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American Yanks in The Land Of The Rising Sun

Hal Stoen, August 2001

I was taking semester finals at a small college (Gustavus Adolphus) in southern Minnesota when it finally dawned on me. I wasn't going to make it. I wasn't mature enough, and my heart wasn't in it. My dad had been a surgeon, and my mother badly wanted me to follow in his footsteps, but I wasn't cutting it in Liberal Arts- I surely wasn't going to be make it through pre-med. Worse, I was not on any kind of a scholarship- I was spending money that my dad had left me when he died.

"So, just what are you going to do?" that voice intoned in my mind. In those days a prime-age fellow like me had limited choices. If you didn't enlist in the military, the Army would draft you. If you were in college, you were exempt. Oh sure, not everyone was drafted, but your odds were not good.

I could see my exemption days coming to an end.

I scribbled on my exam sheet, "I'm sorry, I'm quitting college and joining the military." As I stood up and handed my exam in, other students looked up, some with that look of "Gee, he must be a whiz, finishing already." not knowing that in fact they were the smart ones, I was the quitter. My mother was not happy with my choice, but she had seen my previous grades and knew that I lacked college discipline.

Less than two weeks later I was in San Diego, California, a member of the world's largest yacht club, and with a four year obligation to Uncle Sam. After Boot Camp the Navy sent me to Electronics School at Treasure Island, located in San Francisco Bay, adjacent to the island of Alcatraz. Between Boot Camp and my new assignment I got engaged to Penny back in Minnesota. We knew that schooling would be over in 3 months, so set a date for our wedding.

For once, I applied myself and finished 2nd. in my class. Then came the big event. Where would we all go? I figured that I was surely headed to some ship- you needed a little seniority to get shore duty. The orders came. Shore duty, Yokosuka, Japan. I called Pen from the barracks. "We're going to be living 30 miles from the largest city in the world." "New York?" "No, Tokyo!"

After our wedding we toured America, spending the 30 days that the Navy granted me, ending up in San Francisco. Pen drove the car back to Minneapolis, I caught an airplane out of Travis AFB for the Orient. I would find housing for us and send for her after I had everything in place.

It's so nice to be young and naïve.

The airplane was a Lockheed Constellation.

The MAT's military version. Slimly padded seats. Few windows. No pretty young flight attendants attending to your needs. We passed over the Golden Gate Bridge during our climb-out.

It would be three long years before I would see it again.

We stopped in Hawaii for fueling and rest. Then it was off again over the endless waters of the Pacific. What a huge ocean. I found myself thinking of my father. He was in the Army Air Force in World War II, on the "Island Campaign", and in the Philippine Islands.

"My God Dad, you certainly fought on a large battlefield".

Travis AFB to Hickam AFB: 2,465 miles. Hickam to Wake Island: 2,312 miles. Wake to Tachikawa: 2,007 miles. Total: 6,784 miles.

We couldn't make it non-stop from Hawaii to Japan, a fuel stop was in order. We would be making a scheduled landing at Wake Island, a small atoll in the middle of the ocean, and the site of a major battle during The War. As we let down for landing, the atoll appeared as a beautiful collage of white beaches, green palm trees, and the most exquisite blue that I had ever seen.

After landing, it was announced that we would be bussed to the other side of the island for dinner. The base was loaded with B-29s, the bomber that brought the end to the War in the Pacific. As we neared the military mess hall we passed an old rusting ship hulk, beached during the battle of Wake Island. You could still make out the painted-on Japanese flag on the bow, slowly rusting away.

Our arrival in Japan was at Tachikawa AFB, outside of Tokyo. Total flying time since we left the United States- about 26 hours.

Myself and the other Navy guys were placed on a bus for Yokosuka. After a long and bumpy ride we arrived at my new home close to Midnight. I located temporary berthing facilities for the night, and then went outside for a breath of air before turning in.

There I was in the Land Of The Rising Sun, this twenty year-old kid from America's Upper Midwest. Farther from home than I had ever been, almost halfway around the globe. Thank God I was too young to be overwhelmed. Actually, it had all of the appearances of being a grand adventure. And, in fact, it did indeed turn out to be that way.

The Navy base was on the East coast of the Miura Pennenisula. To the North was the main body of the island of Honshu. To the East was Tokyo Bay, with the Pacific Ocean to the South and the West. This mass of land was within what was named the Kanagawa Prefecture.

Yokosuka was a big base, about 580 acres worth. It had been established by the Japanese in the 1860's, after Commodore Perry arrived in Japan in 1853. There were five drydocks, and pier space to tie up a good portion of the Seventh Fleet. The aircraft carrier Coral Sea was home-ported there along with her support ships.

I soon found out that, although I was a long way from the home, the military takes it's homeland with it.

With the exception of all of the Japanese civilian workers, when on the base you might as well have been back in the USA. They even had an American-style drive-in restaurant, complete with car hops that delivered the food on a tray to your car- except that I didn't have a car.

Memo to self: get a car.

I was assigned to the fleet electronics shop, a small group consisting of a Chief Petty Officer, a Second Class Petty Officer, two Japanese civilians- Whitey and Abi- and me. The first few days were spent on orientation into my new "culture".

