Diary of the 1940 Japan America Student Conference

by:
James J. Halsema

Follow this link for photos of Jim and his parents.

In the spring of 1940 at the age of 21, I graduated from Duke University and prepared to return, despite my father’s opposition, to my home, the Philippines. My parents had retired in Baguio, its former summer capital, at the end of a 30-year career in Philippine Government service, during which my father served 17 years as Mayor and City Engineer of Baguio. My father felt that I should seek a career in the United States rather than return to the Philippines, which I considered home.

At Duke one of my young professors was Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger. Paul’s youth had largely paralleled mine. His father, an American judge in the Philippines, became involved in the Chinese Nationalist movement and went on to be the principal advisor to Sun Yat-sen. In 1940, Duke had few ties to East Asia. Oriental students were so rare as to be discriminated for rather than against. Paul became one of my closest friends, for we had shared the student plight of being considered an oddball by our peers. Duke’s obsession with football consumed most student argument; we argued foreign policy. We agreed that lacking any real American interest in the Orient, the Roosevelt administration was free to do – or not do – whatever it wanted in the area.

One day Paul asked if I would like to be Duke’s delegate to the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. Begun in 1934, the annual meeting sites alternated between the two countries. Ostensibly sponsored by universities, the Japanese government undoubtedly had a strong role. The 1940 conference would meet in Japan. During my junior and senior years I’d urged my classmates to apply for tour scholarships offered by the Germans and Italians as part of their country’s efforts to win American sympathy. “Sure,” I’d said, “You’ll be fed a lot of propaganda, but think of all the free travel, food and drink you’ll get.” Japanese scholarships offered no travel costs outside Japan, but my own homeward steamship passage was to be via Japan anyway. With no job commitments, why not apply? I had no real competition for the slot since only one other senior was interested in the Orient, and his grade was too low to be considered. It was easy to accept the offer.

With three classmates as paying passengers in my Buick, we drove cross-country on two-lane back roads, including a stretch of dirt track through Monument Valley in Utah, to the west coast. After ten sybaritic days at the southern California beach resort, Balboa Island, I went on to San Francisco to ship my car to Manila and rendezvous with the rest of the American delegation.

The delegation of 58 came mostly from prestige schools on the Pacific Coast; a handful from east of the Rockies. Two delegates, Kay Kitagawa and Kay Uchida, were Nisei, Japanese born in America. Earlier groups had more Nisei, since they were actively recruited by students from Japan. Several in our delegation had attended the Sixth Conference in 1939 at the University of Southern California. Stanford University had the largest number of student delegates, and, since Edmund W. Pugh, Jr. served as Conference Executive Chairman, its eight-person delegation tended to dominate.

I felt intimidated until I suddenly realized that I had more East Asia experience than most of my colleagues; my experience began at the age of five months. In June 1919, a U.S. Army transport took my seasick mother, my sister and me via Vladivostok to rejoin my father in Baguio. In later years mother recounted the ship refueling in Nagasaki, where women carried coal aboard in baskets supported by tump lines over their foreheads. Baguio in the 20’s had a resident population of a thousand Japanese, and several of its stores were Japanese-owned. Japanese women barbers cut my hair and the barbershop had thick magazines I couldn’t read, but which were illustrated with fascinating drawings of long-ago samurai in elaborate armor. In 1940, my most recent visit to Japan had been in 1938 en route to my one and only college summer vacation at home in Baguio. That summer, my Kobe “sex store” purchases gained me prestige with my North Carolina fraternity brothers. Although in 1940 I was familiar with recent events in East Asia, I spoke no Japanese and knew little of Japan or its culture. My only contacts had been at Pacific ports and on a train trip from Kobe to Yokohama.

We sailed June 23, 1940 from San Francisco on the Asama Maru, one of the largest and best of Japan’s passenger liners. The traditional departure, replete with streamers thrown to friends on the pier, music by the ship’s orchestra and blasts of the ship’s whistle, had become unique in a world torn by war. I shared #260, a small second-class cabin with two double-decked bunks. My cabin roommates were Jack Baird of USC, a stout pedantic graduate student who ran the university library circulation desk and was accustomed to telling younger people what to do; Donald Earl McInnis of UCLA, “the kid” who was proud of “not drinking, not smoking, not chewing and not going with the boys who do”; and Harold Clifton Gould, McInnis’s antithesis. Baird was easier to get along with than I had first feared.

Among the passengers, was a group of 54 Nisei who were being given a tour of a land in which most of them would not understand the language or customs any more than I. One husky 6’ 2″ Sacramento High School football player complained: “They feed us rice all the time. I’d sure like to get my hands on a good steak.” Our cabin “boy”, Uchida-san, was a quick little fellow who wakened us at 7 a.m., collected laundry, cleaned the social hall and sneaked an occasional beer with us. I made friends with Leo Goldberg, a pleasant New Yorker with a neatly trimmed mustache, who exported Kobe products. A great talker with a smooth manner, he knew his way around the Orient and got along in the way Americans who live there get along if they expect to stay there very long.

We spent the usual day in Honolulu, which seemed the same old place of my first remembered visit in 1927. People on the mainland think of Hawaii in romantic terms. In reality Honolulu is a fairly pleasant town where, with proper friends, I felt it might be good for a summer or two. In July 1940 my main concerns were shopping, the heat and the remarkable combination of races, all of whom in the second generation spoke, acted and dressed 102% American. A Hawaiian bus driver explained with amused tolerance and simple English to a kimono and geta-clad Japanese woman how to get to the Asama Maru to bid farewell to her friends, then turned to glance at the rest of us as if to say: “These foreigners!” We had a drink at the pink-stuccoed Royal Hawaiian Hotel on Waikiki Beach, a touristy clip joint equipped with beautiful lawns and trees, dance instructors and shops selling Philippine-made ukeleles. Lunched at a Chinese restaurant, also a clip joint. Wesley Fishel and I spent the afternoon touring Honolulu and its eastern suburbs beyond Diamond Head by bus. Many fine homes surround the fortified point and farther out, frame farmhouses and a golf course.

While we crossed an almost empty ocean, momentous events were taking place in Europe and our own country. The ship radio receiver for passengers was “out of order,” but having sold radios in my high school days, it was easy to restore the antenna connection with a screwdriver. En route to Honolulu, we picked up the news of Wendell Willkie’s nomination from KNX in Los Angeles. The ship’s radio was irreparable after we left Hawaii but Eduardo Zabarete, a Manila accountant, had a small Emerson battery set. By straining our ears, we could hear Honolulu stations telling of the evacuation of Hong Kong by Americans and British dependents because of Japanese encirclement of the colony. I asked myself: “Will Britain fight if Japan seizes the rock? And where would that leave us?” I tried deliberately not giving much thought to the matter but eventually decided it would be a while before the Japanese made any actual move against the colony. I believed they would wait until Britain was beaten by Germany—if and when such a dreadful thing happened. The white man’s loss is Japan’s gain, as Germany learned during the last world mess. I still found it hard to realize that France was finished as an independent nation. Only a few weeks before, any magazine would have said it had a long way to go yet. No France! Strange, but not overwhelmingly so.

Familiar trans-Pacific trip activities. Played quoits with Emmajean Doddridge, the perky, pleasant blonde delegate from Earlham College in Indiana, and Walter E. “Ted” Winebrenner, who, like me, had college newspaper experience. Both were engaged to be married when they returned home. Another congenial companion was Ted Guenther, a vague cousin of the author of Inside Europe. A group of Germans returning home via Siberia was very friendly too.

Observed lost Date Line Day (July 3) and Independence Day with a student party. Had a flag-raising ceremony on the sun deck and games in the afternoon. Cabin 260’s contribution was a two-story mama with two squalling brats, put together with curtains, towels and sheets and a large quantity of pins provided by a willing but baffled Uchida. I wore an enormous diaper. On the second round Harold Gould, the lower story, collapsed, and we could only watch the others compete. Later dozed in the sun thinking of the States nostalgically in ways that to most seem superficial but to me and Paul Linebarger were integral parts of our culture: chewing gum and Coca-Colas, fine plumbing, concrete highways, easy intimacy between men and women, crisp morning newspapers full of comics and pictures, the friendliness of people on country roads, Florida in the winter sun, Radio City’s magic towers, the filling simplicity of a Middle Western meal, self-criticism, radio variety shows… As we sailed west and north the weather turned foggy and considerably cooler.

We arrived at Yokohama on Monday, July 8 on a hot, humid morning. An approaching storm was heralded by strong winds that brought a heavy mist over the blue peninsulas. At 7 a.m., our expected arrival time, we were still wallowing in heavy Pacific water. At Yokohama by 11 a.m. and was irritated by having baggage, money, tobacco and books minutely inspected on a crowded, non-air conditioned ship before we were allowed ashore. At least we didn’t all have to provide stool samples as travelers from Asian points where required to do on my 1938 trip.

Finally, cleared by the suspicious customs officers, we struggled through milling crowds to be met by our Japanese male counterparts, in black uniforms, white collars and visored caps, who would be our hosts henceforth. They took us by taxi to the station. Although the first right turn into the bustling left-hand traffic gave the usual surprise, the first Asian city I had seen in two years otherwise did not seem strange or foreign. We went to Tokyo on a swaying, bumpy interurban trolley through continuous urban areas, seeing not rice fields but electric transmission lines and straphangers in kimonos. We glimpsed little shops, passed by both paper houses and functionalist modern factories.

In Tokyo we changed to the Seibu Line for a long ride to Kokubunji in what were then the distant suburbs of Tokyo, where we took a charcoal gas-powered bus to Tsuda Women’s college, where the Conference was held. We were quartered in concrete single room dormitories. The big Westerners had problems fitting into Japanese doorways and beds and squatting on Japanese toilets. We found the meals meager. It was mid-summer but not even electric fans were provided.

The hundred-odd Japanese delegates, who greatly outnumbered us, were friendly and very pleasant despite the increasing tensions between our governments. Some spoke excellent English; others had accents difficult to understand. We got together in the village our first evening for a bit of sake, rice wine served hot in small cups from small earthen bottles.

It soon became obvious that we were going to be spending much of our time being shown famous sights and model institutions. We saw no factories except those making household products. On Tuesday morning we went into Tokyo on a narrow asphalt road lined with thick trees and houses close to the pavement. We rode with three buses, whose charcoal fuel so reduced their engine power that they barely crawled up grades. Just as in the U.S., many streets were torn up for utility line repairs.

