemaking teacher, told us that weeds whose names end with “na” are edible, so we looked for nazuna and yomena.  We also picked “railway weed” although it didn’t have “na” at the end. 

A month later, on September 17, the Hiroshima Prefectural Second Girls’ Secondary School building, which had been damaged by the bomb, was completely destroyed by the Makurazaki Typhoon.  From the classroom of our temporary building, we watched the building collapsing with a roaring sound.  At that time, it was said that any plants or trees would not grow for the next 75 years after the A-bombing, but the next spring, weeds started to grow even in the ruins of Hiroshima City.

Sixteen years old (December, 1946)

From the end of September to the year’s end, I was sick and spent a lot of time in bed, but I was able to go back to school at the beginning of the new year.  Entrance exams for colleges were held in March.  I wanted to be a doctor because I regretted that I had not known what to do when second graders of the Nishi class died one after another despite our utmost care.  I wanted to learn what to do with those patients.  There were only two schools nationwide which had a medical course for women.  One of them was Osaka Girls Medical Training School (present Kansai Medical University.)  My father supported me to go there, saying he would manage somehow financially.  I passed the entrance exams of that school and also the Hiroshima Girls Professional Training College.

Graduation picnic to Miyajima in 1946 (second row, second from the left)

In March, I rented a room in Osaka and started to go to school in April.  As I could not get any food in Osaka, I ate only Chinese oranges every day.  I got thinner and thinner, and finally developed pulmonary apicitis, which is an early symptom of tuberculosis.  My landlord worried about me and contacted my parents.  They were surprised to hear of my condition, and my mother came to visit me soon.  I stayed in Osaka only two months after I entered school, but I quit and came back to Hiroshima.

After I came back, I went to see Mr. Tsuyama, the president of Hiroshima Prefectural Second Girls’ Secondary School and Hiroshima Girls Professional Training College, to consult with him about my future.  As I had passed their entrance exam, he told me to go to Hiroshima Girls Professional Training College.  In mid-June, I was admitted into the socio-environmental studies department and began classes.

After the end of the war, classroom teaching changed 180 degrees.  In elementary schools, the same textbooks were used but with militaristic expressions blacked out.  In my school, teachers made their own textbooks.  One of the teachers apologized to us for having taught the military propaganda as history.  Other teachers followed the new policy of democratic education without saying anything about the difference in their teaching.

After entering college, I joined a social science group.  This group had students from different colleges, training colleges, and girls training colleges, like mine.  Before the war, it was impossible to mix boys with girls, but in this group, we equally debated with each other about various social problems.  Also, we held lectures by progressive intellectuals.  In the study group, I met Satoru Kiriake, my future husband, a student at Hiroshima Higher Normal School (present Hiroshima University, School of Education).

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