I had left Pen with the thought that I would get housing and send for her as soon as possible. I knew that I didn't qualify for base housing, hell I was just one step up from a recruit, a Seaman's Apprentice.

Memo to self: get a house.

The first Saturday I had off I rented a cab and started out looking for housing using a list of "approved" rental agents that the Navy had provided. Luck was with me. By the end of the day I had found a two story house in an area known as Hayama, near the town of Zushi. Rent was $78.00 per month. There was no parking area, which the Navy required to be provided as part of being "approved housing". The next day when I went out to look the place over, a neighbor had removed part of his fence and told me that I was to park in his "front yard". The house had no heat, however there was running water- but no hot water. There was a coal and wood fired heater along side the house that looked like it had the makings of being a still.

There was no heat, but there were two bathrooms. One was a "Western" Style and the other "Oriental Style" with a oval porcelain fixture on the floor. But, and this was a big "but" in this land of Honey Buckets, they both flushed. And in addition, there was another room with a deep tub right next to the "outdoor still". It was made out of solid ceramic tiles, those little itty bitty things, about 1/2 inch square. We found out that they did a marvelous job of sucking every available BTU out of hot water.

Back to the Base Housing Facility. They had a list of used furniture that was available for people like me that lived off-base. I request one of everything that is on the list. Two days later, they deliver the goods to our new home. A bed, 2 end tables, a couch, 2 upholstered chairs, a kitchen table, 4 kitchen chairs, and a refrigerator. Pretty meager pickings, but the price was right. I go to the Navy Exchange on the base and pick up two kerosene heaters, it's December and it is cold outside.

And our house has no heat.

The old Chief that was in charge of the electronics shop was getting ready to retire and go back home. He needed to sell his car. I needed a car. He recognized a fish when he saw one. The car had the look of being abandoned in place, a 1951 Ford, bright green, rusting, balding tires. The Chief just smiled as we signed the transfer papers.

The Alpha-Male of the family had gone out on the hunt and bagged the big game for his family: a car, a house, and furnishings for same.

Time to send for my mate.

I sent Pen a telegram (there were no satellites, and you had to make a reservation to use the Trans-Pacific telephone cable) telling her to contact the bank and get money for the airfare from Minneapolis to Tokyo. As a nobody in the military my wife didn't qualify for paid transportation. She wired back that she would be arriving at two in the afternoon, the next Saturday.

Friday night, Pen's coming in the next day, I'm sitting at the EM Club eating pizza and drinking beer. I take my Japanese phrase book and hit the streets of Yokosuka. Small, narrow streets, with banners hanging all over the place. Sights and smells that this Occidental had never beheld before.

An old woman is shining shoes off in a corner of a side street. I park myself and she starts her task. I open my phrase book to the "Words of Love" chapter and start reading the phrases in my broken Japanese to the old woman. "You are my sweetest little cherry blossom". "My heart aches until we meet again". She is falling off of her stool in laughter. It was Christmas Eve and I was having fun.

Pen wasn't having any fun. She was waiting for me up at the Haneda Kuko Airport in Tokyo.

I had forgotten about the International Date Line.

Although I finally had a car, and I'm really being kind with the term "car", I wouldn't have dreamed of driving up to Tokyo to pick up Pen. I hadn't been in Japan that long, but I knew enough not to try that yet.

Christmas Day found me leaving my new home in Hayama and driving the short trip to Zushi and the nearest train station. By train, Yokohama was about a 25 minute trip and Tokyo 45 minutes or so- depending on the station that you were going to. I had made a dry run with a friend the week before, so I was able to refer to my crib notes along the way.

Today the Tokyo airport is out in the country, about an hour from the City, but when I was there the new airport wasn't even a thought in a politicians mind. "Haneda Kuko", Haneda Airport, that was my destination. It resided at the edge of Tokyo Bay, not at all far from downtown, and was also the old military airport. I bounced into the terminal and headed for the Northwest Airlines gate.

An hour early.

And a day late.

There sat my bride, surrounded by baggage and bags containing Christmas gifts- she had been waiting 24 hours. Ah, but young love saved us from what years later would surely have been a "married couple's quarrel". She asked why I had been so late, and after some confusion we finally figured it all out. She was tired- rightfully so. Her flight had gone from Minneapolis to Seattle, to Anchorage and on to Tokyo. Then, of course, she had to wait for her wayward sailor to find her.

And find the right day.

It would be three long years before we both got the "day that we lost" back.

With bags and packages in hand we got a cab to the train station and on to Zushi. The old Ford found it's way to our new home as Pen marveled at how narrow the roads were. The poor gal. She was tired. All she wanted in life was a hot bath and a good night's sleep.

And here we were with a house that had no running hot water.

I fired up the kerosene space heaters and put pans of cold water on top. After the water heated I poured it into the deep ceramic tub in the bathroom. The ceramic tiles sucked the heat out immediately. Pen was able to bathe, but the water never came close to even being luke warm.

As the Japanese winter deepened we found that our home was more open to the elements than we realized. We awoke one morning to snow.

In the kitchen.

Small drifts of it on the floor.

The space between the exterior sheathing and the inside walls was mud and straw. This had cracked with time. A half dozen rolls of Navy-supplied masking tape later and we had "winterized" the house.

