Artist Statement
As my grandmother and her friends have begun getting older, they have thought increasingly about their personal histories and that of their parents, especially surrounding World War II. My great-grandparents, like so many others, seldom talked about that dark and upsetting period of their life once it was behind them and, as a result, much of their stories have died with them. My grandmother and her friends feared their narratives being lost and going untold, and so some months ago, they came to the decision to write their experiences down.
My grandmother wrote a detailed account of her life in Manila and sent it to me. In discussing oral histories of Filipina women born before World War II, Angela Castilla argues that "the process of telling a story is the process of creating identity" (6). For this reason, I have decided to leave my grandmother's writing entirely unedited and complete, so that her story is told purely in her own voice exactly as she recalls it. I have divided her writing into sections that can be paired with illustrations drawn by myself in order to visualize her oral history as a collaboration between grandmother and granddaughter.
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For this project, I wanted wanted help visualize a narrative I have never seen depicted in American media while exploring both the historical and the personal. In this process, I have sifted through hundreds of historical photographs in an attempt to create images that are simultaneously historically accurate and grounded in an aesthetic unique to my personal style. I have done this in the hopes of achieving a balance between learning as complete and accurate a context as possible surrounding my grandmother’s story while also allowing myself to explore my own personal history and connect with my grandma’s past in a much more intimate way than I ever have before. The creative element of this project was a much greater undertaking than I had originally realized. Rather than scale my plan back to something more manageable, I’ve decided to make it an ongoing project that I will continue to build on and add to over time.
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I want the end result to be something personal that I can share with my grandmother, but also to have the potential to be shared with others. This project has been an emotional experience for me, but it has also made me realize how important it is that stories like my grandmother’s be told and not remain invisible or be forgotten.
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This project is ongoing. All photographs serve as placeholders for illustrations to be added as I complete them.
Carmen's Story
My story begins the day I was born. It was July 16, 1938. My family was living on the island of Luzon on a neighborhood street in Manila. The street was populated of residents consisting of Filipinos, Americans and European citizens. We were all living peaceful lives.
The Philippine Islands were beautiful islands and consisted of three main island groups, Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. They dotted the warm, blue North Pacific Ocean and were covered with palm trees, coconut trees and beautiful flowers and foliage. They had beautiful beaches. Manila was a beautiful cosmopolitan city located on the main island of Luzon.
Then on December 8, 1941 the Japanese bombed the Philippines about 9 hours after bombing Pearl Harbor on December 7. Filipino and American forces were caught unready and the invasion of Luzon began. The invasion happened on December 24, 1941. This happened the day after President Manuel Quezon declared Manila an "open city". The president did this to help prevent the destruction of Manila. On January 2, 1942 Japanese troops captured Manila. All American and British citizens were ordered to remain in their homes.
Shortly after, the Japanese started arresting both the American and British citizens on the island. They were transported to Santo Tomas which was formerly a university. Santo Tomas became a walled compound of about 48 acres in size consisting of university buildings surrounded by tall iron fences.
My father had been a civil engineer and taught at Santo Tomas as a substitute teacher prior to the war. As an interesting side note, he helped design and build the defense tunnels in Corregidor. I was only about 3-1/2 years old when the Japanese came to our house and took my father away to Santo Tomas. It was a frightening and deeply sad experience for me. I remember hugging the pajamas he had just taken off because it still had his smell. I don't remember for how long I did this. Worried that my sister and I would be sent to an internment camp my mother devised a story and told the Japanese that Josephine and I were not American mestizas but rather Spanish mestizas. Fortunately they believed her and as a result we were spared being sent to an internment camp.
Approximately 7,000 people were residents of Santo Tomas. The internees were diverse. There were bankers, engineers, business executives, plantation owners, waiters, beachcombers, missionaries, nuns and priests as well as wives and children. The Japanese did not provide food to the internees. The food at the camp was purchased with loans from the Red Cross and donations from individuals. The internees also grew some of their own food with gardens. I remember visiting my father through the iron fences of the fenced compound of Santo Tomas and bringing him food, money and medicines.
