The boy raced through the jungle, legs pumping as fast as they could, heart pounding within his chest in counterpoint; Lush tropical leaves whipped at his face and arms, vines and tree roots did their best to trip him, tug him to the ground, ensnare him...And the then the ground did come up to hit him in the face and his eyes saw nothing but the blinding flash, his body responding with pain. How could the ground come up to smash him in the face, he thought. No, it was his face that fell to the ground, he had fallen, through fatigue or the thick jungle vines he knew not.
Tears ran down his brown face as he struggled to find his feet, and then strong hands pulled him up roughly, an ungentle push to his back urged him forward, deeper into the forest.
The boy ran the best he could, bare feet slapping the ground, slipping and sliding, as he followed the dark figures ahead of him deeper and deeper into the dense jungle. Five minutes ago he was sleeping in the room he shared with his two brothers but the sirens wailed and he was woken in a shock; Run! his father had shouted - And he did, like life itself rested on it and he knew, of course, that it actually did.
The drone of engines rumbled overhead as hundreds of planes slowly made their way across the sky, white condensation trails following in their wake; He couldn't see them through the jungle canopy now, but he knew they were there. His mother told him so and so he ran. src
From the direction of his home he could hear the faint calls of the soldiers and then the loud crack of the guns, muted explosions coming from overhead. Thud. Thud. Thud.
He had heard the British soldiers call them "AA guns" but he didn't know what that meant. All he knew was that the British were firing upwards towards the planes overhead and the planes were full of bombs they'd drop downwards...And that he was running for his life. He didn't understand a lot about it, but he knew how to run. He was the fastest runner in school and now he applied all that speed despite the fatigue he felt, the fear.
The small group ahead of him slowed to a stop and he almost ran headlong into his older brother who had stopped, puffing and panting, eyes also wide with fear. He was panting heavily as well and his legs burned almost as much as his face did from being whipped by the jungle during the headlong rush from the village they called home. The boy started to cry, it seemed the right thing to do. Tears streamed down his face revealing clean brown skin as they washed away the mud from his fall earlier. He could hear his mother asking his father if they were far enough away; The answer came back, I don't know. He heard something in his father's voice, something he hadn't heard before...It sounded like uncertainty and he felt bad for his father who was always a solid rock of a man emotionally. He came to understand it as fear a little later, but now it perplexed the little brown boy with streaks of mud on his face.
The jungle seemed eerily quiet this far from the village. The sound of the British AA guns were a low but constant boom, boom, boom, still ever-present, but muffled by distance and the trees...And then a new sound reached his ears...A whistling sound, high pitched, like the wind whistling in the trees, but also different...Closer in came...Closer, louder...The boy looked up to his father and opened his mouth to ask what the sound was...
The bomb slid easily from it's rack within the belly of the bomber rolling lazily past the open bomb-bay doors and into the sky. It wasn't alone as the bomber disgorged its lethal cargo into the skies above Malaya. It fell downwards towards the dark jungle below, whistling, the fuse spinning, awaiting its moment to detonate. It struck a tree on the way down breaking off branches and deflecting away from its original path and... src
...But before the young boy could utter the questioning words to his father something crashed in the tree tops somewhere behind and above the boy, branches breaking and snapping...And then his fathers' face, turned down towards him, lit up, white, yellow, red and the boy's head exploded with the loudest noise he had heard in his life. He felt his body pushed forward through the air toward his father, a rag doll thrown by some giant hand. Fire. Everything was on fire. Heat, noise, wind...He couldn't breathe...And then nothing.
...The bomb eventually found the earth and buried itself deep in the forest floor made soft by the recent downpours, the fuse spun still...And then...BOOM!
The boy was running again, he didn't know why. How. He felt someone holding his hand, pulling, almost dragging him. What was that noise in his head, that ringing sound? Why couldn't he hear anything else? And then a tree exploded to his left and another ahead of him...
The year is 1941, World War Two rages and the mighty Japanese Army march almost unopposed down the Malayan Peninsular towards their goal of Singapore. The little boy above is my five year old father running for his life with his two older brothers, mother and father and various other's from their village.
The British defenders bravely fight on, firing their AA (Anti-aircraft guns) upwards at the Japanese bombers who are heavily bombing the area prior to their ground forces marching in to mop-up. My father and his family ran into the jungle that night and many to follow, to escape the bombs that would be dropped onto the British defenders and would at times spend days in there, eating whatever they could find: Lizards, leaves and roots. Usually nothing.