With no central heating system we lived in the kitchen all winter. There, the two kerosene heaters kept the place comfortable while coating the walls and ceiling, and our noses, with a film of black soot. But, we were comfortable. Our bedroom was on the opposite side of the house. We bought an electric blanket, turned it "on", and left it that way until Spring. At night we could see our breath as we lay in bed.

My routine was to set the alarm for an hour before I actually had to get up. I would pad into the kitchen and light the two kerosene heaters. A pan of water went on top of one, a tea pot on the other. Then back through the frigid air to bed. When we awoke an hour later, the kitchen was warm and toasty- well, warm. We had a refrigerator, but no stove. Pen did all of the cooking on the kerosene space heaters. It took a long time to prepare meals. To fry a couple of eggs was a 20 minute affair.

This was Pen's department, and she attacked it with a vengeance. The kerosene heaters were our lifeline to our life style. The Japanese would sit at tables, with a pit underneath filled with coals for warmth. We were Americans. We were spoiled. The daily routine with the heaters was to shut them down, one at a time, then trim the wicks carefully so that there was no carbon residue or rough edges on them. If you didn't do this on a regular basis they smoked even more than normal. The kitchen smelled of kerosene. The ceiling just got blacker.

The next year I was able to purchase a large kerosene heater for the kitchen at a Navy surplus sale. The heater had an exhaust pipe that went outdoors.

No more soot.

We had arrived.

After cooking all of our meals on the kerosene heaters for a year we were able to purchase a used gas range. To this day I marvel at how she prepared the meals that she did without a stove.

My "job" with the Navy was almost like being a civilian contractor. I worked from seven to four and wore dungarees. Our responsibilities were the land-based communications equipment for the base, and the radios on the harbor tugboats and the "pusher boats". These were converted landing craft that had a heavy hemp mat placed over the door that used to drop to allow troops to storm ashore. They were used in combination with the tugs to bring the large surface ships of the Navy to dock.

After my day I got back in my car and drove home. The base was on one side of a peninsula, facing Tokyo Bay. Our house was on the other side, facing Mount Fuji, the sacred mountain of Japan. The commute from one side to the other took about half of an hour, and went through about six tunnels that were carved through the mountainous country. I was able to wear civilian clothes most of the time, changing into my "uniform" when I got to work each day.

Our house was actually pretty nice for a couple of kids that didn't have much money. After parking in my "front yard parking spot", one had to walk down a small footpath. After several turns of the path you arrived at our gate. There was no front yard to speak of, what there was of it was dirt. Large grass yards did not fit into the crowded culture of Japan. Opening the front door you entered a small foyer, with a step-up ledge. This is where you took off your shoes and shifted into slippers, for from this point on all of the floors, except for the wood ones in the kitchen, were made of straw- "tatami mats" they were called. Straight ahead was our bedroom, the two toilets (Western & Japanese), and the stairway that went to the upstairs bedroom. From upstairs you could see Mount Fuji. It was a lovely view.

Back downstairs, and past the bedroom, which had only three walls- the fourth was made up of sliding rice paper doors, just like in the movies. Through what we called the "living room" to the kitchen. Off of the kitchen was another small hall that led to the bathroom, and the infamous tub of the heat-sucking tiles.

We drove over 25,000 miles while we lived there. On weekends we would drive deep into the mountains to sight see. It was beautiful country. We went to Tokyo numerous times, mostly just to look around. There were a lot of open ditches. The place had an air about it.

During our stay we survived six typhoons that hit the area. Our house was about a half mile from the ocean and was never damaged by these storms. In addition, we survived numerous earthquakes. These occurred on an almost daily basis, mostly small ones, but some that would definitely get your attention. It was quite difficult to walk while these things were going on. One "threw" me off of a counter that I was sitting on, and I almost lost control of our car while inside of a tunnel during another.

We got a dog and a cat. Ralph the dog, and George the cat. George left us one day at the Navy base, never to be seen again. We had gone in to have a family portrait taken for Christmas cards. We stopped in at the base drive-in for coffee, and George made good his escape through the rusted out floorboards of the old Ford. No more cats. Ralph stayed in Japan after we left, being adopted by a "landing craft unit" that ferried supplies back and forth between Yokosuka and a Navy training base.

The Ford died after about a year. I found a 1953 Mercury in the Navy impound lot and bought it for $300.00. It had solid floorboards. Pen and I felt like we were riding in a Cadillac.

We went up to Tokyo one day for the Emperor's birthday. This, and New Year's, is the only time that civilians are allowed to enter the Imperial Palace grounds. There was a sea of people waiting for the Royal family to arrive. I only stand 5 foot, 9 and a half inches, and was one of the tallest people there, looking over a ocean of black hair. The few foreigners stood out because of their height and their "other than black" hair. After a bit of a delay, the Emperor strode out accompanied by his wife, son and his wife, the Princess.

There were many shouts of "Banzi!" as the crowd bowed to the leader that MacArthur had replaced with a civilian government and a constitution of his own writing. Strange, standing there as an American, looking at this little man that was the titular leader of a country that had dragged the world down so low in the Great War. So many people had died while he was in office, and the world had changed forever.

"Whitey", one of the Japanese civilians that worked for us at the base, told me that when Japan surrendered the Emperor made a nation-wide radio broadcast to the people. He said everyone cried. Not so much over the shame of the loss- by that time they knew it was inevitable- but by the sound of his voice.

