By Joel Guinto and Virma Simonette BBC correspondents from Singapore and Manila
July 15, 2023
image copyrightVirma Simonette/BBC
image captiontext,
Pilar Garland (right) and his sister-in-law Maria.
When Pilar Galang entered a room full of women in their eighties on crutches, she suddenly couldn’t remember why she was wearing her favorite floral dress. The 88-year-old glanced at her sister-in-law, Maria Quilantang, and it was a cue that brought her memory back. The two women once again attended a WWII-era gathering of “comfort women,” women who were forced into military brothels operated by Japanese troops in Korea, the Philippines, Taiwan, China and Indonesia during World War II.
In Mapaniqui, a rural village in the Philippines, there are about 20 women who are the last comfort women survivors in the Philippines.
As children, they were taken from their homes, dragged along dusty roads into a red house, and repeatedly raped by Japanese soldiers. Now in their 80s or 90s, they are still fighting for a public apology and compensation from Japan.
But these aspirations have been elusive for decades.
They tell their trauma to anyone who will listen, hoping that even as their memories fade, the world will not forget them.
At that time they numbered nearly 200,000 people, mostly Koreans. In South Korea, their number has now been reduced to nine. Taiwan’s last known comfort woman survivor died in May. Japan’s refusal to confront its wartime past and pay reparations has been a source of tension between the country and its neighbors.
In a 1951 peace treaty with Japan, the Philippines agreed to waive its claim to wartime reparations. The Philippines, Japan’s main source of development aid, has been reluctant to put pressure on Tokyo, despite the former comfort women’s denial.
image copyrightVirma Simonette/BBC
image captiontext,
Many local women were taken from their homes, dragged along dusty roads into a red house, and repeatedly raped by Japanese troops.
“We want justice before we die,” Maria, the most outspoken “leader” of the comfort women claiming, told the BBC. “There are only a few of us left, and we are all in our twilight years.”
On a sweltering afternoon, the group calling themselves “Malaya Lolas” (grandmothers of freedom) came together in Filipino fashion to sing the story of their lives in slow a cappella verse.
“We wept, we begged for a little sympathy. Their savage hearts only longed for satisfaction. When I was 14, I was viciously violated…” the group sang.
Maria started cracking jokes to put the other grandmothers at ease. She told them that singing in front of an audience is no different from singing karaoke. Moreover, chewing betel nut can relieve all anxiety.
After that, she got serious. She was raped when she was eight years old in that red house in the middle of the rice fields. To this day, the pain floods her every time she sees the house from across the highway. For, the dilapidated house is still standing there, and now attracts the ghostly curious and some historians.
In the village where these grandmothers lived, there are still many dilapidated houses from the World War II era. The village, located in the town of Candaba, two hours north of the capital Manila, is rich in duck eggs and farming crucian carp, now less known for its dark wartime past.
image captiontext,
Maria said the disaster took away her childhood, a good education and a happy family life that she could have had.
Maria told the BBC that other everyday mundane events can also trigger memories of her past. When she sees the rain-soaked soil, she recalls that during her captivity, her only source of drinking water was water from the deep footprints left by the buffaloes that plowed the rice fields.
“We carry a pretty heavy burden,” she said.
“But I had a lot of dreams as a child”
Maria said that the disaster took away her childhood, a good education and a happy family life that she could have had, but her father died in the war: I could have worn beautiful clothes and become a cute little girl. Instead, we kept moving and were always afraid of the Japanese. “
However, she considers herself lucky that she married a farmer and started a family. Many other Filipino comfort women suffered discrimination in their communities and their own families.
image copyrightVirma Simonette/BBC
image captiontext,
Ms. Crews: At 94, she is one of the oldest members of the comfort women group.
Ms. Maxima dela Cruz also wanted very much to attend the party that afternoon, but she could not because she was bedridden. At 94, she is one of the oldest members of the group.
From the window of her home, she watches the idyllic days go by in the town of Mapaniki. In her youth, she was one of the most vocal supporters of “Grandma Liberty”.
“I’ve been to so many protests. I’ve been to Japan, Hong Kong, even Europe,” she said.
“Lawyers helped us get to these places. Although my body is now weak, everything is still clear to me and deeply imprinted in my mind.”
image copyrightVirma Simonette/BBC
image captiontext,
The village has a painful history.
After the war, Cruz said, she was forced to work and was unable to go to school because she had to help out on her parents’ farm. When she got married at 16, she vividly remembers the family sharing a whole chicken instead of having a wedding feast.
“It would be great if Japan could give us a little bit of living expenses,” she said.
For the “grandmothers of liberty,” remembering the past has always been a spiritual sustenance, their lawyer Virginia Suarez told reporters.
“It was very liberating for them to tell their story in song. When you go through what they went through, you can’t keep silent. Because that would be extra torture,” Suarez added.
Japan insists that Filipino women seeking compensation must have the support of the Philippine government. “Grandma Liberty” has made relevant demands to the Philippine government and even appealed to the Supreme Court, but failed.
add text to video,
In 2019, South Korea released the earliest known video of comfort women
The “free grandmothers” filed a complaint with the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), which ruled in March that Manila must compensate the grandmothers and publicly apologize for decades of suffering and discrimination. .
“This is a symbolic moment of triumph for these victims of the Philippines’ past who were silenced, ignored, ignored and erased from history,” said Marion Bessel, member of the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women ( Marion Bethel said.
Lawyer Suarez said since the CEDAW ruling, government agencies have issued thousands of pesos in aid to her clients. But she added that they will never stop fighting for an apology from Japan.
image captiontext,
Another former comfort woman from the Philippines.
“The apology is really important to ‘Grandma Liberty’ because it’s an acknowledgment of wrongdoing,” she said.
She also emphasized, “Japan has committed a very serious crime against them. The world should not forget this, and Japan should pay the price for it.”
For Maria, their battle will continue as long as someone is willing to listen. “We’re a very close group of friends and there’s a lot of people helping us. We want justice. As long as we’re invited, we’ll keep singing.”
#Comfort #women #Dont #forget #survivors #Japanese #sex #slavery #WWII #BBC #News #中文
2023-07-15 08:39:28