Our first stop was a ceremonial visit to the gates of the Imperial Palace, where we were lined up to make a small bow while being officially photographed. We were not allowed to take pictures ourselves. Groups of schoolgirls in middy blouses marched past us, watched by policemen with white-topped hats standing on every corner.

Next we visited Nagatamachi, a model primary school aided by Rockefeller Foundation funds, whose classrooms rivaled mine at Duke, but whose bathrooms had the familiar stink. We saw children, many wearing eyeglasses, poring over and laboriously copying samples of characters. Much of the classroom work involved recitation in unison. Other students were doing the same kinds of artwork as eight year-old Americans. The kindly, chubby-faced, mustached principal beamed as a six foot four American gave some of his pupils rides on his shoulders.

After what seemed like hours of tramping around, we lunched at Tokyo Imperial University and were impressed by its large library with attached coffee rooms, modeled on Harvard’s Widener Library. In a brief talk, Professor Takayanagi Kenzo reminded us that modern Japan is founded on a strong foundation of feudalism.

Returned to Tsuda College for the official opening of the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. A banquet in the gymnasium was followed by a speech emphasizing that the Japanese were the way they are because it is not for an individual to question “Why?” to the world around him. They must obey the commands of their parents, teachers, and leaders.

Finished a long day in a Japanese bath, begun with a diaper of water to clean off, followed by immersion in a large circular tub filled with very hot water into which I lowered myself very gingerly, gently burning. No unisex bathing here.

Decided in a round table Wednesday that the major difference between the American and Japanese educational system lies in our varying concept of what the nation is. A Japanese girl compared Japan to a mother who tells her children what they must do. Most of the Japanese students say they do not resent government censorship or “thought control.” Three delegates particularly impressed me: Naoto Ii of Waseda University, Bill Root from the University of Washington, and Kotaro Tsuda of Yokohama Commercial Institute. The women of both countries are either being shy or don’t know very much about world politics.

After lunch we went into Tokyo central station by electric suburban train, a route that has tunnels and crosses canals and that is already becoming familiar. I stood in the front car watching the shiny narrow rails click by station platforms, sidings, frogs, switches, substations just like any other electric suburban railway in the States or Europe. We walked a long distance along streets bare of traffic to the unique low buff modernism of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Imperial Hotel. Its ceilings seem to have been built for Japanese-statured guests. I find the building dark and confining. We dined in style with music at the New Grand Hotel’s air-conditioned roof garden. Most of the American students made boors of themselves, jumping up to look at the sunset. Later, on the Ginza, Ted Winebrenner and I ditched the rest and wandered by ourselves, ending at a beer hall with a geisha serving us excellent draft beer. She and her colleagues were intrigued by my size 11 shoes. Apparently no tips are accepted. Returned on a late evening train. To judge by their snores and florid complexions, several of our fellow passengers has more than enough to drink after they left their offices. They don’t hold their liquor well.

We hold roundtable meetings in the college library, which is uncomfortably hot and humid. We argued the concept of patriotism: in Japan admiration for one’s country is a moral matter not open for questioning. We agreed with the proposition that “science is unlimited; it’s the scientists that are limited.” I was struck by a casual reference to the Philippines, a Commonwealth scheduled for independence in 1946, as a country whose future guarantees unspecified “changing conditions.” The sticky heat and lowering drizzle reminded me of Manila, and I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll be able to cope with its climate again.

When we went into town that afternoon and the others, we were constantly accompanied by male Japanese students. Apparently we’re not supposed to wander around by ourselves. Why? Because the police have a hard time shadowing 58 foreign students in they go their separate ways. We had time for drinks at the Imperial, followed by a tempura (batter fried seafood) snack with chop sticks, rice bowls and little dishes of horse radish, soy sauce and pickles, plus green tea in a hole in the wall called a cha-mise, which translates as “tea shop.” Walked down the Ginza shopping district, looking into Mitsukoshi Department Store. Its attractive displays included much artificial fiber clothing and magnificently packed but smelly preserved fish. Drank foaming steins at the very German-looking Lion Beer Hall, whose murals displayed Nazi peasant girls carrying similar steins. Dinner at Lohmeyer’s restaurant was pleasantly filling. Ach, du lieber!

Among our fellow passengers on the Asama was the staff of the Italian Consulate General in New York, who had been expelled by the U.S. Government for subversive activities. With their country at war with Great Britain, they could not return to Italy via the Atlantic. They were a pleasant and friendly lot who bore no grudge against Americans and were glad to educate us in the ways of the world. Their leader, Count Allessandri, went to the International Settlement in Shanghai. The Soviet Union was reluctant to allow the rest to cross its territory on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, so they spent many days sitting in the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo awaiting visas. Each time we visited its lobby we were treated to drinks and talk. One evening in low voices they identified other people in the low-ceilinged room. Half of them seemed to be spies of one sort or another. It takes one to know one.

The Italians pointed out that the Japanese had at least three sets of security personnel trailing us: the local regular police, the kempei-tai (military police with power over civilians that made them kin to the Gestapo), and the Foreign Ministry people whose main aim was to keep us out of trouble. They felt that while the Japanese civilian government would do its best to show us the most favorable side of their country, the actions of the military and police were at cross-purposes.

Our daily round tables grew increasingly dull. Their agenda is obviously organized by the Japanese authorities, and the arguments are not genuine convictions but designed to convince us of the rightness of their cause, the strength of their patriotism and their dislike for war. And we have to listen to papers like one advocating ” A New Order for Women’s Education in Japan.” However, we hear from our ex-shipmates at the Imperial—whose lobby always hums with whispered stories–of growing armed opposition to the present cabinet. Perhaps it is symbolic that at times the engine noises and practice machine gun fire from silvery planes at a nearby military aviation base drown out our discussions at Tsuda. We really have done little but thresh out Japanese problems, with little mention of our own. The Japanese women not only are shy but also their English is not up to that of the males. They apparently don’t desire equality.

Excursions, planned or out on our own, help overcome the boredom. One afternoon Emmajean and I persuaded two Japanese students from Tokyo to accompany us on a walk across vegetable fields to a gravel road that brought us to a small village, where we were instant celebrities. The kids stood amazed at the enormous Americans. Kindly adults lent us their bicycles so we could ride up to see the huge, half-empty Murayama Reservoir of the Tokyo water supply system. Hot and tired from pedaling, we rested at a roadside restaurant, drinking bottled beer. Next day we were bused to the Nagano Sericultural Laboratory to observe elaborate scientific studies of boiling silkworms so their fiber could be unreeled by deft women operators. During a hurried visit to the spacious, magnificent new Imperial Household Museum, we enjoyed phases of Japanese arts. I admired Stone Age pottery and Hiroshige prints but was most impressed by the gorgeous court costumes in perfect preservation.

Dinner Saturday night July 13 at the Kokusai Bunka Shinkokai (Society for International Cultural Relations) was the major event of the Conference. I was seated next to Toshi Go, editor of the semi-official English language Japan Times, considered to be the mouthpiece of the Foreign Office. We quickly established the relationship of fellow journalists. After the platitudes we’d been hearing at Tsuda, I was impressed by the frankness of the speech on “The America-Japan Relationship” given by Yusuke Tsurumi, a member of the Diet and Parliamentary Vice-Minister of Home Affairs. “Since 1931 Japan’s actions on the Asiatic continent have begun to conflict with the status quo system established by the Washington (1921-1922 Naval) Conference,” he said. Now Japan faced either social upheaval at home or expansion abroad. The old system could be maintained only if Japan had freer trade relations and access to raw materials and could export some of its excess population. He complained that the United States had started talk of war with Japan two decades ago. Japan had suffered three major blows: 1. Emigration restrictions and outright exclusions such as the 1924 U.S. Immigration Act; 2. Tariff barriers like those endorsed by the Ottawa Trade Conference, and 3. China’s anti-Japanese attitude. He concluded by saying America should not judge the world exclusively by its own sense of values.

On Sunday we took a long bus ride through Tokyo’s western suburbs to another rooftop restaurant for a luncheon given by the “O.B.”s (Old Boys, a Briticism for alumni) and “O.G.”s of the Japan Student Association. A good meal served by deft waitresses. Dr. Masaharu Anesaki emphasized that the main aim of the Conference was not “good will” but education. He had many other words, but they were difficult for me to hear. Downtown to see the Imperial Diet, a gaudy imitation of all the world’s parliament buildings: marble, neo-Gothic, with a red silk and pure gold emperor’s room. As usual, no pictures were allowed. Finally went back out our way to the Jiyu Gakuen, a school whose president, Mrs. Motoko Hani, a short, half-blind woman, is said to be one of Japan’s most progressive educators. After we had been shown the grounds, she greeted us at dinner with a rather unusual plea for pacifism. The buildings, designed by a pupil of Wright, are simple, airy and full of windows. Pupils are encouraged to work on their own initiatives, and have done such things as building a tiny hydro-electric plant. They prepared the largest and best meal of our week here. Alumni are active at settlement schools in Peking (loving the Chinese) and in northern Japan. The classical concert by students was pretty good, except the woodwinds. We were escorted out with lanterns held by pupils. Ted and I spent two hours in the bathroom having a water battle. Finally, while killing a quart of wine with Dick Takauchi and Ted we had an earthquake strong enough to knock fire extinguishers off the walls. I’ve been through a lot of them but they always scare me.

We had some hot arguments at our round table Monday, July 15. They brought forth two admissions—already known to us, of course, but seldom admitted in Japan. First, Japan has fortified the Pacific islands mandated to it by the League of Nations under the condition they not be. Second, even before 1930 Japan had laid full plans for expansion in Asia. We’re hearing much talk of regional blocs led by Japan, which is claimed to be a “bulwark against Red imperialism.”

Takauchi accompanied Ted and me to the Tokyo Nichi-Nichi’s air-conditioned offices, where Ted asked a lot of questions about present day Japanese journalism but got unsatisfactory answers on the degree of press freedom it is permitted. After getting a haircut, I went by myself for a heart-warming visit with Harold and Ethel Amos, people who had known me since I was eight years old and who could discuss my Baguio friends, since he had been headmaster of Brent School there before coming to Japan in 1934. Not knowing Japanese, my trip there from the Ginza downtown area was confusing. First I took the wrong train on the Yamate Belt Line. Then I got off at the wrong station to wander about helplessly, trying in vain to ask directions. When I got them, I took two wrong buses. Finally, a policeman put me on the right train. I arrived at Tokyo American School in the Meguro ward bearing two priceless gifts: a can of American coffee under one arm and a carton of Kodachrome film in the other.

