|
|
|
Bridging Cultures |
|
|
|
Phyllis (Harumi) Ah Loy’s family was involved in the pearl-shell industry from the late 19th Century. Phyllis’ maternal grandfather and grandmother came to Thursday Island in the 1890s and established a business building luggers, dinghies and slipways for the developing pearl shell industry. Later, her father, Haruyoshi Yamashita, joined his brother on Thursday Island and took over the running of the soy sauce factory. Phyllis’ mother, Tei Shiosaki, was born on Thursday Island. In keeping with Japanese tradition of the early 20th Century, Tei was sent back to Japan with her five brothers to complete primary and secondary education. She returned to Thursday Island when she was 19 and married Haruyoshi when she was 20. Haruyoshi Yamashita was President of the local Nihonjin-kai or Japanese Club on the Island from 1928. He retained this position for many years. The Japanese Club was the focus of social life in the community and its activities reflected Japanese cultural traditions. Within 24 hours of Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, 1141 people, almost all the Japanese in Australia and its territories, were arrested. The process was facilitated by the fact that the Japanese community was easily identifiable, small and concentrated in the north-east. They were interned on the basis of ‘Japaneseness’. The largest group of Japanese detained was on Thursday Island (359), where the Japanese quarter ‘little Yokohama’ was transformed into a temporary internment camp with barbed-wire fencing around its perimeters and machine guns at each corner. As far as possible, daily life was allowed to continue. Phyllis remembers coming home from school that day: Oh, we’ve barbed wire around us, we’re prisoners! We didn’t know what was going on. At the end of December 1941, the first wave of Thursday Island internees was transferred to the mainland on the Zealandia, along with internees from Darwin, and the second wave on the Marela. On New Year’s Day 1942 they arrived in Sydney. Families and single women went to Tatura, Victoria. The single men went to Hay, New South Wales. Phyllis, at age 12, was interned with her father and mother and her seven brothers and sisters at Tatura, Victoria. She remembers that each person was allowed one bag on board ship and that the family did not know where they were going: We just knew that we were going to be put in a detention camp. Conditions on board were very cramped and when fresh water ran out they drank ‘semi-desalinated’ water mixed with ‘Enos’ fruit salts. Phyllis recalled their Christmas dinner: I can never forget Christmas dinner – sour tripe and white sauce – oh, it was sour! The children found camp life interesting. Phyllis remembers the Ueno Acrobatic Troupe practising walking up stairs on their hands while balancing a stool on their feet and tight rope walking. Before war broke out the Troupe had travelled with Wirth’s Circus. In addition to regular concerts, movie nights and sports competitions, there were picnics two or three times a year at Waranga Reservoir where the internees picked mushrooms and collected mussels and yabbies. The education of children was an important part of camp life. There were 361 Japanese children at Tatura. Phyllis’ youngest sister, Takeko, was born in the camp. The internees were required to form a committee to manage each compound. Phyllis’s father replaced Albert Ueno, acrobat, as Leader of B Compound. Leaders tended to be older, competent in English and socially prominent. When Haruyoshi became ill, Phyllis, still a teenager, had to take over his role. She recalled: It was a lesson in life … I always say ‘Never give in’. I tell my children the same thing. Today Phyllis lives in the Japanese Club building on Thursday Island. She married William Ah Loy in 1950. William continued the family tradition of involvement in the pearling industry and his first pearling lugger was the Nobby. He employed Islanders as divers, many of whom had learnt their skills from the Japanese before World War II.
|
|
||