They had never heard the Emperor speak before.

I was to encounter the Emperor once more, this time on a face-to-face basis. After we moved into our new home and started to drive around the area, we discovered that the Emperor's Summer Palace was just a few miles down the road from us. Poor guy. We moved in and there went the neighborhood. Driving home one day I noticed more people than normal along side of the road as I neared our house. After parking the car I walked back up to the main highway. Like most of the main roads, it was concrete, two lanes wide, with a shoulder about two feet wide. One had to be careful stepping out of a shop or a home that was located on a road, as the traffic was but a few feet away. I leaned up against a telephone pole and waited to see what the turn out was for. Before long a small motorcade approached. Policemen on motorcycles led a black limousine. I leaned down to peer inside as the cavalcade slowly went by. The limousine's lone occupant turned my way just as it came abreast of my position. There I was, the lone American, a cigarette dangling from my mouth, eyeball to eyeball with the Emperor of Japan, less three feet away. As they continued on down the road, I walked back home wondering if he was thinking "Just how the heck did we lose the war to those people anyway?"

One day the British Fleet came to Yokosuka. They were on their Far East Cruise. The aircraft carrier Victorious carried the Flag Officer. A tanker, several destroyers, and other support ships made up the small flotilla. On this occasion the fleet was accompanied by several Canadian destroyers, resplendent in a kind of sea-green paint.

The US Navy told us that they wanted all personnel to be good hosts to our British friends. Pen and I decided to do our part and marched on over to the mooring spot of H.M.S. Victorious. We boarded and were met by the Officer Of the Deck, who arranged a ship's guide for us. He was a totally charming fellow, Mike Beasly as I recall his name. We invited Mike and a half dozen of his friends over to the house that weekend for a barbecue and beer. Heck, I had a fridge to cool the beer, and a machinist had made a grill for us- we were ready to entertain. The night before I remembered British custom, and took the beer back out of the fridge. They had a great time, getting great amusement out of our hard Midwest accents.

The next day Pen and I drove into the Base to see how our new British friends were fairing. The OOD remembered us and directed us on down to the crew's quarters- unannounced, and unescorted. We waltzed in as guys were getting dressed and coming out of the showers- the phrase "Woman on board!" was shouted out several times. Mike and his crew survived our little party OK, but the streets of Yokosuka had been less kind to them that night when they got back to the base and went out partying.

"Rum Time" arrived. No one in charge seemed to know that we were there as the pint of the Queen's rum was issued out to the men. Each sailor had his own tin cup, but the tradition seemed to be to take a sip and pass the ration around- this was certainly more enjoyable than the US Navy. This was also a special occasion- the Empire was celebrating the birth of the Queen's son, Prince Andrew. An extra ration was dolled out. They all decided that Pen was one of the few women to ever drink rum with the crew of a British Man of War. She paid the price the next day. After a week or so, our new friends left to continue their voyage around the shrinking British Empire. They gave us a lovely large photograph of the Victorious- something that I treasure to this day.

The town of Kamakura was just a few miles from our home. It is the home of one of the most famous Buddhas in the world, the DiaButsu Kamakura. It was a beautiful thing to see.

We found that Buddhas can take several forms. Another one not far from us was in the town of Ofuno, it was named the "Goddess of Mercy". Whereas the DiaButsu Kamakura was bronze, this one was made of concrete and was quite large.

Mount Fuji was visible from our house. I could understand why it was the sacred mountain of Nippon, beautiful in form and ever changing with the sun's direction. After a time, I kept hearing the phrase about this mountain. "He who fails to climb Mount Fuji in his lifetime is a fool. He who climbs it twice is a bigger fool."

I decide that I didn't want to be thought of as a fool.

With another American Navy man we board the train for the nearest village at the base of the mountain. Pen, showing an incredible amount of common sense, stayed home. We arrived at a small village with a mass of other climbers. It doesn't take long to realize that a climbing stick is a mandatory item. Vendors on the streets of the village are selling them everywhere. For some reason, they are all octagonal in shape- a tradition I find out later. Some of them are decorated, some of them are plain. We opted for the plain version. A bus took us up to the tree line. Follow the crowd.

My God! I look up, and there is a solid stream of humanity snaking up the side of the dormant volcano.

Walking is very difficult. The trail, and the sides of the mountain, are composed of volcanic rock. Tiny little pieces that seem to slide under your step. One step forward, slide back a little. This tended to lengthen the journey. There are "rest stations" along the way. Small areas that are smoothed out of the rock, most with a fire going, some with tents. Each rest station had a name and a number. This information was forged into a branding iron that rested in each station's fire. For a few Yen they would brand your "Fuji stick". For a few more Yen you could have some tea, and a broth of unknown origin. With the exception of our "branding stops" we continued the pace. People started to fall out and start the return back down the slope, apparently not caring that they would be thought of as fools by society. Not us dumb Americans. We pushed on. It gets windy when you get into the higher elevations- and cold. Our stops by the fires became more frequent- and longer.