Tuesday’s hot round-table discussions (we’re getting to know each other enough to speak our minds) evoked a reprise of Tsurumi’s arguments, but more baldly couched. Japan is assuming control of East Asia in its national self-interest in order to secure an outlet for its excess population (not by their settlement there but through increased industrial activity at home) and for its raw materials. This policy was forced on Japan by foreign tariff barriers against its expanding exports. Why not control population growth, one of us asked. Because birth control is against a national policy to make the nation strong and also because it would affect popular morale. Despite the “accidental” bombing of the U.S. Navy gunboat Panay on the Yangtze in 1937, the U.S. should loan money to Japan to develop a new China. The emperor is and should be venerated. A good Japanese also believes in the three greatest virtues: silent obedience, filial piety and loyalty to superiors, we were told.

After a good siesta (for once), went downtown with Ted, Emmajean, “George” Fujioka of Kyoto University and another student to eat at a real Japanese restaurant with straw matting on its floors, paper walls, low tables and attentive waitresses in kimonos. We had over 40 cups of sake and two bottles of beer. Sake acts like all wine—it makes me sleepy, so I prefer rum. Back on the street we saw little sheets of newsprint that George says are what we call extras, announcing the fall of the (Mitsumasa) Yonai cabinet, said to be largely because of Army dissatisfaction with his foreign policy.

We heard in our July 17 meeting that America did not enter the World War until 1917 because it was afraid of Japan at its back. The best arguments were from Nobuo Ito, whose father is a director of the dominant Mitsui Trading Company. They live in the fashionable Azabu ward of Tokyo. Ito, who knows the outside world from first-hand experience, is shrewd. He speaks excellent American-accented English, knows his naval vessels and displays a much more realistic attitude than most of the other Japanese delegates. When we discussed treaty breaking, he explained it as “induced by desperation.”

The long train ride downtown is becoming boringly familiar. We are constantly watched, and I am not really comfortable here. I crave Coca-Colas, automobiles to drive, house servants, good modern plumbing and home cooking: the comforts of living in the American-controlled part of the Orient. Visited B. Wilfred Fleisher of the English-language Japan Advertiser, who talked with me awhile as he received Domei news agency flashes on the cabinet situation. Not until evening did I learn that Prince Fumimaro Konoye, who had served once before, is the new premier. Will he bring totalitarianism? Meanwhile, I took a ride in a bright and clean subway car to the Mitsukoshi department store to inspect its wide selection of poor quality goods. Ordered greeting cards. Had dinner at the American Club. We have had no contact with the American Embassy. Our government seems as disinterested as the Japanese are anxious to make an impression on us.

According to the old-timers who hang around the Imperial Hotel lobby, Jimmy Young, who was tossed into a Tokyo jail a few months ago and then was deported, deserved what he got. Larry Smith of International News Service says that, before going to Chungking, Young boasted that the only thing he hadn’t done in his career was to land in jail. He got his wish.

Thursday, July 18, was the last day of the Conference per se. At the closing ceremony the reports of the committee chairmen indicated much disagreement between the American and Japanese positions. We had a lot of picture taking. Our USC faculty chaperones, Drs. Francis Bacon and Catherine Beers, are getting on my nerves with their petty instructions. “Your passport is your most valuable possession in these difficult times,” biology professor Beers solemnly advises me, speaking from her vast experience of travel—around Los Angeles. Today both went around making sure we all remain until the end of receptions. Lots of picture taking by the Japanese, who are camera fiends when they can get film. I took a picture of Emmajean in her newly acquired Japanese costume, complete with fan. Good farewell buffet on the campus lawns under a bright moon.

Now we are starting a trip through western Honshu, Korea and “Manchukuo.” In Japan, we will be accompanied by students from the areas we visit, who represent the Kokusai Gakuyu-kai or International Student Institution. A representative of the Gaimusho (Foreign Office, and a few students to serve as interpreters will be with us in the occupied areas. The group will return to Japan and get back to San Francisco August 30. However, I want to continue to the Philippines and have talked with Gaimusho officials up to the level of Viscount Masayoshi Inaba to see if I can get a visa to Japanese-occupied North China so I can leave the group at Dairen and travel to Peking and Shanghai, where I can take a ship to Manila. I haven’t discussed this with the tour leaders yet but Ted and Emmajean are aware of my plans.

We left Tsuda College at 10 a.m. Friday, July 19, after frantic searches for laundry, paying bills and autographing for fans. It was one of the hottest and muggiest days in Tokyo’s history. Trading was suspended for nearly a minute in the Tokyo Stock Exchange as we entered its air-conditioned visitors’ gallery to a prolonged burst of applause. That was a real thrill. I have two uncles who are members of the New York Exchange but my visits went unnoticed there. Here sales are by auction on the floor and are announced above it: short term on the one side, long term on the other. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was today’s most heavily traded issue.

We had tea in the directors’ boardroom. Lunch was at the Tokyo City Hall, where we got a forgettable speech from aide Nobuo Tanikawa, preceded by that old bromide: “The Mayor regrets but the pressure of other business… ” Then to the new marble building of the Japan Broadcasting Corporation, ostentatious with items like cloth covered walls but not very original. We were received by the government radio’s chief, R. Nakayama. He stressed that mutual respect was absolutely necessary as the basis for international understanding: our use of terms like “Jap” conveys contempt as well as ignorance. He compared the widespread knowledge by Japanese school children of people like Washington and Lincoln with the utter ignorance our students have about Japanese heroes. I was particularly struck by his statement that crossing the Pacific involves a great change of perspective rather than only an adjustment of watches. The implication of the talks we heard was that some day the U.S. may really need Japanese friendship. We ended the long day in Tokyo with dinner at the Rotary Club and entertainment at the big Mitsukoshi department store.

Somehow the Conference planners neglected or rejected the idea that we needed a good night’s sleep. The Americans and Japanese delegates found themselves aboard two day coaches on the narrow gauge Tokaido mainline of Japan Railways, riding all night down the Pacific coast of Honshu on the 375 kilometer (233 mile) journey to Nagoya. My mother often spoke of taking this route with Dad on her way to the Philippines after her marriage in 1912. Silvery moonlight lent a surrealist note to the waves below the tracks, rice fields beside them and mountains above. Electric traction passed through the Hakone Mountains tunnel via Atami and a stop to get a coal-burning steam engine at Numazu. We bought ice cream and hot tea in pots from vendors. The tea with pot cost 5 sen. As the hour grew later and later the exhausted travelers attempted to sleep. The agony of their effort was etched on their open mouths and sprawling limbs. I stayed up, part of the time watching from the corridor between cars (with Emmajean) the scenery go by, catching several glimpses of soaring Fujiyama with its snow covered flat top. Outside of that it was no fun. Dawn changed the picture from black and white and gray to vivid colors: green rice fields, blue mountains and an occasional dried-up river. Nearing Nagoya, scores of factory chimneys broke the skyline and we were joined by a suburban electric line. Students from Nagoya Commercial College met us, dragged us on crowded streetcars to the rambling, old-fashioned and comfortable Nagoya Hotel, where we left our luggage but were then taken without pause on a tour of the Nagoya Pottery Factory. We were given lunch at Kinjo Women’s College and forced to listen, tired and dirty, to the inevitable speeches hoping for “goodwill between our two great countries.” At that point we didn’t have much. A program of classical dances should have been mildly entertaining but Ted and I were too tired to give a damn. Sneaked away from the group and slept from 3 to 8 p.m. and had room service bring us supper. This was real Asian personal indulgence. The toilets were even Western Style. Emmajean and her friend Shandy came back to report that the reception at the Nagoya Town Hall wasn’t much and that our absence hadn’t been noted. Pugh’s group put themselves up at the newest and best hotel. Had two beers with the gals before going back to sleep.

Started out our second day in Nagoya with a visit to Atsuta Jingu, a drab shrine in a drab city. No photographs allowed but didn’t plan to take any. Then Nagoya Castle with its gray stone walls, green roofs and golden dolphins protected with wires against thieves. Bought a suitcase at the Matsuzakaya department store, since my old one has had one too many moves. The store has a roof garden, zoo, and a view of the city with the chimneys of munitions, textiles, and pottery factories as well as the modernistic Asahi Shimbun building. Lots of air raid sirens. Travel by hot, crowded bus. The police must be spending much time, money, and effort trailing us around, and I’m fairly sure my diary is being read. Ito-san, a youngish millionaire, had us out to his magnificent estate this afternoon. First looked at an indoor classic fencing match with elaborate ceremony but few bullseyes, then took part in a traditional tea ceremony with a noted tea master who whipped powdered green tea and boiling water to produce a product that looked and tasted like pea soup. We inspected his 350 year-old house and had refreshments in a garden decorated by strutting peacocks. All quite luxurious, especially when compared to downtown Nagoya.

A 30 kilometer (19 mile) train ride across a level stretch of rice fields to foothills where the Stanford group stayed at a hotel while we were housed in a traditional Japanese inn with paper sliding walls, beds on the matted floor and everyone running around half-dressed in the heat. We were taken up the Nagara River in barges pulled by men, our way lit by fires burning in pots on their bows, to see trained cormorants fishing in the swift mountain stream. After the birds caught the fish they were prevented from swallowing by restraints on their gullets and the wiggling fish were pulled out. Judging by the small number of ayu caught this must be more of a tourist sight than an actual paying proposition. But no shortage of mosquitoes: we were plagued by enough to stuff a museum and between insect bites and the hot and sticky night I slept poorly.

