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Title: Journey Home (Aladdin Books)
ISBN: 0689716419
Author:
Yoshiko Uchida
Publicate Date: 1992-10-31
Publish: 1992-10-31
List Price: $5.99
Average Customer Rating: 4.5
Format: Paperback
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Amazon Lowest New Price: $1.15
Amazon Lowest Used Price: $0.01
Amazon Merchant Price: $5.99
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1: An o.k. book
The book is a good book, but in the middle, too many good things happen that don't make me want to keep reading. However the authors purpose is good, and it helps with understanding World War II, and what happened to Japanese people. I like the book emotionally.
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2: Return Home to Berkley - Forgiveness
"The Journey Home" provides insight into the injustices of Japanese Americans. Yuki asks about the security threat and the Japanese are shocked believing not security threat exists. A band of boys caused some disruptance without any real damage. The Japanese morally should have had a right to "face their accusor", a right to legal counsel, receive "due process of the law", and a "speedy trial" before being sentenced as a prisoner. The incareration became a "best bad thing": 1. The Japanese distributed throughout the United States away from tight knitted Budhist communities and intergrated into American culture 2. The Japanese intermarried, abandoned traditions, and adopted Christian belief systems. 3. The Japanese exported skills and talent over a large geographical area and through hard work were rich within a decade. Japanese brain power help America surge forward into prosperity. 4. The Japanese community formed strong bonds of friendship, cooperation, and trust due to the hardships and trials they suffered.
Injustices included forced sell furniture and personal items, lotting of stored items, property was lost, the Japanese were given prison numbers and report times; no legal representation - constitutional preemption of personal liberties based on military national interests; the Japanese were not fairly financial reimburse or restored for the lands, homes, and possession they lost; the Japanese travel by cattle cars to camp and the women in coaches; and the Japanese spent years in forced confinement until the war neared completion.
Yuki and her family were sent to Topaz. Yuki describes living conditions as dusty and hot. The Japanese were forced to eat beans, potatoes, and pork; a diet foreign to them. Yuki describes the murder of her friend Emi, grandfather, who was shot while walking along the gate. The guards were suppose to protect the prisoners, but instead it seems they harrassed the prisoners and used them as target practice. The soldiers claimed the old man was trying to escape. The Japanese community claimed he was not.
Yuki and her family were allowed early leave from the prison camp and lived in a small apartment in Salt Lake City. Yuki accidently breaks a vase that her mother kept. Yuki suffers from anxiety relating to her brother fighting in Italy for the 442nd. Yuki fears her brother is hurt or will die on foreign soil.
Hope is restored for the family. Yuki's father learns the California law banishing all Japanese Americans from California has beenrevoked. Yuki is called a "Jap" by a white lady and told to "go home, we don't want you here." Yuki asks her mother to attend her as she uses a remote bathroom and her mother agrees without question. Yuki and her family arrive after many days traveling by train to Berkley, made possible by sponsership from Reverend Wada. Yuki learns that her brother Cal has been injuried while fighting in Italy under the 442nd group and will return home.
Mr. Oka wants to buy back his store. Mr Oka sold his store for $400 and the new owner wants $5,000 to buy it back. Yuki's father offers to help Mr. Oka and tells him that the Japanese community will need to group together resources to help start business again, a financial credit union, brillant. The financial brillance of this idea was amazing. I image that if communities today worked in such cooperation then less small business would fail. The Japanese community raise the finances without the burdensome weight of interest.
"That our son Ken", "Just about your age Ken", "Our son was killed in Iwa Jima", "Your son was killed by the Japanese? It could have been the son of one of her friends in Japan who had thrown the grenade or pulled the trigger or thrust the bayonet that had killed Johnny Olssen" Stephen Ollsen says to Mr Oka, "but try now to forgive us if you can. Don't destroy yourself with anymore bitterness." Mr Oka replied, "I guess forgiving does take the bundle of hate off your back. Still, when you've been wronged for so many years..." Mr. Oka then looked at Ken and said, "I suppose we need to forgive ourselves, just as much as other people."
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3: A Must Read!
The book "Journey Home" by Yoshiko Uchida truly reflects the gowvernment and American society during World War 2. It shows that the American government wasn't as thoughtful or complex as it is today. They thought that since one group of Japenese was dangerous, then they all must be dangerous. They forced all of the Japenese out of their homes on the coast of the US and into internment camps. In these camps, their "apartments" were actually smelly, old horse stalls. In this book it shows the struggles of a poor Japenes-American girl and he family. Could you imagine being in this young girl's shoes? Not having hot water, having to wash your clothes in a barrel, not to mention the waiting in line just to wash your clothes. But this book woke me up and made me think abot being in her shoes, walking where she walked, and it was the greatest experience to read and imagine. This forshadowing and exilerating story will fly you to another place and show you what life was like for Japanese families during World War 2. It will take you on an adventure; without making you pay for an airplane ticket.:)
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4: Interesting and realistic
Journey Home is an very interesting book. The story takes place in Salt Lake City, Utah where Yuki and her family strugle to live and be free, and happy.
The camp in the desert is where Yuki and her family, friends and neibors have the terrifying experinces of their life.
This is an exciting book. I would rate this book around a five.
I would recommend this book to almost everyone because this incidenthad occured before in life.
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5: an INTERNMENT camp is not a 'concentration' camp...
Everybody knows that a concentration camp is where they gas people, starve them, rape them and generally turn them into lamp shades and soap. The girl in the book was not sent to a concentration camp as mentioned in the book... she was sent to an INTERNMENT camp. This book is a fictional account, not a true story, of a fictional girl set in a historical setting during the Japanese interments. The internment camps did none of the aforementioned to the unfortunate Japanese and Japanese-americans in the american camps. (one third of them were not american citizens). Also this occurred only to the people from the west coastal states, where the US was most vulnerable to attacks from Japan, (a fact rarely mentioned in us history). most were given a choice to move to another state or to an internment camp. Most chose the camps, an obvious show of trust that they would be treated safely, (which they were).... Overall a good touching book, but was writtem 30 years after the war, with little regard to US war-time sentiments of the forties.
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