Darkness started to descend on the mountain. We needed a home for the night. As you neared the top, the camps with tents became larger- sleeping accommodations for the climbers. We stopped at one for the night as the mountain went totally black. For a reasonable sum we had dinner, that "soup" again, and tea. Our "beds" were futons inside of the large tent. The "pillows" were filled with the now familiar volcanic rock- crushed just a little finer than that on the foot path. My friend and I sat on our haunches, Japanese style, around the campfire as people chatted and told stories. The heated saki tasted wonderful in the cool mountain air. Our Japanese language skills were limited, we didn't understand 99% of what was being said. Nonetheless, we pay attention, nodding when they nod, laughing when they laugh. They gave us that look. The rock bed and pillow actually felt good, tired as we were.

I had heard the phrase before- "I'm so tired, I could sleep on a rock." Now I know.

Seemingly just hours later, an old woman wakes us with a cup of hot tea- it's time to start climbing again. We have our Fuji sticks branded and strike out in the darkness. Up. You can see a few people near you, but mostly it is quiet. And cold. And dark. We stray off of the path now and then, a fact that is obvious to you right away as the rock becomes larger under your feet. The sky starts to lighten just a wee bit. The top is in sight. We have to make it to the crest before the sun rises. That's the deal. Getting to the top is one thing, but being there when the sun rises over the Land Of The Rising Sun, that is everything!

We are successful. We stand at the edge of the dark crater, over 13,000 feet above sea level. Being so high, the sunrise is not spectacular. I have made it. Sunrise on Mount Fuji. I can no longer be thought of as a fool- well, not on this subject anyway. Even with the sun's arrival it is cold up there. I stare down into the crater and see a wisp of vapor come out. Dormant, but not dead. We walk over to a fire and warm ourselves. I get my stick branded "Sunrise, top of Mt. Fuji" it reads. It's time to go back down.

A look back down the path that brought us here shows a sea of humanity, activated by the daylight. This would not be a fun trip, going into the salmon mode back down the mountain. My friend sees some climbers, now descending climbers, going down the other side of the mountain in what appears to be a huge rock slide. It looks like they are skiing as they walk and slide down the slope. A quick glance at the crowded path convinces us that this "skiing" is the way to go. We step off and quickly master the technique. Long, giant strides, using the Fuji stick as a rudder. We progress rapidly and in a matter of hours are back down to the tree line. At the base is a campfire. With a branding iron in it. My stick now reads "Sand Ski, Mt. Fuji".

And I thought we Americans were entrepreneurs.

We made it back to the train station, and were home that night. A little tired, but a grand adventure.

Today, on the wall of my den, there is an octagonal stick, covered with branding iron marks. I am very proud of it.

To quote Dickens, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times". We settled into a routine, Penny and I. I left in the morning for work, she whiled away on the home front. It really was much worse for her than me. I got to see people during the day, and had a job to keep my busy. Pen was alone in the house, with the nearest American miles away. Some days she would come into the base with me and spend the day at the library.

Her daily and weekly chores around the house took on much more meaning than that of the average Western housewife. Cooking was an adventure for the months that we lived there without a stove. Frying eggs on the top of a kerosene heater took an extraordinarily long time. Washing clothes was an all day affair. Just heating the water took hours. Without a washing machine, she washed all of our clothes by hand in the kitchen sink using a scrub board- a piece of wood about one foot wide by two feet long, with a metal center area that had ridges. One rubbed the wet, soapy clothes up and down across the ridges to clean them. Her "clothes dryer" was rope that was strung along a pole outside of the house. In the winter the clothes had to be dried in our one heated room- the kitchen. All the time that they dried they slowly accumulated the smell of the kerosene we were heating the place with.

My pay, as a very junior enlisted man, was marginal at best. We learned how to make do without any luxuries. I had some money in a trust account back in the States that was the remains of my inheritance from my father. When we really were scraping bottom I would write a pitiful, pleading letter to the bank's administrator that they release a few hundred dollars to us. Finally, when I reached twenty-one the bank released the balance to me, but by then we only had a year left in the Orient and decided we had best hang on to the money for our return to the United States.

Some of our friends were able to pay for or "con" their way onto flights to the U.S. for visits with family and friends. We never had any luck in this department. The bottom line was that we served the entire three years in Japan without ever returning to our homeland until the end.

One of the tires on our car needed replacing and we just didn't have the money to buy a new one with. There was a Navy jeep that always parked by the end of the pier that our shop was located on. One night when I had the watch, I slipped down to the jeep in the darkness and stole the tire. Feeling embarrassed, and yet triumphant, I went to mount my hot goods on the car the next day when I got home. It was the wrong size, something that until then I had never thought about. Now what to do? I didn't dare risk bringing it back onto the Base. I dug a hole in front of the house and buried it- a future archeological find.

We decided that we could make some money teaching English. The Japanese are taught English in school. Their spelling, phraseology, sentence structure and such are probably better than most Americans. But pronunciation was a problem. Even though they knew the words, they were extremely hesitant to use them in public for fear of embarrassing themselves. (On many occasions, in our day to day travels, we would carry on "conversations" with the people in writing- no spoken words. It was strange.) So, we started teaching conversational English out of our home. I don't recall how many people we had. The "classes" were small, or one-on-one, but looking back now it scares me a little to think that there are people over there that may talk like I do.