We took an old interurban trolley through narrow streets to Gifu station and got into sleeping cars with facing blue plush seats. Perspired our way up through pleasant hills, green with trees and grass, with a fair gravel road alongside. We noted the continuing and very obvious presence of a gumshoe from Tokyo, equipped with straw hat and magazine. One of my colleagues doesn’t know a word of Japanese except the expression “Ah so!” which he repeats with different inflections so well that he’s caused some of our Japanese seatmates to lower their voices in conversations. My food and drink vocabulary is growing. “Biru” came naturally and I’ve learned in train dining cars that “katsuretsu” are pork cutlets and “curryandrisu” is actually curry with rice. Eventually pulled into Otsu, an ancient town at the southern end of Lake Biwa, a large fresh water lake almost entirely surrounded by wooded mountains rising steeply up from its waters. Lunch in a broken-down lakeside pavilion, enjoying cool breezes off the water. We had consumed enough beer that even the usual welcoming speeches sounded extremely pleasant. The Biwako Hotel with its spacious grounds appears traditionally Japanese outside but inside is modern and luxurious. I slept all afternoon in one of its 38 comfortable Western-style rooms. From my windows I can see Mt. Hiei, about whose combative priests I wrote a paper for my comparative religions class at Duke. After a skimpy dinner took a moonlight sailboat ride with my pals Ted and Emmajean. Much talk of Conference politics. We think that if such get-togethers are to continue the American organizers will have to place much more emphasis on Eastern colleges.

After the past strenuous fortnight it is most pleasant to spend a quiet, cool, comfortable and restful day in a tourist area. Spent the morning on the hotel porch writing postcards, catching up with diary entries and watching the clouds over the hazy mountains behind the semi-American Colonial style Shiga prefectural offices. At noon we scrambled aboard a rickety ferry to sit on a mat on the stern as it leisurely plodded from one landing to another on the lake. Passing occasional factories such as the Toyo Rayon works, one of Japan’s largest textile producers. After going under a two part bridge at the lake outlet into the River Seta we reached Ishiyama (“Stony Hill” for the rocks in its grounds) temple for a picnic lunch of “citron” (from the French word for lemonade) and a few sandwiches. I was impressed to learn that in one of its buildings lady Murasaki Shikibu composed the long and (to me boring) romance, Tale of Genji. Relaxed at last, we spent our return to Otsu seated on stern mats singing college songs and doing much horsing around. We had a tea party featuring iced “coffee” at Rinshoen, the country villa of Kinya Nagao, director of the Wakamoto patent medicine firm. Extremely simple, it is made of bamboo, wood, plaster and paper in early Tokugawa style and blends with its natural surroundings. At the water’s edge is a tea ceremony building, surrounded by a rock garden, tall reeds and a little artificial stream. Walked back to our hotel through the rice fields in a narrow strip between Hiei ridge and the lake, passing a naval seaplane training school. Had a meeting and elected Carl Ronning as next year’s conference chairman. Our politicking seems to work once in a while. This evening Ted, Emmajean and I went swimming in the cool, fresh waters of Biwako. The group has received orders from the local police to observe an 11 p.m. curfew. They must be tiring of paying overtime.

“George” Fujioka, the perspiring and efficient Kansai area program chairman, had us up at 6 a.m. July 24 to begin a full day of sightseeing. We put our bags in the hotel lobby, grabbed a bit of breakfast and then waited for the bus to take us to Sakamoto village on a bumpy gravel road that led steeply up to the terminus of a cableway. Every temple, railroad station, hotel and point of tourist interest in Japan has a rubber stamp, usually with an illustration, that tourists can use to mark their souvenir books. A damned good idea and in this scenic and historic area I am accumulating many on my diary pages. We amused ourselves with stamps before we rushed into the cable car for a rapid and smooth ride to near the summit of Hiei-san, whose 843 meter (2,800 foot) altitude provided a cooler and damper climate. Looked at many temples of the Enrakuji complex among the cypress trees nearby, not particularly interesting except for age. One bright new one was included among the lot. After a last look at Biwako, we descended on a pilgrim trail worn by millions of feet over the ages past little shops. One sold clay pigeons the buyer could toss over the cliff. Had iced tea at Shimeigatake’s new Eizan Hotel, with a view over the plain that holds Kyoto, one of the world’s oldest cultural centers. A short ride on an electric train and we were in the city for lunch at Doshisha University’s colonial Amherst-style building. Then, once more perspiring, we took a train to narrow Shinmonzen, Kyoto’s foreign style shopping center. I bought several color prints, which were very cheap. Stayed at the Miyako Hotel on a hill in a room with private bath. Dinner at Rotary Club with usual speech expressing how glad its members are to see that we have “lost our false ideas.” Have we?

With its surrounding mountains, dry rivers, ancient temples, modern buildings, gardens, and millennial continuing culture, Kyoto is a pleasant city indeed. Many contrasts: after passing modernistic Kyoto Imperial University Hospital’s buildings and a silk weaving mill our sightseeing bus took us to the white stucco buildings and chanting priests at Nanzen-ji, the 17th century center of the ascetic Buddhist Zen sect that did so much to foster simplicity in Japanese life. We also saw the three story Kinkakuji or Golden Pavilion in a lake surrounded by a garden. I was too hot and itchy to enjoy it as much as I should. Entrances full of gaudy junk created with great labor. How can men stand the routine boredom of the handwork and the charging and overcharging for souvenirs? Lunch at a beautiful Japanese style restaurant, with smooth carpentry, mats, chopsticks, low lacquer tables, green tea, food in red lacquer boxes. A Doshisha professor performed a ritual dance. Back in the bus for a ride to the railroad station with a timid girl conductor looking like a frightened kitten and repeating “gozaimasu” at every turn. Fast electric cars on a curvy track through rice fields and occasional hills 24 kilometers south to really ancient Nara, where we were met by a long procession of jinrikshas decorated with American flags. A quaint old town with an inquisitive populace. In Nara Park I dragged through the National museum but picked up feeding the deer, especially when the animals bowed to us. A movie company was making a firm with actors in ancient costumes resembling those in the Baguio barber shop magazines and heavy brown makeup. Our human horses strained uphill to the Kasugajinja, four small shrines set among giant cryptomeria trees, torii gates and 3,000 stone lanterns, with eating and souvenir shops for Buddhist and Shinto pilgrims and sightseers. I was impressed by the quality of 8th century architecture and metallurgy displayed by Nara temples and by the Fu Manchu-looking Daibutsu or giant Buddha at a time when my ancestors were huddled in huts along the North Sea. Most are justly labeled as “National Treasures” or “Important Cultural property.” Staying at the fine Nara Hotel nearby. Celebrated my saint’s day in the hotel bar with Emmajean.

Friday another short trip, only 40 minutes from ancient Nara to bustling Osaka on the double-track standard gauge Daiichi electric railway, which runs through a long tunnel. Osaka, with its busy streets, tile-roofed tenements, smoking chimneys, modern office buildings and businessmen’s hotels is a great contrast. “Every land must have its commercial nerve center,” the Rotary Club president explained. “You have Chicago, we have Osaka.” He spoke in the air-conditioned banquet hall of the New Osaka Hotel. On the top floor of the white-towered Asahi newspaper, that resembles an airport control tower, we watched a documentary film. Also we could sit down for a show of the heavens at the planetarium atop the municipal electric building. The relaxation of being entertained without any exertion on my part hasn’t come my way in a long time. At the rival Mainichi some of the American delegates gave speeches on how they had “come to love and appreciate Japan.” I learned from S. Fukuoka, Osaka bureau manager of Domei Tsushin, that Prince Konoye and his cabinet took office July 22. His all-important Army minister is Lieutenant General Hideki Tojo. Toured the press room with its deafening roar and walked through long rows of type fonts that are said to contain 30 million hira-gana and kata-kana characters as well as type for the newspaper’s English-language and Braille editions. We heard 27 speeches today, mostly saying the same things. Ted agrees that our hotel room view could as well be in Chicago. I received a piece of very goods news from Suma of the Gaimusho, in a translation of a letter he has sent to the Japanese consul-general to the Wang Ching-wei puppet government in Nanking established this March asking him to offer me courtesies, including interviews with officials. Part of my China trip seems to be on the tracks.

Spent a hot morning in the enormous Kanegafuchi cotton mills in Osaka. The huge building was steaming with more than natural dampness to the point that I left marks when I sat down. This is supposed to be the world’s largest textile mill. We saw miles of cloth being steamed, sized, dyed, printed and put into bolts with labels in many languages. They have put a lot of American mills out of business. The clean worker dormitories have mat beds but nothing else. Swimming pool was scummy. Judo room had more mats. As usual, no photographs allowed, since this is a heavy industrial zone. Lunched at the municipality’s University of Commerce, with more welcome speeches.

One of the features promised on this trip was a home stay. At four this afternoon the hotel lobby was a hive of activity as the American students left with their hosts to spend two nights in the area along the extremely fast Hankyu electric line west of Osaka. This evening we are sitting in the very Western parlor of Saburo Shimada on Showa-en in Nishonomiya, a residential town on Osaka Bay halfway between Osaka and Kobe. Mr. Shimada, who received us in his book-lined living room in short-sleeved shirt with tie and slacks, is a wealthy manufacturer of glass, including the water glasses all over the country that bear his “SGF” in diamond logo. His wife wore traditional clothes. Masao, his son, is interested in jazz records, often listening to Manila broadcasts on his father’s big radio. He and his sister were in Western dress. In the living room with its overstuffed furniture we hardly feel in a foreign country but tomorrow we will awake on tatami mats in rooms with sliding paper doors. What a dinner we had! After the meal we walked across the tracks for a formal tea with the Shimadas’ friend Mrs. Amaike.

Had a fine breakfast on the Shimada terrace before another tiring day of travel by jammed tramcars and trains across the port city of Kobe, pinched between mountains and sea. Much evidence of the disastrous 1938 floods. We were on our feet for hours, sweat coming off our backs like rain. First to Rokko by train and up the mountain to the impressive new buildings at Kobe College of Commerce. After a small plate lunch we enjoyed a view of the Inland Sea, mountains, factory chimneys, German and Italian ships taking refuge in Kobe harbor from the British Navy, quaint sailing boats, a continuous line of cities along the water. The college president showed me their South American collection among 100,000 volumes in the library and I put in a plug for my Duke Professor John Tate Lanning’s new book on Colonial American Thought. After lunch a long ride across town to Sannoura Park to wearily climb to the municipality’s kanko house for scanty supplies of iced tea and cakes. Didn’t think it was worth the effort. Jolted back east to the Chinese style Toka-ro Restaurant, authentic to the dirty tablecloths and ancient eggs, but fairly good food, which I much prefer to Japanese. Good to get back to the Shimada, where I listened to KZRH in Manila to learn there is a growing possibility the U.S. may impose oil and steel embargoes on Japan in retaliation for its aggression in Asia. Congress is considering another big expansion of U.S. naval power.

