The Land Of The Rising Sun

My Granddaughter Lauren just returned from visiting Japan. While there she was part of a concert in which 10 pianists performed playing 10 Grand Pianos all at the same time. We are all very proud of her.

This brings back a few memories of several visits I made to Japan 55 years ago. I can't believe it has been that long. We visited several port cities there during the Korean War. I was mainly in Sasebo and Yokosuka both of which are south of Tokyo. My memories are vague on most things except for a few things I do remember. I awoke one morning and went out on the main deck and realized we were anchored off the coast of Japan. Our ship was so large that we could not tie up to a dock. This was true in most cities we visited throughout the world. The USS Wisconsin, a Battleship of 987 feet long was one of the largest in the world. That's longer than three football fields laid end to end. We had to anchor about 1/2 mile off shore from the port. When we got liberty we had to ride an LCI (Landing Craft Infantry) boat to shore, also know as a Higgins boat. This is a very interesting story you might want to read http://www.history.navy.mil/danfs/a8/andrew_j_higgins.htm

You really have to hold on tight as these flat bottom boats ride the top of the waves and constantly slam from the top of one wave to the bottom of the next. I remember thinking how good these boat drivers were, they were also known as Coxswain's in Navy terminology. They would drive the boat at full speed at the dock and you were sure you were going to crash into it but at the last second they would throw it into reverse and stop it instantly just inches from the dock. When we disembarked at Sasebo, immediately to the right is a very large Navy Base, to the left is a road leading into town. Also on the left was a restaurant that most guys stopped at to get a steak that was the size of a dinner plate. I wonder how all of us knew to go there, One of the first things we did was to convert our cash into Yen.

At the time one dollar would get you 360 yen. A very common price for a lot of things was "1000 yen" That seemed to be the price for everything but you soon learned that most prices were negotiable. I'm afraid I never had much money to spend on anything. It was a great place to buy cameras and watches if you could afford it. My monthly pay at the time was $75, Out of this I sent home to my mother an allotment of $20 which the government matched and she received $40 a month. This only left $55. We got paid every 2 weeks, The navy always paid in cash and the bills and coins were always brand new. We had to stand in long lines for everything in the navy and a common term everyone would reiterate was "Hurry Up And Wait" The pay table was no exception. It took 4 people to pay you, one to look up your name and pay amount, another to count out my pay of $26 which is what I got after taxes, another to count it again and another to count it into your hand as a final check. This amount had to last me for 2 weeks.

Another thing about cash is that you were not allowed to carry actual cash on you while you were ashore, You had to buy Military Script which you could use the same as cash. Even the coins were in paper script. I suppose they didn't want American money in the hands of the black marketeers.

I was a very naive young guy from the poor section of town in Cincinnati who had never been anywhere or done anything outside of Cincinnati, Ohio before joining the Navy. I was really excited from the first time I got on the overnight train which took me to the Great Lakes Training Station near Chicago. (Training will have to be another blog) Anyway here I was in Japan with Japanese money about to embark on a self guided tour. The first thing I remember were the girls and the way they dressed. I never saw anything like this back home. Most were young, slim and very pretty. The thing that really caught my eye was the slit in the side of their skirts that went from the hem line almost to the waist leaving most of the leg exposed. The girls I knew back home wore peddle pushers or shorts. I stood on a corner and carefully surveyed the passing scenery. This dress style had not yet caught on back home. One of my biggest surprises was when I had to go to the bathroom at the home of a friend of one of my shipmates. First of all when you enter the home of a Japanese family you have to take off your shoes and put on slippers that they keep at the front door. When you go to the bathroom, Surprise! Surprise! You have to put on "Bathroom Slippers to enter and there is no toilet there. Only a small trough on the floor. One is expected to squat. something I never got used to.

I took a train from Sasabo to the town of Nagasaki which is the town where the second atomic bomb was dropped in August of 1943. There was still evidence of the bomb damage while I there. One thing I thought about at the time was it was 1953, It had only been 10 years since we almost obliterated the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with Nuclear bombs killing hundreds of thousands of people. Yet. all the people I met or interacted with were very cordial, polite and friendly. I stood at this site of a church and wondered if I could forgive the horror the people must have suffered in those days but from what I have read the Japanese culture taught that to surrender during war is a disgrace and death was preferable to save one's honor. To invade Japan and end the war would have involved millions of men from all over the world and would have resulted in many more deaths than the bombs caused.

It wasn't long before the Japanese agreed to a conditional surrender of their country and all of its people with the condition that their emperor Hirohito could remain as Emperor and leader of the Japanese people. The surrender was signed in the deck of the USS Missouri Battleship (A sister ship of the battleship I was on, the USS Wisconsin) in Tokyo bay, My ship arrived 3 days after the signing.

Photo of General Douglas McArthur, Commander in chief of the armed forces and Emperor Hirohito,

You can read about him at http://broadband.zoomtown.net/google/redirect.php?to=aHR0cDovL3d3dy5zcGFydGFjdXMuc2Nob29sbmV0LmNvLnVrLzJXV2hpcm9oaXRvLmh0bQ%3D%3D&context=results.1&count=2&_LT=GRLK_GBARGLBLX_OGRSR

He actually did have a part in the war when he supported the invasion of China prior to WW2. This is one of the events that led to the war. Japan has no natural resources to speak of and when they could not buy or trade for a commodity they needed they felt compelled to invade a country and take it by force. I didn't mean for this to be a history lesson.

While in Japan I traveled to Sasebo, Yokusuka, Nagasaki, Tokyo and a ski resort somewhere up north, I think it was called Kobe. Tokyo was extremely busy with wall to wall people on the sidewalks. I don't remember where we went or what we did but at least I can say I was there. One thing I remember was the tiny Taxi cabs and the bicycle powered Rickshaws which wound in and around the traffic, There didn't seem to be any traffic laws, it was every car for itself. and everyone else stay out of the way.

One thing that needs no explanation I believe is that every sailor who came back on board the ship after a visit to a Japanese city was required to swallow two penicillin pills by a Navy pharmacist who was on hand to meet every LCI which brought sailors back to the ship after their liberty.

Our ship was the flagship of the Pacific 7th. fleet which meant we always had the commanding 4 star admiral on board whenever we were at sea. If any global emergency arose were ready for it. The ship was also a showpiece that impressed people all over the world with it's 16" gun barrels that could hurl a projectile as heavy as a Volkswagen car a distance if 24 miles and hit a target with accuracy. We also carried 20-5" gun turrets, 20-Anti-Aircraft guns. 20-40mm guns, 40-20 mm Twin barrel guns and 49-20mm Single barrel guns. The sides and the deck were 12" thick. It's hard to believe something that big and heavy could float. Not only could it float but it could speed up to 32 miles an hour at sea. I know that's more that you wanted to know but I needed to tell you.

Maybe more later on other countries I have visited.