We had friends on the base that helped us out. One of them was a "cumshaw" artist of renown. He got us a huge box of steaks from the Navy mess hall one time. The only condition was that we invite him over now and then for dinner- a condition that we gladly agreed to. Another source was a supply boat that made supply runs over to a Navy training facility on Chiba Peninsula. The crew supplied us with military "C rations" on a regular basis. Pen's favorite was the fruit cocktail.

We bathed in the kitchen. The bathroom with its' floor and walls composed of ceramic tile sucked every bit of heat out of the air so that we could only use it for bathing purposes in the heat of summer. With pots of water warming on the kerosene heaters, we would do sponge baths. It was like being in a hospital for an extended period. Now and then we would treat ourselves by purchasing wood and coal from a charming old man that was the local chimney sweep.

This went into the contraption that was called a "water heater". It was located outside of the house, next to the bathroom. Access was through a small wood door that was about two feet wide and three feet high. The "heater" itself was about a foot and a half in diameter and around five feet high, black with soot stains. There were more valves on it than one thought necessary, along with a temperature gauge. I would place the wood and coal into the unit by way of a small opening at the bottom. Then add some of our precious kerosene. Once the fire took hold, there was a ferocious rush of air as the thing transformed itself into a miniature blast furnace. There was no dampener, it was all or nothing. There was also no high temperature pop-off valve. Water heater explosions were not uncommon in the area.

I suspected that NASA could have used ours as a first-stage unit on a space vehicle launch.

I would crouch outside watching the temperature dial slowly climb. Experience taught me that when it reached "critical mass" we had to immediately start drawing water, lest the "countdown" began. Now the unit was creaking and groaning, a cherry glow would begin at the base and slowly start extending upwards as the temperature needle started to rise. Through the small trap door, where Pen was now waiting inside. Off with the robes, turn the knobs, and voila! Hot water. Really hot water. Scalding hot water. By the time we would get the proper mix of hot and cold, the charge was over. The whole experience took less than three minutes.

We learned to adapt.

Back to our two bathrooms. One was Occidental, the other Oriental. The Occidental one had a sink and a conventional toilet, albeit the "crapper style" with the tank mounted up by the ceiling and a long chain to activate the flush mechanism. The Oriental one had a small sink with a floor toilet. This was unusual in that the toilet actually had a flushing mechanism- a rarity in the area. Japanese toilets are elongated ovals that are mounted flush with the floor. One end has a "hood" that comes up about six inches. (In the homes without plumbing there was just a hole under this unit. The smell was incredible. Once inside one of these you felt more like throwing up than relieving yourself.)

One night we invited Whitey, one of our Japanese workers at the base, and his wife for dinner. After her meal she whispered to her husband and he asked me where the bathroom was. I told him, he told her. She excused herself with much bowing and left. She did not return for almost half of an hour. The next day when I saw Whitey at the Base he was laughing, and said that he had to tell what had happened. His wife got up and followed the directions, except that she turned into the first bathroom rather than going down to the second one. She closed the door, and was eyeball to eyeball with the strangest contraption that she had ever seen. Her first Western-style toilet. At first she was amused, but then, remembering why she was there in the first place, she tried to figure out how to use the darn thing. She immediately dismissed the idea of sitting on the seat. The idea that everyone would place their bare bottoms on the same seat was abhorrent to her. After analyzing the situation, she carefully climbed up and squatted on the seat, Japanese style.

Looking back at it now, Penny and I realize, and have for a long time, how important this part of our lives was to us. We certainly didn't feel deprived of anything. We missed conveniences that we were familiar with, but by the same token, we were resourceful and had the resiliency of youth on our side. Plus, we had each other. We were only married a few weeks before I shipped out to the Orient, even though we had known each other and dated for two years before that. But, as all married couples know, you don't really know someone until you live with them, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. These were our "formative years". We matured in our lives and in our marriage. We are much stronger now as a couple than we ever would have been had we not lived that time in Japan.

One day we decided to go into the Navy base for a break in the action. I went there every day of course, but that was work- this trip would be for relaxation. It was a huge facility, with plenty of attractions to help pass the day. Included on the base was the flagship of the Japanese Navy from the battle of the Kuri Sea when the Japanese Navy took on the Russian Navy and won. There were enormous dry docks, large enough to hold a super tanker. Sadly, I found out that most of these were built by American POW's during the war- at a horrible attrition rate.

We drove to our nearest train station in the town of Zushi, about four miles from our home. Boarding the train from Tokyo we noticed a larger crowd of people than normal, but thought nothing more of it. After sitting down in one of the cars a Japanese soldier with a rifle came over and snapped to attention, staring straight ahead, next to us. It was then that I started looking around. Lots of people. Lots of people wearing headbands with Kanji writing on them. Then I saw the signs being held close to the floor. "Yankee Pigs!", "Yankee Go Home." "No Nukes." And so on.

It slowly dawned on us. We were on a train loaded with Japanese going down to hold a demonstration at the Navy Base. Looking around I made one other observation. We were the only Americans in sight. When the train pulled into the Yokosuka train station our armed escort walked us to the exit gate, never saying a word. Pen and I walked fast to the main gate, about six blocks from the station. The Marine at the gate thought that it was foolish of us to be out and about, but also said that rarely do they confront American citizens when these demonstrations take place. For the rest of the day, as we walked around the base, we could hear the loudspeakers from the gathered mass. At the end of the day, they got back on the trains and went home. We followed shortly afterwords.