On Monday morning visited the spacious and spotless laboratory in the harbor area in which silk from the Kansai district is inspected before export. Some of the trial rooms are air-conditioned. Watched men testing color, evenness, and strength of the fibers. Silk means a hell of a lot to Japan—and American women. Behind the group, Ted and I used a taxi to try to get to the university luncheon but the driver thought we wanted its previous location and we took an electric railway that took us almost to the Takarazuka “Girls Opera” hall in the suburbs before we got off at the new Kansai Gakuen campus with its California Mission-style buildings. But the event was being held in downtown Kobe, so we went to the Oriental Hotel’s grillroom and then joined Leo Goldberg for a convivial afternoon at the house he has rented on a hill near the Tor Hotel. Drinks served by his amah while we listened to risqué American phonograph records whose points I didn’t really understand. Later wandered around town under the elevated railway tracks. Read about the leading English businessman in Kobe being arrested on an espionage charge. Had a good dinner but didn’t feel too well afterward, so Ted and I took an ancient Packard taxi to rejoin the group at the decidedly second-rate Rokko House with winding corridors on a mountainside (but not high enough up to be cool). Got instructions for our Manchukuo trip. Practically no picture taking from now on. In Japan proper photographs may not be taken from places over 20 meters high, of naval vessels, dockyards, harbors, large buildings, industrial areas (especially any kind of heavy industry) and certain fortified coastal areas.

Finally a relaxed day with no program. Sat around the Oriental Hotel bar with several red-faced American businessmen who live on expense accounts and apparently have little to do but drink beer and eat the free bar lunch. Made tentative reservations to leave Shanghai August 28 on the President Coolidge for Manila. With world events happening so quickly and unexpectedly, I wonder if I’ll be able to make the trip. Took the Hankyu line back to our hotel. Ted wanted to write, so went with Emmajean to the 920 meter (3050 ft.) summit of Mt. Rokko, hiking up a steep hill to the lower station of the mile-long cable railway. We didn’t puff but we sweated profusely. Much of the line had been washed out in 1938 and repairs were still underway. On top it was cool but damp. We walked along the mountainside to the Rokko Oriental Hotel for beers and a dim view through the haze down to the harbor. Then we walked another kilometer to the summit before descending.

On July 31 we took an all day 533 kilometer (329 mile) long ride westward on a steam powered, fairly fast express train on the Sanyo line, much of it along the Inland Sea on the southwest coast of Honshu. I’d seen the lovely scenery several times on trans-Pacific ship trips, as it is on the main route from Kobe to Shanghai. Each time we cut away from the sea with its narrow channels and mountainous islands we climbed up valleys green with rice fields and towns clustered along narrow, dusty gravel roads. Our puffing engine filled tunnels with smoke as it labored along the double-track narrow gauge line, then descended rapidly on clacking rails. At stations we were met by vendors of boxed lunches, watery ice cream, hot tea in earthenware cups and porters in red caps. Station names were bawled in toneless voices from tinny loudspeakers: Hi-me-ji, O-ka-ya-ma, Fu-ku-ya-ma, Hi-ro-shi-ma. Got a distant view of Miyajima across a narrow channel crowded with fishing boats. Factories every place that had enough room to hold them. A businessman full of sake going back to Shimonoseki with rice cakes donated some of them to us in the interest of international good will, only to fall off the train as we pulled into his home station. Many soldiers among the crowd at the pier sheds. “You can’t see Asia without a program,” I yelled at my compatriots as our air-conditioned express ferry with modern décor pulled out of the harbor at high speed, dodging junks by a few meters, leaving behind the clusters of lights of Shimonoseki and Moji on Kyushu across the narrow strait that was our last glimpse of Japan. I can do without its shortages, filtered news and sticky summer heat. Very strange to be aboard with wedge head rests in a big common room among men in underwear and squalling children. Cathie Beers threw a fit about such conditions. Bathrooms had squat equipment without toilet paper; wash basins had hot water but no towels or soap.

Although often disturbed by squalling infants, I slept fairly well on my mat until a squawky public address set up a toneless spiel and music on records. After 7 1&Mac218;2 hours we already were entering the almost landlocked harbor of Fusan, 120 miles from Shimonoseki, and at the southern end of the Korean peninsula. The sun was just coming up over hazy blue mountains as we slipped around the breakwater past camouflaged oil tanks for our first look at Asia and the first mainland portion of the Japanese empire, “Tyosen.” A great fuss before we docked as we were accused of photographing military installations. The Gaimusho man came immediately to our rescue, pointing out that none of his charges had their cameras out but that a German passenger was the guilty party. At the pier we stepped into standard gauge railway cars with individual chairs. Apart from saturating clouds of soft coal soot from the locomotive in the many short tunnels, the trip was quite comfortable but the food in the dining car was skimpy and there was no beer. Railway being double-tracked. Adjacent gravel road still washed out in many places. Red soil, mud villages with Rising Sun flags flying in observance of a national Thrift and Fast Day, but also steeples of two Christian churches. Few electric power lines or factories. Wide, shallow, gravel-banked rivers and blue hills gradually rising into real mountains that reminded me of the hazy jaggedness of Chinese scrolls. About 450 kilometers to the capital of Keijo (Seoul to the Koreans). We took our suitcases and our sooty faces to the big 1915 vintage Tyosen Hotel, owned by the Japanese Government Railways. Washed our blackened faces as best we could but in vain before taking a bus to the Government General building, a five story pile of marble, brick, and frescoes vaguely reminiscent of the original Library of Congress building. Shown an English-language documentary film on 30 years of Japanese achievement in bringing Korea into the modern world. Afterwards an official remarked wearily in tones worthy of a European colonial counterpart, “We are trying to reforest the mountains but as fast as we plant trees the local people cut them down for firewood.”

At breakfast Emmajean read out her transcription of the sign in her hotel room: “The Devotion Day for new Oriental recreation. Day that people keep mind to meet any trouble to make racial happiness in the future. Dinning room will be served only light dishes by economic style and dry in bar room.” Via bus (gasoline powered here) to Nanzan Mountain to view Keizyo, Keijo or Seoul from the Chosen Zingu, a Shinto shrine. Saw many substantial modern buildings, dominated by a red Church of England, backed by hazy mountains. Parks paved with gravel, lined with stone lanterns, with many weird stone dogs. Went by Tokuzyu Palace and its fine gardens but didn’t enter the buildings. Many old men with straggly beards, horsehair top hats and flowing white garments. Look like less healthy versions of bearded man on bank notes. Women dressed in puffy white blouses and blue skirts. It was good to be on American soil at the Consulate General, which occupies the grounds of an old palace. Consul General March, a fat and pompous old school diplomat, showed us his Korean house, which had been made much more comfortable with American heating and furniture, plus a WPA painting competing with his wife’s traditional wood blocks. Had afternoon tea with Oda, the English language secretary to the Government-General—a sort of good will man. He was frank about the true status of Manchukuo and says this will not be the case with China proper. On the other hand Korea, which he compares to U.S. territories like Hawaii, will eventually become part of Japan, as Algeria is now part of France.

After a good dinner we took the night train for Manchukuo. We had a special sleeping car but weren’t allowed to take down the seats to use as beds. Couldn’t see much in the darkness but stood on the platform talking with Emmajean. Soot coming through the partly opened windows, especially in many of the tunnels, makes it hard to keep clean. We were late all along the single-track line, stopping at almost every siding to let southbound trains—mostly passenger—pass. A long stop at Heijo (Pyongyang). I had a hard time curling up in my seat but nevertheless got quite a lot of sleep. Rained all night. By morning the hills were flattening out and rice paddies were displaced by fields of corn, millet and soybeans. After the frontier station of Singisyu (Sinuiju in Korean) we crossed the wide and muddy Yalu on a long steel bridge. Another is under construction for a double track project. No road traffic. Antung is in Manchukuo, the country created by Japan to hide its annexation of Manchuria. A perfunctory customs examination while a South Manchuria Railway locomotive and dining car and SMR crew are added. Faces outside window are definitely Chinese. Surprised to be going by more mountains on the 240 kilometer run to Mukden. They are bright green in the summer rain. Soldiers instead of gendarmes guard the stations and there are pillboxes and barbed wire. Many new towns and dams. A muddy rawness about everything. At Penhsihu a coal and iron works in a valley that reminded me of West Virginia, but still mostly under construction. Countryside much more familiar to me than to our Japanese escorts. It’s much cooler this far north, with temperatures in the pleasant 70s. Went straight through to Mukden in a broad plain that could have been in the American Middle West. Staying at the Yamato Hotel built about 1931. While relaxing in a hot tub I read the Manchuria Daily News of America’s increasing marriage rate. Napped until 7 p.m., when I was awakened to attend a dinner given by the Seven Seas Society, a creature of the ubiquitous South Manchurian Railway, along with the Kwantung Army, the real authority in this puppet state. Food composed of everything from sea, land and air. It didn’t pay to investigate. Wound up the day with ice cream, cakes and good music at a Russian candy store near our hotel.

Next morning we took a bus ride through the city of Mukden, comprised of the modern Japanese section, Yamato-ku, with paved streets, new steel and concrete buildings, and the old Chinese town of Fengtien with a wall, muddy streets full of pedestrians, pigs and sheep, gaudy signs, and smells. Our bus driver really could handle his steed, blowing his horn like mad to keep up with the general din. It’s still drizzling and cool. My Japanese Government Railways Baededeker-style Guide to China, compiled in 1923, mentions Mukden only as the chief city of Manchuria and the gateway to China from Europe via the Trans-Siberian Railway. It contains a picture of the North Mausoleum, built in 1644, which is still impressive. Flagstones succeeding the muddy approach, curving tile roofs, red walls, and stone animal figures facing the courtyard make a perfect Hollywood set for a Fu Manchu mystery movie. As an unusual privilege for foreigners, we were given entrance to the inner court through a 30-foot wall. We wondered why we were shown two other complexes: Northeastern University, now used by the Japanese as a barracks, its stadium made into a stable and Tung-shang-tang or Municipal Orphanage/Poor House, which is run-down, its yards pools of water covered with green scum, odd piles of stone, flies, old men sitting on their mats and staring into space.

