Comments on: First-Hand Account of Life as a Civilian in a Japanese POW Camp

By: Skookum

Skookum — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 06:35:15 +0000

Didn’t know there was another person using the “skookum” name. I take it that you’re from the Pacific Northwest. I’ll change my name the next time I post. Endshuldigung Sie, Bitte!

By: lirelou

lirelou — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 05:31:44 +0000

Reminds me of Neville Shute’s “A Town like Alice”, wherein the Japanese in Malaya kept shifting a group of Women and Children prisoners from one camp to another, as the numbers dwindled. Interestingly enough, the female character ends up much like Mevrou van Kaampen. That was redone some years ago as a television miniseries starring Bryan Brown as the Aussie POW.

By: skookum

skookum — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 01:05:44 +0000

Wha? Both of the above posts made by “Skookum” were not made by me. Not that I have any disagreement with the opinions expressed therein - but just think that whoever wrote those posts should be credited with them. Or are there now two Skookums (Skookae?) who are registered on this blog?

Anyway, this morning I read the whole story - very fascinating - she writes from the heart. I had plenty to do but couldn’t stop reading….

By: Bad Monkey

Bad Monkey — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:55:13 +0000

Re #9 GVI:

The film “Paradise Road” written and directed by Bruce Beresford and featuring Glenn Close, Cate Blanchette, and Jennifer Ehle, is a fictional rendition of the story of Dutch and British women in a Japanese prison camp in Sumatra, based on the same story as Helen Colijn’s autobiographical book mentioned above. But I suspect you are alluding to not only the prison camp part of the story, but the larger context of Elizabeth Van Kampen’s life in Indonesia. I’d also like to see such a film made.

By: gbnhj

gbnhj — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 22:52:45 +0000

This is an interesting personal account of life in colonial Indonesia both before and during the Japanese occupation in WWII. If you are interested in this type of work, you’ll really enjoy it. She’s obviously wrting to the reader, and not simply creating a diary of events, yet it’s still very personal.

Unfortunately, I had to stop before I’d gotten any further. Given Mrs. van Kampen’s sense for writing details and personal anecdotes, I plan on reading the rest tonight.

By: globalvillageidiot

globalvillageidiot — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:53:18 +0000

It isn’t very often that I click on a link here and wind up spending the next hour or so reading it over. Elizabeth van Kampen tells a fascinating story. Very moving. It would make for an incredible film.

By: seouldout

seouldout — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 20:20:28 +0000

Quite a moving story. Thank you, Mrs. van Kampen, for posting a link to it. Your account of your return to Indonesia brought a few tears to my eyes.

By: yuna

yuna — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:52:07 +0000

i just read the other string of comments from the eariler post, and found it strange how everyone was really against pawi, and missing his point. koreans don’t do themselves justice by getting so worked up when it comes to their arguments, however, to make an issue of the very few koreans within the japanese army who were most commonly forcibly drafted from their homeland who commited horrific acts when the main perperators still deny wrongdoing, is just not understandable, and it’s similar in spirit to the war movies that the japanese still make which ALWAYS portray themselves as victims of the war, which is the precise kind of thing which make its neighbours angry in the first place.
the issues are never black and white, but different shades of grey and a book such as the following
http://www.nytimes.com/books/9.....ohagt.html
by chang rae lee? might give a beter understanding of what the “koreans within the japanese army” mean…
the point i am making is that these korean men within the japanese army could not be used as an ammunition against those koreans who feel that japan has done wrong against them, yet that’s what seems to be happening.

By: Bad Monkey

Bad Monkey — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 19:44:15 +0000

For anyone interested in more in the first-hand experience of Dutch women in Japanese prison camps in Indonesia, I highly recommend the book ‘Song of Survival’ by Helen Colijn. In some ways similar, in some ways very different.

By: Skookum

Skookum — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 17:55:14 +0000

#4
It did happen in former Yugoslavia. And it was ethno-hate that led to it. One of the reasons why I think long-held ethnic grudges are poison.