 Communication was terrible. There were no satellites, just the Trans-Pacific telephone cable, and that was tied up by the military. Penny's folks called us one time. They had to make a reservation to use the undersea cable a week in advance. The call was limited to ten minutes.

On a Fall evening we drove to Yokosuka to have dinner at the EM club. The club was different from most installations in that it was off of the base by about three blocks. After a good dinner and dancing, and Pen being hounded by sailors that wanted to dance with her because they "Hadn't seen a round-eye in months." we left for home. Our car was parked on the street. Turning on the radio to listen to the Armed Forces Radio Network we only got static. A glance out the windshield showed the reason. Our antenna had been broken off, neatly at the base. This was a national pastime for the Japanese. They didn't discriminate, but did favor American Armed Forces automobiles. So, no news, no music during the drive. It was late when we arrived home, we hit the sack. The next morning we slept in, a combination of too much booze and a late hour the night before.

It was Saturday, November 23rd., 1963

President John F. Kennedy had been killed in Dallas, Texas.

The next morning I turned on the kitchen radio, expecting the usual AFR shows, only to hear dirge music. After some minutes of this the announcer came on and said "Due to the tragic loss of our President, normal scheduled broadcasting is cancelled. All American military personnel are requested to return to their duty stations."

We drove into the base in shock. All American forces were placed on full alert status. All ships that were able to make way steamed out of the port for the safety of the open seas. No one knew it this was just an assassination or part of a larger plot to attack the United States. The confusion was soon cleared up and the base, along with the other American Forces stood down later in the day.

On the day that they buried JFK it was cold in Japan with a low overcast and a light mist. Appropriate for the occasion. By Navy tradition the largest ship on base would fire off a salvo every hour on the hour. It took some time to reach us as we lived across the peninsula from the harbor. A slow rumble would come rolling across the land and give our house a gentle shake, the report from the heavy cruiser St. Paul's six inch guns. Every hour, on the hour. Sunrise to sundown.

It was truly a dreary day.

Driving home from the base one day my life flashed before me as an event happened that I felt would doom me to a Japanese prison for life.

I struck an old Japanese man with my car.

He appeared out of nowhere. The streets are narrow, no sidewalks except in the larger cities. I was traveling about thirty miles per hour, only a few miles from home. The sound was sickening, even more so when I got out and saw the old man laying in the street. A crowd started gathering. I envisioned myself being dragged through the streets. A policeman appeared. He bent down over the old man and started whispering in his ear.

The old man stood up, and walked away into the crowd. I never saw him again.

The policeman directed me to a "police box" less than a hundred feet down the road. The "Police Box" was a small shanty, about five feet square. They were scattered everywhere in the country, and were in addition to the larger regular police stations that they had in the larger towns. In halting English he explained that he knew this old man. It was approaching New Year's. Tradition, especially among the older Japanese, was to enter the New Year debt free. This fellow made it a practice to stand by the edge of the road at that time and look for an American driving toward him. He would leap out, hitting the car with a wood club that he had under his black "robe" and then collapse by the side of the road. A hasty cash settlement from the frightened American would salve the man's wounds. I was lucky that the policeman knew the situation. The officer filled out a special form and gave it to me with a smile and a dismissal.

The form was used as permanent "evidence" that I, and the United States Government, my employer, was held faultless. It turned out that these were issued to Americans after any type of automobile accident. It was quite impressive, all in Kanji with the only English being "Hal Stoen" and "the Government of The United States". There was even a gold colored seal attached. By the time I left the Orient I had a fair collection of these "documents." I swear, I could frame and display them and tell people that they were honorary degrees from the University of Tokyo. Instead they are in a trunk somewhere down in our basement.

During our stay we had done many things, seen many sights, experienced a lifetime of memories. We travelled over 25,000 miles by automobile alone, not to mention the train travel, in this relatively small land, going out most every weekend to explore the territory.

Viet Nam was heating up across the Pacific from us. Our base sent some landing craft over along with support personnel. The aircraft carriers would come into port with the aircraft's American markings whitewashed out. America was fighting a covert war. As my time for transfer back to the Continental United States drew closer, the Navy started extending duty time. There were "windows" that opened up now and then between these extensions. I would have served for my country, I would have fought for my country. That was my job. I would have done it even if I had been a civilian. I was, and still am, a patriotic person. However, there is a major difference between being told to do something, and volunteering to do it. People talked. We heard stories about what was going on in Southeast Asia. It didn't seem to us to be "America's war".

I didn't want to go to Viet Nam. I prayed for a "window".

After three years, the window opened. It was time to go home.

My papers arrived. I was being transferred to "CONUS" The continental United States. My orders were for me, and me alone. Nothing about Penny. I went to the Military Dependents Section on the base to find out why the error. The clerk looked up my file and made the discovery.

I was married to an illegal alien.

When she came over to Japan, Pen travelled on a civilian airliner at our expense. I was too low on the military totem pole to qualify for military transportation. She had, of course, a civilian visa. When it was due to expire, I went to the Navy to get a military visa. They assumed that if she was there, she must be "legal" and issued one. Their mistake. But, being the military they now became hard-nosed about it and insisted that as long as I had paid her way over, I was responsible for getting her back.