Leaving Mukden at 4:40 p.m. on the dot, we took the South Manchurian’s “HatoHaot” Express north to Hsinking (“New Capital”) called Chinchow or Changchun before the Japanese eight years ago decreed it would be the capital of their Manchukuo. Its first-class observation car held generals and colonels of the occupiers’ Kwantung Army. We rode with officers of lesser rank. Chinese sat in third class. The Hato was an all-steel, quiet, fairly fast train that took us through soybean fields, low hills, and much green foliage, including a few rice fields at the same latitude as South Dakota. We saw a magnificent sunset as we ate an unappetizing dinner in the dining car. Always dessert is ice cream and watermelon. Took a long bus ride from the station to a Japanese hotel, naturally named Yamato, and far from luxury establishment. As usual, the toilets stink. We entertained and were entertained by four huge sumo wrestlers in kimonos, their hair in topknots. After a pillow fight, most of our group went to the Paradise Cabaret to be entertained properly by White Russians. Huge draft beer 70 sen in a fine grill room. I talked with Emmajean in the hotel over a bottle of sake.

Hsingking is a Japanese-dominated city full of Kwantung Army soldiers in dark khaki uniforms, generals riding in Buicks flying Rising Suns and flags with stars. We drove around in a dusty bus. Since this is ostensibly the capital of an independent state (not recognized by most nations), the Japanese have a magnificent Consulate General in the center of town. We didn’t see the headquarters of Manchukuo’s General Wu. The capital city evidently was inspired by the District of Columbia with traffic circles and much space between government buildings constructed in a bastard Chinese neo-classical style. The yellow tile-roofed palace of the Emperor, the last Manchu, who was once called Henry Pu-yi, has a stout wall to protect him against “bandits.” The jail is on the other side of town. We were shown the battlefield where the Japanese triumphed over the Chinese in 1931. Dinner tonight in the New Capital Chinese restaurant given by the Dai Ichi Club, the largest I have seen, occupying a neo-classical building with white columns. Consumed enormous quantities of beer and 23 courses of food. Ted argued with the assertions of T. Okada, California-born translator for the official Kokutsu News Agency, that this is really an independent country under Japanese protection and Emmajean also asked him sarcastic questions about who really runs this country. So far we haven’t hard of any official who is not Japanese. After six weeks of togetherness our gang has developed cohesiveness and has heard so much propaganda that we kid around and refuse to believe anything we are told. I hope I’ve contributed to some background history on Japanese-Russian rivalry. Told them that as an infant in 1919 I had been in Vladiovostok when American troops sent from Manila were trying not only to help Czech ex-POWs escape the Red Army but also to restrain the Japanese from trying to take over Siberia. Ted says he has “a medal given to me by the Czar for extraordinary bravery—using an Oriental john.” Cathie Beers still vainly tries to keep us in line. Walked back to the hotel in the cool night.

Our train from Hsingking to Harbin on a sunny morning went so fast we could milk cows from its windows, as the saying goes. We stopped in a soybean field for an hour to let the Asia Express pass. The siding was guarded by an armed soldier and across the tracks was an old sod breastworks. Bridges have blockhouses at either end. Many fine looking Japanese officers, many with families, were on our crowded train. Manchuria must get the cream of the crop. We walked up a very European street to a lousy hotel being converted from Western to Japanese style with tatami and squat toilets. It has the same discomforts as the one we left this morning. Once again the other section of our group got the better accommodations. Harbin, full of animals, their dung, and mud, is a city where Chinese and émigré Russians still predominate. Few Japanese are on the streets. Most signs still are Cyrillic. We hired a drosky at two yen an hour (33 minutes by the red-faced old Russian bandit driver’s calculation) to tour the European-style Pristan quarter. Since the Russians had a “concession” here from 1896 to 1924 as part of its Chinese Eastern Railway shortcut across Manchuria to Vladivostok, it has no wood buildings but many stone, brick and concrete relics of the ancient regime. After the 1917 revolution it contained so many refugees that it was the largest white city in East Asia. The Soviets invaded Manchuria only a decade ago to convince warlord Chang Hsueh-liang that they maintained the Czarist share in control of the line. Now everything is run down; paint is peeling, and holes make sidewalks dangerous walking. Stores sell furs, embroidered blouses, candy, and South Manchurian “White Wolf Scotch” whiskey in Johnnie Walker bottles. On the wide, brown Sungari River we saw two Germans in a noisy motorboat flying the Nazi swastika and a sailboat almost capsizing under the weight of too many blonde Russian passengers. After a dinner of borsch and steak at the New Moderne Grille we had tea and cakes at a nearby Russian tearoom. Tap water is unsafe to drink. Thanks to the occupiers, we are still on Tokyo time and darkness does not fall until around 9 p.m. When the gaudy neon sign on our hotel came on, it illuminated in its rosy glow a synagogue across the street.

Toured Harbin officially on Wednesday, August 7 in a big glassed-in bus with a handsome Russian driver and a chubby-cheeked Japanese guide. They took us to a new Japanese shrine; to the log Central Church where Orthodox services were being sung by white-robed priests with long blonde beards; past the USSR embassy, flying a big red flag (hard to believe the Kwantung Army was licked in the Nomonhan Incident on the Outer Mongolian border a few hundred kilometers west of here only a year ago); past 1890s European-style mansions with walls and gates and large gardens and to the new obelisk, modeled after the Washington monument but not as high. On its grounds soldiers drilled with a light machine gun while two fighter planes tumbled around overhead like flies in a skillful, nerve-tingling dogfight. No one of our group can say now that the Japanese don’t know how to fly. The Chinese section is a mass of animals and humans crowding muddy streets. Saw the big Sungari River that held large steamers and a gunboat. It even boasts a naval institute. Again lunched at the New Moderne, each course a la carte and colossal. Tasted first white cheese since I was in Europe four years ago. Tried taking a nap but was bothered by flies. Tea and cakes at the Mars confectionery, proudly displaying its American electric refrigerator in the front room. Its Russian proprietors long to rejoin their relatives in San Francisco. “We have no future here,” they lamented out of earshot of our guide. At 5:40 we assembled in the station waiting room, which is still equipped with icons and candles, to be bundled south. Several washouts slowed us and we had to wait until we got to Hsinking in the middle of the night to obtain a private 2nd class sleeping car with wide, dirty plush seats and closed beds. Succeeded in opening them enough to use as beds, stretching out with fair comfort and using raincoats for pillows as we turned out the lights.

The trip south form Harbin to Dairen is 943 kilometers (581 miles), a 23 hour journey. Most of the train is composed of coolie cars smelling of unwashed, hard-working, blue-coated Chinese laborers. We went through six such cars to get to the diner as an orange-red dawn came up across the plains. We were having oatmeal for breakfast as we passed the Anshan steel mills and its row upon row of workers’ houses. At lunch we sat drinking beer and eating Manchurian stew with rice. Emmajean writing scores of postcards to family and friends in Indiana. Further south, hills, then jagged topped mountains appeared. No formalities except one more stamp in my passport as we crossed back into admittedly Japanese territory on the southern end of the Liaotung Peninsula, which Japan called Kwantung. Raining as we emerged from the Dairen station into a clean, brightly lit, brick and concrete modern city to deposit our suitcases and wash up at the multi-story Yamato Hotel before going to the Hoshigawa (Star River) Hotel on the beach for a colossal dinner given by the South Manchuria Railway. We were encouraged to sing college songs but as the sole Duke delegate I stumbled on the words of my own. Had a bull session with Emmajean, Fran, Greg, Vinton, and Yamanaka. The Japanese students on this trip probably had their political ideas changed more than we (but not all those about what they regard as the free and easy behavior of American college women.) They and other Japanese sometimes appear racists, looking condescendingly on fellow Asians, yet resenting Americans who do not treat them as equals. They are afraid of both the political and military threat posed by the Russians. The Americans have become much more knowledgeable and sophisticated about Japan, although they (including me) still have a lot to learn. We know that while they share the belief that Japan is entitled to more access to raw materials and markets, many influential people don’t like to see it gained by brute force. Free speech is no longer safe and this has been conveyed by indirection, hints, even by what is not said. I’m sure my diary is being read while I’m out of my room.

The longest bus ride of our tour was as we were taken southwest to the tip of the Liaotung Peninsula. Our expert driver went 50 miles an hour in an American-made International on the narrow, winding asphalt road through tunnels and around rocky peninsulas to see the battlefields of Port Arthur (which the Japanese have renamed Ryojun), where from August 29, 1904 to January 1905 the Japanese attacked the circle of forts protecting this major Russian naval base from observation and bombardment. Looking at the ruins of the East Chikuka-shan north fort, where hand-to-hand combat inside tunnels went on for five months, I wondered at the bravery of these white and yellow men fighting so valiantly over a bit of ground. The stench of corpses must have been awful. We were shown the collapsed room where Major General Kondratenko was killed by a shell. Barbed wire and trenches are still visible. Much of Europe and China now resemble this. The ashes of 22,700 soldiers are enshrined on Monument Hill, which affords a view of the entire operation. Chiaki Tanaka, a Nisei who works for the Railway’s propaganda bureau, was our well-informed guide. Lunched at another Yamato Hotel, where many Europeans from China are spending the summer. At the government museum in the new Port Arthur saw much Manchu work from snuff bottles to mummies clad in the same blue jeans worn by their modern counterparts, bank notes, dolls and clothes.

Saturday morning August 10 I got up early to check with the Water Police to be sure I wouldn’t have problems leaving Dairen separately from the group. They didn’t give a damn where I went, so after breakfast we all went down to the long covered passenger wharf where the gang embarked for Kobe and home. I shook hands all around, walked down the gangplank and took a taxi to see the railway’s magnificent library. My ship leaves for Tientsin this afternoon. It’s been an exhausting but exhilarating two months.

