Chieko Kiriake

Waiting for Peace Doesn’t Make It Come

8. Employment and Marriage

In 1949, I graduated from Hiroshima Girls’ Professional Training College and started to work for the Hiroshima Prefectural Board of Education.  About the same time as graduation, I got married to Satoru Kiriake, who was two years older than me.  After graduating from college, he got a job at the Chugoku District Research Institute of the Chugoku Construction Bureau.  He was assigned to research agricultural crops and population dynamics of the Chugoku District, which required him to travel around the district.  Afterwards, he changed his job to a major publishing company.  However, he became independent in 1961 because the company began to publish only popular books, so he launched an education-focused publishing company, Toho Publishing Co.

After employment in the Prefectural Board of Education, I was assigned to the Social Education Department.  The purpose of this section was to eliminate militarism and feudalism and spread democracy in society.   Soon after starting to work, I was dispatched to the Civil Information and Education Section (CIE) of GHQ’s PRC Ministry of Local Military Affairs in Kure.  I took a training course on educational activities to promote public awareness of democracy, gender equality and children’s rights, which the U.S. was trying to promote in Japan.  After that, I visited organizations and temples in Hiroshima Prefecture to educate people about the rights of women and children.  Until then, Japan was a male-dominated society, and women and children were below men.  In organizations where men and women were members, the top was always a man.  I held workshops to say that that was wrong and that leaders should be elected. To give examples, leaders of local youth groups and women’s associations were usually influential local men and women.

While I was visiting towns and villages in Hiroshima Prefecture to educate the public, I met Tomoe Yamashiro, the author of “The Song of the Cart” (Niguruma no uta).  I had met her once before when she gave a lecture at our Social Science Research Council while I was in the Hiroshima Girls Professional Training College.  She was also visiting villages to advance the consciousness of rural women.  She condemned me vehemently, saying, “You are promoting democracy from the top down using government funds.  That is not democratic.  It is better to do something than nothing, but don’t forget that the way you are doing it is not correct.”  She introduced me to a job opportunity as an elementary school teacher in the northern part of the prefecture, but I declined it as the school was too far away.  I continued the job at the CIE until I gave birth to our first daughter in 1956.

When we first got married, my husband and I decided that we would never have children, because both of us were A-bomb survivors, and many A-bomb survivors around us had given birth to handicapped children.  However, seven years after our marriage, our family doctor asked me, “Do you consciously not have children, or aren’t you able to have children?”  When I honestly explained our decision, the doctor got angry and said in a harsh tone, “There is no good or bad in human life.  If your baby is born with a disability, you have to raise the child with even more care and respect.  Your husband is publishing books on human rights.  Does he discriminate against people with disabilities?”  Our daughter was born in 1956 and our son in 1962.  

Cherry blossom viewing picnic

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