I was leaving the Navy as I joined it. A day late, and a dollar short. There was no way that I could afford the airfare back home. We were at loggerheads. The Navy wouldn't do it, I couldn't afford it. "Fine," I told the clerk "I'm going home. She's here, and now she's your problem." (It's a good thing Pen wasn't there for this show of bravado, she knows what a lousy poker player I really am.) "Wait." the clerk said, "We can work something out."

The "final solution" was to give me more of an open-ended arrival window in San Francisco, my destination for final discharge. Pen could get a free ride home, but it would have to be "Space-A", "Space Available".

We would soon find the true meaning of that phrase.

We notified our rental agent, Mrs. Watanabe, that we would be vacating the house. Poor lady, I think we were probably her last American renters. The furniture, sparse as it was, belonged to the Navy. We sold our kerosene heaters to newly arriving Americans. The heaters, being a hotly traded commodity, went fast. In the months prior to our departure we shipped dozens of cartons full of our personal goods by way of the US Mail back to Minnesota. My allotment from the Navy for shipping goods back was so small as to be laughable. Fortunately for us, postal rates were low at the time. A landing craft crew that ferried supplies from Yokosuka to a training base over by Mount Fuji took our dog as a mascot.

For our final few days we moved in with some friends that had Navy housing in Yokohama. Then, suddenly it seemed, after three years of living in this strange land, it was time to go home.

We boarded a Navy bus at for the long ride up to Tachikawa Air Force Base. We were going home! The Operations Center at Tachikawa was huge, almost like a civilian terminal building. We checked in and were told that we had to go to the "Space-A" counter. An Air Force Sergeant wrote our names down on a sheet of paper that was on a clipboard. We sat and waited. A flight was announced. We both grabbed our suitcases and went to the counter. The Sergeant checked the clipboard, which now had what appeared to be a ream of paper on it. All of the new papers were on top of ours.

This didn't look good.

A routine developed. There would be a flight call. Knowing better now, Pen would stay seated with the baggage while I checked to see if there was space for us. Officer's dependent children had priority over these two waifs that just wanted to go home. The first night came to find us warming the waiting benches. They had little "resting cubicles" that contained a small bed and a dresser. The walls were 6 feet high, no conjugal visitations with that setup. The first night passed. The second night passed.

Then on the third day our names were called. The good Sergeant had a flight down at the Tokyo Airport. It was a charter full of American servicemen going to San Francisco, and there were three seats available. An Air Force Airman appeared at the counter. If we could make it to Tokyo in one hour, we could have the space. It would be our responsibility to get there on time. Did we want it?

Ten minutes later the three of us were in a cab bolting down the narrow Japanese roads. We told the driver that we would tip him $50.00 if he made it on time. The Airman equalled the offer- a hundred bucks total. It was the ride of a lifetime. I have been on my share of amusement park rides, but nothing, nothing, will ever come close to the adventure of hurtling along in a cab driven by a Kamikazi wannabe. The Haneda Airport was across downtown Tokyo, situated on Tokyo Bay. Fortunately, it was not rush hour.

With joy, we paid the one hundred dollar bribe as we screeched to a halt in front of the terminal. We ran to the Pan American counter for a gate number. The agent said that the flight had closed it's doors but would wait for us. We did a steeplechase through the terminal. When we got to the gate an agent walked us down the ramp, knocked on the door of the aircraft, it opened, we entered, it closed immediately behind us. The engines were already running. It was a Pan Am Boeing 707-320, God, it looked good.

Less than 10 minutes later we lifted off, leaving behind what had been our home for three years, this strange place of the Rising Sun.

Somewhere enroute we regained the day that we had lost three years ago, as we crossed the International Date Line. Our first stop was at Anchorage, Alaska for refueling. About a week before our arrival, the great Kodiak earthquake had struck, leaving large cracks in the runways and ramp areas. These had been temporarily patched, but the stress on the aircraft's tires and landing gear must have been awful. We were not allowed to get off of the airplane. Less than an hour later we were airborne, finally headed to San Francisco- U.S.A.

When the graceful 707 touched down at Travis AFB the passengers actually cheered, like us, most had been away for a long time. Inside of the military terminal we went to get change so that we could make telephone calls to our family. Welcome home, sorry no change, there was a "coin shortage" going on. We had change, but it was all paper. Military script that we were forced to use in Japan. Paper nickels, dimes, quarters, used so that the, at that time, American dollar couldn't fall into evil hands. A kind hearted soul gives us a couple of quarters so that we can at least phone our parents and let them know that we are home, safe and sound.

Pen's Sister and Brother-In-Law lived in Los Gatos at the time, a town South of San Francisco. During the cab ride down the driver had the radio on. It struck me as so strange to hear commercials. Years of listening to Armed Forces Radio had spoiled us. The next day I was driven up to the Navy Base at Treasure Island, in the Bay, next to Alcatraz. After a week of paper shuffling by the Navy I was a free man.

Pen and I boarded a Western Airlines flight and arrived back in Minneapolis, finally home after all of those years.

The Navy contacted me several months later, reminding me that my military obligation was for six years total, four active and two inactive, and that I would be required to take "two week cruises" for the next two years.

I threw the notices away.

Hal Stoen