As the war progressed living conditions in Santo Tomas worsened and the Japanese became oppressive and even brutal in many instances. By the end of 1943 there was no meat in any of the kitchens of Santo Tomas. People on the outside were forbidden to visit the internees and contact with the outside world was not permitted at all. We could no longer visit and see my father. We could no longer bring him food, clothing or medicines. It was a very trying time for my father and for us as well. Food shortages at the camp became very serious and provisions extremely inadequate. The internees suffered weight loss, weakness, edema, beriberi and other threatening health conditions. My father lost an extraordinary amount of weight during the three years that he was interned. From January 1942 to March 1945 there were 390 deaths in Santo Tomas mostly due to malnutrition and starvation.
By this time Manila was constantly burning as the Japanese burned almost all of Manila and there were fierce bombings as well. Manila was in total ruin. Our home was also burned. Today, I have inherited a cast iron skillet that somehow survived the burning of our home and it was the only item that was saved. I really treasure that skillet!
My mother retreated to the province where she was told it was much safer from the Japanese oppression. Here food was more plentiful as well since the farms were here. The province also provided work for her to support her 2 girls as well as her brothers and their families. She and I lived in the province with people she knew who had access to farm products like coffee, eggs and rice. My sister lived with my mother’s brother, Uncle Tiquio, and his family in their humble home in Manila.
My mother would hand carry these products on foot from the province to Manila where it was sold or traded in the markets. It was a long and arduous travel of about two days and sleeping only where she could find safe shelter for a few hours. The travel was always accompanied by bombings all along the way and many times she was the only survivor amongst a group of travelers. She would also bring these foods to Uncle Tiquio, his family and my sister. Mama would stay with them upon accomplishing her mission of selling and bartering the farm products and resting awhile until she felt strong enough to trek back to the province. I would be left in the province with her farm friends until her return. I was always so overjoyed upon her return and that she came back alive! I remember her telling stories of her ordeals as she traveled, of enduring the bombings and seeing so many of her fellow travelers killed and injured. Sometimes she was the only survivor in the group.
The Japanese took away all means of transportation. At first doctors were allowed to keep their transportation but after a while they were also taken away. I do remember one night in the province when we were awakened and told by the Japanese to go to the Catholic Church in the town. We hurried to the church still in our night clothes, I'm sure accompanied by Japanese soldiers with their bayonets. The Japanese took the men and God only knows what happened to them. The women and children were taken to the church and locked inside. Their intention was to burn the church with the women and children inside. But the American forces started bombing the area and the Japanese troops fled leaving the women and children free to leave and go back to our homes. Our lives were spared.
On February 3, 1945 at 8:40 p.m. the internees at Santo Tomas heard the sound of tanks, grenades, and rifle fire near the front wall of Santo Tomas. The Americans had come! A small American force had come to liberate the prisoners of war and the internment camps in the Philippines due to the belief that the Japanese would massacre all the prisoners both military and civilian. The total number of internees liberated at Santo Tomas was 3,785 of which 2,870 were Americans and most of the remainder were British. The evacuation of the internees began on February 11, 1945. The near starvation of so many saw 48 people die within the compound in February of that year. My father left Santo Tomas that day. He was so emaciated and so skinny and weak he could barely walk. He didn't know where to go but he just started walking the streets of Manila and couldn't believe the vast destruction of the city. After seeing all this destruction he did not know where his family could be and whether they were even alive.
The news of the American forces coming to liberate the Philippines also reached us in the provinces. We knew Japanese oppression would be severe and possibly deadly. My mother and I fled to the hills and out in the farms. I remember seeing uniformed soldiers and became absolutely terrified. The sight of a uniformed soldier brought terror to me! But they were American soldiers who were offering candies and gum!
When my mother heard the news that liberation could be near she hurried to Manila with me. When she heard the news that Santo Tomas was being liberated she also started to walk the streets of Manila toward Santo Tomas. My mother and father ran into each other in the street! The joy and happiness and thanksgiving of seeing each other alive was overwhelming! My sister and I were in our Uncle Tiquio's house with him and his family as we awaited the news.