His village, indeed all of Malaya (now Malaysia) and Singapore would eventually fall to the Japanese and he would live under their iron-will and strict rules observing terrible things and suffering unimaginable hardship. He would live through the Japanese Occupation though until they surrender to the Allies in 1945 - He was 9 years old then.
Born in Malaysia in 1936 my dad [and his family] came face-to-face with the brutality of war in 1941 and he would see many horrific things in the 4 years he lived under Japanese rule. My father would not talk about those years very often when I was a kid but over the last several years has opened up some more about it which I'm very grateful for. Unfortunately these days at almost 82 years old (now 83) he suffers dementia and at times doesn't remember me. However I remember his stories and want to share some with the steemit community. It's odd, he struggles to recall who I am, what he had for lunch, and yet can still speak Japanese learned at school during the Occupation and remember some other details.
My father immigrated to Australia in 1965, met my Australian mum and the rest is history as they say, however the memories of this period of his life never faded from his memory. Some are good memories, most are not. They're brutal in their reality, and it seems surreal that my father lived through them. This is my first attempt at writing down some of his memories and I'm not sure if I did a good job however hopefully whoever reads this can use their imagination and fill in the blanks that my limited writing ability has left. I don't have the skill to take you there with my words and I only hope I do my father's stories some justice.
You can find the original 1148-word post here, written and posted by me on 25th February 2018. This post comprises 1398 words and has been reworked and reposted for the @nonameslefttouse #showcase-sunday concept. See the intro post here. I suggest you read it as he set some guidelines and a simple copy-paste of an old post is probably not legit.
Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default
Glad I kept on reading...... As it was a true story. A personal story. Good Stuff..!!
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Yep, thanks for doing so. So few actually read posts around here and I think they maybe missing out on a lot.
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Well done, my friend...you did fine, bringing this story to us from the memory of your father.
Thanks mate. 😊
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Absolutely moving, @galenkp. I love that you're taking the time and making the effort to learn more about your father's experience and committing it to written history.
I've heard snippets, bits, and pieces from various family members, but I wish I had been able to coax more stories from my grandma about her WWII experience in Japanese-occupied Manila.
Japan's effort in the Second World War affected many including Australia direct which was bombed hundreds of times (Darwin). I think any who had to live under their occupation suffered greatly.
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Justice indeed done I believe mate. This reminds me of things my grandfather would very rarely tell me about his time in WW2 he was in the medical core going out into the field to collect the wounded etc and bring them out. He was a big strong man so was very capable at picking them up and extracting them and often in the heat of battle with bullets etc going past. One time he said he was crouched down by a tree waiting to spring out to pick someone up and a bullet lodged in the tree just missing him by about 1mm.
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Much respect for corpsmen and stretcher-bearers. Must have been brave souls to place themselves in such danger in aid of others. I'm not sure I could have done it to be honest.
Indeed mate very brave people and putting them selves into such dangerous situations to rescue other brave men.
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That’s dementia. My grandmother can regale me with stories from ages ago but I don’t think she actually remembers my name (she at least knows I’m her grandchild).
Those war periods really don’t sound enjoyable 😖
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My mind can come up with some interesting thoughts from time to time but honestly, I can't even imagine what that must have been like. The story does paint a picture though and seeing it like that puts me in a silent mode. Something to think about.
Dad used to tell stories and until I was a little older and understood the whole picture from those days through my own historical research it didn't hit home. I have two more in that series which I will also feature on a Sunday.
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Sadly I know all too well the fear on children faces and the damage done even if they are physically unharmed. Thank you for sharing this again. Your words painted a vivid picture of his struggle that ultimately resulted in your birth whether or not the war influence his decision to immigrate or not. It's a part of who you are its part of your creation and existence. Thanks again, I don't know if your father was able to read this or not but you do him a great honor.
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Thanks mate. No dad didn't read this. Went to see him yesterday and he wasn't having a good day. This was written off stories he'd told me over the years and whilst he didn't go talking about it much he would sometimes, and in quite a lot of detail. Always with much sadness.
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What an incredible and terrible story your father lived. I'm glad he shared some with you. Btw, I think you did a great job of presenting it; I was there, in the jungle, hearing those AA guns BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM - pop pop pop pop crackle - BOOM BOOM.