Bearing witness to the encounters of American soldiers and Japanese civilians in the aftermath of a savage war, the memoir of Mrs Yumi Goto is poignant testimony to the capacity of ordinary people for mutual curiosity, learning and generosity. In the summer of 1945, s contingent of 1,800 American soldiers was posted as a garrison force in the country town of Muramatsu, where they lived alongside a community feeling “depressed and fearful” at the prospect of foreign occupation.
Mrs Goto, and English-speaking graduate of one of Japan’s top universities for women, had relocated to Muramatsu with her family after their house in Tokyo was destroyed in a bombing raid. She became an interpreter while the Americans were in Muramatsu, and recorded light-hearted but perceptive observations of the Japanese-American encounter. Written in English for an American audience who “would like to read how their young men behaved in Japan”, and revealing “the thoughts and sentiments of a 26-year-old girl in war-devastated Japan”, her memoir is a charming and uplifting account of a woman journey, and how ordinary people from very different backgrounds found common grounds in difficult circumstances.
