Farewell To Manzanar Essay

The book “Farewell to Manzanar” reflects the true story of a family’s struggles in the life of internment camp during World War two. The main dispute in the book mentioned is the loss of freedom which Japanese American in the camps. The narrator depicted how her family was drifted apart due to the difficult time they had in the internment camp.
On december 7, 1941, Japan attacked the Pearl harbor Hawaii. On the same day Jeanne’s father whom she called Papa burned the Japanese flag and the documents. Papa became the suspect and was taken into custody when FBI investigated the Japanese people. Jeanne and her family moved to the terminal island which was the settlement of other Japanese families. Her Mama encouraged herself to keep her family together but it was hard for Jeanne who was not used to live around other Japanese people. The Wakatsuki family had a second move to Boyle heights. President Roosevelt signed an executive order 9066 which granted war department to assign military area

and exclude any person from that place. The final destination of families was to Manzanar camp which was an unfinished place with tents and row upon black barracks. The conditions of the camp was not designed properly when people came to live. Jeanne described how her family was tearing apart when she realises her family did not had meal together. Father Steinbeck who was the priest of Caucasian lived among them and convinced the internees to convert to catholicism before the end of war. Due to the improper resources, the Japanese-Americans children were getting ill. Jeanne’s family faced disaster when Papa was released and he joined them at the camp. He started drinking because of the rumor spread around that he was an informer and people called him “Inu” which also means a dog. When he tried to misbehave with his wife, his son Kijo punches him on his face.
A riot occurred on the exact day of the Pearl harbor attack which people named as December riot. A guy named Fred Tayama who was a leader in Japanese-American citizen league was beaten by six men in which one was cook who claimed to be Caucasian. While the riot began when the cook was arrested and crowd was furious after hearing the news of his arrest. The mob was splitted into two groups, one headed to police station and other headed to kill Tayama. The military started to bring their guns, and submarine machine guns when the groups arrived at the police station. With the military opened fire, it injured lot of people and two died young men, while ten people were injured and treated in the hospital for the gunshot wounds. The bells were ringing around the street when the police was patrolling and the riots continued till the next day noon.
Later on the life for the families on camps became tolerable like a small town with school, churches and dances.

In the end of 1944, around 600 people in which only aged and young group remained on the camp. Jeanne’s family was getting separated when Eleanor and Shiq were supposed to leave and around same time Woody got drafted. Woody was Jeanne’s elder brother who used to find ways to survive in the terrible situation faced in the camps. It was decided that all camps would close in twelve months and everybody has to go back to their home which did not went well with the Wakatsuki family. Everybody in the camp was worried about finding new home. While everybody’s last hope of departure being postponed broke after the bombing on Japanese cities; Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This marked the ended the World War two with the winning of United States. Jeanne and her family left the camp in early October. The family moved towards Los Angeles and found

apartment.
When Jeanne was in her sixth grade, she was feeling embarrassed and guilty for losing her childhood in Manzanar. She was treated like a foreigner by her classmates and was rejected couple time when she tried to get into group of friend circle.. During her school time, issues occurred regarding Jeanne's Japanese identity, though she had great experience of playing drum, her band teacher needed permission to allow her to participate. She restrained the memories of Manzanar until she made a comeback to that place and recalled all the memory of her family. When in 1972, Jeanne and her husband paid a visit to Manzanar, she realised that even though she grew with the shame and guilt of being imprisoned for so many years , the memories were still fresh in her mind as it was the important aspect of her life and her family.