Saturday, August 10 I lunched at the Russian-owned Victoria Restaurant together with a SMR accountant and a writer before embarking at 2 p.m. on the 2,300 ton Tientsin Maru of the Dairen Kisen Kaisha, a line which operates on the narrow Yellow Sea between Antung, Dairen and Tientsin every two or three days. Passengers include Chinese coolies jammed into steerage, businessmen and a few tourists. After rounding the cape beyond Port Arthur we were out to sea in the Gulf of Chihli. My cabin mate is J. Naruse, manager of the Toyo Cement Co.’s asbestos plant in Tientsin. The only Europeans are two Germans. The line’s claim of “Excellent accommodations for tourists” is well founded. I even got a stamp showing the ship for my diary. The muddy Yellow Sea is well named. Passed only two fishing boats before crossing Taku Bar at 9 a.m. to enter the Peiho River for a three hour trip upstream, making many abrupt turns between unfenced corn fields and mud villages that crowd its banks. Occasional huge mounds of brick kilns and old Chinese forts. Passed several tugs and barges flying Union Jacks, which were also painted on their sides. They haul goods from Tientsin to ocean-going freighters off Taku. Near Tientsin warehouses and tanks of Texaco and Standard Oil of New York, plastered with American flags and surrounded by electrified fences. Tientsin has been a treaty port since the 1860s, with exclusive settlements for major powers except the U.S. After a month in Japanese territory it was almost unbelievable to meet Chinese Maritime Customs officers, taxi drivers and porters who speak passable English and to see American and European goods displayed in store windows along Victoria Road No. 3. Over a dilapidated steel bridge to the ramshackle railway station. Thought I was doing well exchanging my travelers checks at one dollar for 15 “Mex” (ican) but learned later that the moneychanger, who kept his Chinese money in piles, had cheated me. Prices even at this rate are so favorable to dollar owners that foreigners live high for little. Took a crowded first-class SMR train through truck farms and cornfields, with a fairly good dirt road alongside. Felt lonely awhile, missing the horseplay and conversation of the Conference gang. Only 86 miles to the Chienmen station hard by the high, solid Peking walls, with the new building of the Japanese-run railway administration adjacent. Weather cool, dry, pleasant. Went through a second passport inspection of the day and on to the famous Grand Hotel de Pekin, a bit old and run down but with big airy rooms that cost 18 Mex. a day. They too now had a souvenir stamp. My parents and sister Betty stayed here in 1937 when Dad came up from the Philippines to meet them after they had crossed Eurasia by train. Ubiquitous service by Chinese room “boys” clad in white gowns. Took a short ricksha ride on busy, clean streets through the Legation Quarter, seeing U.S. Marines and tall radio towers near the American establishment. Went through huge Tartar City gate, plastered with OPPOSE BRITAIN signs in English. Had 9-course dinner on roof for 4 Mex. The deal looks damned interesting.

It was interesting. I found it difficult to catalog my impressions of my first full day in ancient Peking on one diary page. First hired a ricksha coolie at 3 Mex. a day. He soon glistened with sweat and a brief rain, taking me and my suitcase to the Peking Language School through a muddy alley to arrange for room and board at 10 Mex. a day. This establishment provides American missionaries with instruction in Chinese so they can function in remote stations all over China. Next stop was a bookstore selling pirated reprints of recent American and British volumes. Finally to the Forbidden City through its Tung Hua or Eastern gate. My impressions were of yellow and green tile roofs with rows of animal figures on ridges ended by long tongued dragons; Chinese policemen in faded khaki uniforms; antique stores with row after row of looted art objects; ancient buildings with green and silver painted beams, red gates and pillars, a princess’s bath chamber, grass growing on paved courts, marble balustrades and bridges, bronze cranes and turtles, carved center pieces in stairways, crickets in trees, soft drink stands in the entrance ways, great arched gates. German-style lunch at Hotel du Nord. Orchestra consisted of seven Filipinos from Cavite and a Cossack who escaped the Reds by walking across the Gobi Desert. Many Japanese Army officers in hotel, which has a Nisei manager, but size of city population precludes their dominating the street scene. French Bookstore in hotel has an excellent Orientalia Collection. It sells rare items only for U.S. dollars. Visited American Consulate to have pictures taken for a Peking residence permit. So-called Temple of Heaven, visited in afternoon, had similar setup as Temple of Heaven. Marble-paved ramps connect levels. Rounded tile roofs in gorgeous blue. Throne nice and wide for fat emperors and empresses. Perfect symmetries. Real temple is round white marble. Pictures describe the precinct better than words. Lovely to watch sunset from Western Hills as neon lights came on across the city.

The College of Chinese Studies, as the Language School is now officially called, is full of missionaries in from the back country for a few days of clean beds, good American-style food and conversation with compatriots. I moved from my hotel this morning after having had my suitcase packed by the room boy much more competently than I could have done and came down a narrow dirt back alley or hutung in my ricksha. Even after four years of Japanese rule, the missionaries are still unable to grasp The New Order. A month in Japan helps me. It still seems unusual to be allowed to take photographs from high places. Hot and sticky this morning, so I rested all morning. That was a mistake, since the accumulated weariness of our strenuous trip took hold at once. After lunch, braving the rain underneath the ricksha canopy while the coolie got soaked, I visited Coal Hill, a high artificial mound with steep sides and three pavilions. Climbed steeply up a slippery trail to the top for a view of the city. To the south the Forbidden City’s yellow roofs and wall-defined courtyards. On the east Peking National University in the same ugly style we saw so often in Mukden. To the west; hills, one crowned by the Lama Temple, looking like a huge white bottle. Saw Japanese soldiers operating a field radio on another hill that had an air raid siren tower. Ah, progress! Tonight I’m snug in bed reading a pirated edition of Christopher Morley’s Kitty Foyle. Its language is frank but the novel is only fair.

Pass issued to Jim Halsema for travel
from Peking to Shanghai, August 1940

On August 14 I got my Peking residential permit and applied at Japanese military headquarters for a pass to go to Shanghai. Another example of who really controls Chinese territory. Then back to the Forbidden City, the city of royal palaces within a city, now empty of inhabitants. Entrance through the tile-roofed North Gate requires a 50 Mex. cent yellow ticket that keeps out the hoi polloi. It’s an overwhelming maze of beautiful buildings, gardens, red walls, museums, halls of heavenly this and that. Even though much looted of its contents, there is still far too much detail to permit me to absorb the details item by item. Without occupants or use it has lost its personality. Maintenance is spotty and many murals are flaking away to nothingness. Courts, pavilions, tea stands without number. I must confess my tastes are more for Chinese architecture than interior decoration. Japanese simplicity is superior. The most interesting relics are the palaces containing some of the original furniture of the Manchu Ching dynasty that came to an end only three decades ago. The royal artifacts included a bicycle with hard rubber tires, bathtubs ancient and fairly modern, clocks and brass bedsteads. Toured with Herr Bramer, a Shanghai International Settlement Police constable with an English mother and accent. After lunch, accompanied him to the very well equipped Rockefeller-endowed Peking Union Medical College to see his seriously ill brother. I am both anxious to get home to see my family and at the same time dreading the search for a job and the career decision that it must entail. I really don’t like being away from American-style comforts and government any more. This may change in time, but listening to Tirso Cruz’s tinny Manila Hotel dance band over KZRM makes me realize how provincial it all is there. And I don’t get along well in a hot, wet climate like Manila’s. Felt better after a few beers at the Wagon Lits Hotel and a look into the excellent Central Park of the palace city with gardens and tubs filled with fantastic goldfish.

On Tuesday I had a cold and “summer complaint” that left me worn out although I did little. I did drag myself into my ricksha to go north to the Temple of Confucius, which In Search of Old Peking tells me was built in the 13th Century. Most notable to me was its three-arched stone gate. Its side buildings are being sanded down and repainted. Not much else in Peking is being restored these days. Such temples resemble the ax that belonged to George Washington: “It’s exactly the same ax he used but the head was replaced twice and the handle three times.” The hall of Classics, various tablets to the memory of the sage, his disciples and men who passed examinations would have been much more interesting had I been able to read the characters on them. To me they were just a collection of old stone tablets. An old geezer angling for a tip rushed around unlocking doors and I had to tip him. Not many tourists any more. Down a dusty street to the Drum and Bell towers: old buildings and not much more. Spent much of the evening listening to a short-wave radio. Heard an anti-independence talk by a Filipino who said that in this day and age his countrymen should be satisfied with the substance they already had rather than seeking an illusory form of absolute freedom.

By August 16 the military pass enabling me to travel to Shanghai by rail had been issued but after chasing around having the buck passed between the Japan Travel Bureau, the airplane company and the Peking Hotel concierge, the military told me that they didn’t want me to go by plane. “We are afraid that it will be so crowded,” an officer said. At least the train trip won’t break my banks. First class including sleeper to Pukow opposite Nanking, a trip of 714 miles, is 64.60 Mex. Or about $4. Afternoon trip up to Peihai, a lake that until 1925 had been the private preserve of royalty. Its chief feature is a white bottle shaped pagoda bearing a mystic Tibetan inscription. It is on a hill on an island in a lake. Lotus plants in flower float upon the lake, which is bordered by the graceful fronds of willows. My sightseeing was interrupted by frequent need to find a w.c. They’re not easy to find but my ricksha boy understood my problem. Around the lake are various temples with fancy names. The Nine Dragon Wall is a mass of writing tiled color. One miniature mountain covered with figures reminded me of Coney Island. Sitting in my lonely room tonight I feel a need to get away from this dead and dying city quickly.

My internal problems subsiding but my ricksha boy must be really worn out after trotting all over the city. He trotted up a dusty avenue past rattling trolley cars and open air markets, turned right on a narrow and bumpier street, found himself involved in a great funeral procession led by a big red coffin carried on great poles by men in green costumes and hats with red feathers that made them look like Oriental Robin Hoods, but finally reached Flower Street, headquarters for jewelers who deal with the tourist trade. Went with Bramer to the Altar of Heaven again to photograph the rounded beauty of its blue tiles. A hot, dry day with blue sky. The nearby Altar of Agriculture, where the emperors tried their dainty hands at plowing each year. With all the ceremonies they had to go to each year it is a wonder they ever got the time to do any governing. It is all gone to ruin now except for a half-hearted park. Saw a mosque across two fields and a garbage dump. After lunch slept three hours to visit Nanhai or South Sea Lake, now a semi-public park. Coolies can’t afford to pay the small admission charge. It has many pavilions, extensive rock gardens, lotus ponds and distant views of white towers. Around it are government offices, big cars and the office of the “Manchutikuo Trade Commission.” I liked much better the view of the big red and white striped Marine radio towers against the blue sky and white clouds.

By Sunday my internal upset had lasted three days and I felt the shadow of my former self. It draws off my energy while my mind works overtime remembering more pleasant times and worrying about what I’ll do for a living in Manila. The missionaries are full of war stories, some of which might well be discounted as wish-fulfillment dreams. The central section of the Forbidden City ended my visits there until the next time I get stuck here. Many separate buildings in individual courts down walled lanes. With scores to choose from, the emperors couldn’t complain of being tired of sitting on the same throne each time. Many policemen in faded khaki uniforms stand around doing nothing. Liked some Chinese drawings of horses and a series of sketches in a style similar to 14th century Italian that show the production of rice and silk. Afterwards had ice cream and fruit sundae in a Chinese tearoom.

