Diary+Entry+1+-+January+4th+1937



My family told me to be home schooled. Just like everyday I was studying with my mother. She was teaching me about how Americans and Europeans started the war by making a un fair trade with Japan. They started to invade other countries in Asia and getting their resources away. Japan needed to find a way to defeat those Americans and Europeans, which was to invade countries in East Asia. As I was learning about this my mother said, “Just because of their economy problems they had ( great depression ) they are also making us suffer”. But I thought that Japan is also going to act like Americans and Europeans if we also invade other countries. I thought that I should question this to my mother since my dad is an officer who is working in China. My father Minoru Oda was always worried that he has to leave us in Japan. He wants to take us with him, but my mother disagreed with him because it will be to dangerous for me since I am only 9 years old. I felt that as I was growing up I was learning about different propagandas from my mother.  Recently my mother seemed very depressed. She received a message that my dad was part of Roko Bridge ( Marco Polo Bridge ). I was also shocked to, I saw pictures of war, it was horrible. I couldn’t believe that he was part of the war. It was when I was really young, invasion of Manchuria in 1931 and now we are going to have war with China. Going to war with China and being aggressive with Russia? I just think that Japan is becoming more like Western. Although I do not like the fact that my Father is a part of the war, one thing I appreciated about my dad is his occupation in China. Because of this, our family got a lot of respect. I heard my mother talking to herself what is going to happen with the attack of Roko Bridge with Soviet Union. She said that Soviet Union is going to be against Japan even more in World War II because of this event. With all this, it confused me that whether all western countries are against Japan and mother said some countries are allied with Japan. With this segment I was very confused, some countries are allied with Japan and some are not. However this is not important, important thing is that I heard about Russia’s massive land, they seem to be strong. I just hope that my father will be safe and does not go to battle any more. I don’t want to say this but if my father dies then our family will die. I just think that going to war is just corrupting Japan and making Japan fall in to a war like other European countries that did it for themselves.