Slept so poorly that I stayed abed all morning, missing a scheduled visit to Yenching University. I just didn’t feel up to it, and dozed away until 1:30 p.m. Had no lunch and only milk and toast for supper. I’m sure hungry tonight! Cheered by the prospect of moving again. Walked with Kramer to the Peking Union Medical College again, en route visiting a big arcade that sold everything. To judge by the number of copies of the pirated edition of his How to Win Friends and Influence People on sale, Dale Carnegie soon will have created a chummy nation. Pearl Buck also goes well here. Note that ricksha boys always tell foreign customers they haven’t been given enough money for the ride: the thing to do is get off and pay no attention. Caroll Alcott, the American commentator on XMHA, a Shanghai International Settlement radio station, is eagerly awaited by foreigners here for his 15 minute noon and evening news broadcasts, delivered in a dry, toneless voice but full of cracks against the Japanese and their collaborators and news about their activities. Amid commercials for familiar products like Jello and Ovaltine, he refers to “the New Odor” in East Asia. The Japanese attempt but do not completely succeed in jamming XMHA’s shortwave signal. Attempts have been made to assassinate him,

Tuesday, August 20 was my last day in Peking and went very well. I felt well again and dared take an 11-mile bus ride into the countryside to visit Yenching University. At the city gates the Chinese passengers had to get out and walk through a police patting down. Several freshly painted anti-British signs have been erected for the edification of the English-speaking tourists. The university, sponsored by Harvard and aluminum king Hall, is built in modified Chinese style. The water tower is disguised as a pagoda and all the buildings have curving Chinese roofs in green tile but the interiors are fair—but only fair—examples of familiar classroom plaster. Evidently the educational system is mainly in the American tradition. An English-speaking Chinese political science student clad in a long white gown bargained ricksha coolies down from 1 Mex. dollar to 30 cents for a trip on a narrow asphalt road to the Summer Palace around a large lake on the Mountain of 10,000 Ancients or Garden of Peaceful Enjoyment. The British destroyed the original palaces in 1860 as a punishment for a truce violation, so the buildings and a marble boat are the creation of the Empress Dowager, who squandered the funds meant to build a Chinese navy. It’s all part of the decadence that led to China’s fall and Japan’s rise.

Started south on Wednesday, August 21 after ten days in Peking. An early breakfast, then with myself in one ricksha and my baggage in another, went down the streets already bustling with people, to the Water Gate. A short walk to the 11-car train. Much SMR stock but the first-class sleeping car was built locally in 1923 and looks its age. It has compartments with connecting washrooms. Boys (really boys) come along at intervals with hot tea and hot towels. I share a compartment with Kenjiro Sawai, a Japanese broker visiting his firm’s branches in China. We exchange cards. The adjacent one holds two Canadian missionary ladies returning from vacation at Peitaho beach on the Gulf of Chihli. Same scenery all day: flat fields green with millet, corn and cotton broken by clumps of trees marking mud villages with mud walls and by flooded areas. Signs of recent track washouts. Frequent stations are from the towns they serve unless the places are large. Signs that the New Order is disputed: stations and bridges with barbed wire on concrete posts, low concrete pill boxes with loopholes of differing sizes, occasional sentries atop station roofs. As Chinese passengers leave the stations they form long lines to be searched for firearms by Japanese or Chinese soldiers. Very slow going. We didn’t get to Tientsin’s factory until noon and not until 9:30 p.m. did we cross the Hwang Ho or Yellow River on an enormous bridge, floodlighted and heavily guarded, into Tsinan in Shantung, a whole day to go 304 miles through a monotonous plain. Here we had our passports examined as we had in Tientsin. The examiner was obviously a Russian. A night guard of Japanese soldiers in full equipment boarded the train with us. We found our berths made up and all shades pulled down.

At dawn Thursday we were passing a heavily populated region of low rounded rocky treeless hills. Almost every mile a villager stood with a white flag guaranteeing the absence of guerillas and stations were guarded by stone blockhouses. At sidings we passed armored trains camouflaged in gay colors. Meals in the dining care are almost as bad as the service. Tablecloths are dirty, there is no ice, no water, and soot blows in through banging loose screens. But I got a compartment to myself and was able to take a nap and read Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies, a tale of England’s Terrible Twenties. At the edge of the hills Hsuchow, where we exchanged at par our North China bank notes for 100 military yen bills, good only in (occupied) China. Made a long stop at Pengpu on the rapidly flowing Hwai-ho. It was attacked by Chinese troops last year. The country has changed noticeably to a wide, heavily cultivated plain where millet, hemp, cotton, peanuts, and wheat are grown. Walked along the platforms of the stations where we stopped. Those on this British-built part of the railway are much simpler than those the Germans constructed north of Hsuchow. A few more very low hills before we reached the terminus of Pukow on the Yangtze. Here we went through baggage and passport examinations again. Young Japanese soldiers in shirtsleeves were pushing old Chinese women around, an ugly sight I hadn’t seen before. Almost got into a fight with an angry porter for giving him the wrong kind of bank note. All passengers were jammed aboard an overcrowded ferry, which threatened to capsize in the broad river every time we passed a ship’s wake. Traffic included an army tranport, armored launches, a gunboat with anti-aircraft guns. On the south bank Nanking, with Japanese flags on all principal buildings and more examinations. Once British, now Japanese Yangtze Hotel a few blocks up from the river hot as hell in the August afternoon.

Tossed all night in the heat on a hard bed and was up early for a lousy breakfast and a long ricksha ride through the ancient gray city wall down a long boulevard of potholes past places familiar from 1937 newsreels: the rebuilt electric power plant, the newsmen’s hotel ruins, the burned and gutted rickshas are rundown. Shops alongside are in shacks and display a few pitiful articles for sale like looted beds. A steady stream of Japanese tanks, and Army and Navy staff cars. Visited the Japanese Consulate General. Yes, they had the Gaimusho letter but unfortunately Wang Ching-Wei was busy in conference with the Japanese envoy, so I’d have to make do with the Publicity Minister. Had lunch with a Miss Violet and three other lonely spinsters at the Presbyterian mission, its walls marked with posters bearing the American flag and the words “American Property” in English and Chinese. They still receive newspapers from Shanghai but in plain envelopes. They say Chinese guerillas are near the city and that it is blacked out at night. Their school operates up to the high school level and support destitute widows simultaneously. Walked around city three hours and had a name seal carved by hand. Most of the customers are Japanese soldiers. Their favorite purchase is a leather bag. At 5 p.m. (“Chinese time” rather than Tokyo’s) I was received by the Publicity Minister Lin Pai-sheng in a former bank building guarded by soldiers with fixed bayonets. He had a personal guard outside his luxurious office. Lin speaks good English and pretends to be very frank. Actually, he admits more and more as he waxes voluble. Although he first denied it, he later said “We are using pressure on American (and other) business to gain recognition for our government.” This would be followed by “cooperation.” “We have nothing against Chang personally,” he stated bluntly. Says Wang left him after Chang refused to enter peace negotiations. Japanese soldiers (“peasant boys”) had been taught to regard the Chinese as enemies but were now learning to treat them less roughly. Acknowledged that the Nanking regime could not yet survive without the help of the Japanese army, which would be withdrawn “gradually”—if there were peace. He compared the present situation to the American Civil War, when brother fought brother. Even to carpetbaggers in occupied area, I thought. Confessed that Nanking’s own army currently only has two battalions, equipped only with rifles. The Wang government is trying to obtain control of the railways. And so on. Obviously this is a puppet regime.

The railway runs on Tokyo time and I had to be up at almost dawn to catch the 8 a.m. express. South of the Yangtze service is back to normal. Trains runs quite fast. First-class had excellent upholstered individual seats and tea was passed out at frequent intervals into glasses inserted into holders. Adjacent seat occupied by a loud Chinese affiliated with the Finance Ministry in Nanking, who thought he spoke English. With difficulty I learned that a new China Central Bank is being organized to issue “fapu” notes at par with the Chungking dollar. Initial issue will be 500 million. Ruefully complained that “Japanese has got monopoly North China Federal Reserve. They issue about 8 billion dollar. Also half billion military yen every year.” He pointed to the electrified barbed wire fence between Tanyang and Changchow, where guerillas derailed a train only three weeks ago. As far as Soochow low mountains appeared alongside irregularly, then lakes, rice fields and canals. At many places, especially Wusih, ruined factories and empty tenements marked the grave of the real new China that existed until 1937. Acres of wrecked buildings marked our entry into Shanghai’s newly rebuilt North Station. Japanese sanitary efforts consisted of making us wash our hands in carbolic solution and having our trousers sprayed with it. Took a battered taxi around the wrecked railway administration building, full of shell holes but still standing, a Rising Sun flying over its roof, past sentries and barbed wire barricades and into the International Settlement. A great feeling of relief. Registered at the Park Hotel, 18 stories of modernity. It costs 60 Mex. (nearly $4) a day but I like luxury when I can afford it. Tramped miles along Bubbling Well Road in the summer heat, bewildered by real city traffic again. Bought a pirated copy of Hallett Abend’s, Chaos in Asia, strongly critical of everything we’ve been told in recent weeks, from a young Jewish refugee recently arrived from Germany who peddled books on the street. Celebrated my return to Western control with sundaes, real coffee and a lousy movie.

While lunching in the Park’s fine air-conditioned dining room I witnessed the last British soldiers in Shanghai, 600 Seaforth Highlanders, parade down the racecourse to embark, leaving only our 4th Marines to carry on. Seeking to interview Carroll Alcott, I rang the XHMA doorbell. A man opened the door, looked at me suspiciously and barred my way. “You’ll have to pardon me for being rude,” he apologized, “but we’ve been threatened.” Not once, I learned, but repeatedly. Alcott was almost kidnapped on the street. He twits the Japanese not only on the radio but when they call him on the telephone. Toured the International Settlement all day by foot and bus on a day when the temperature hit 95 but I was too fascinated to notice. This is an island in a Japanese-controlled ocean. At the other end of the Garden Road bridge Japanese sentries make each Chinese passenger bow and remove his hat but—in sight of foreign witnesses—do nothing else. In their area they use rickety Nissan pancake engines to replace the abandoned streetcar lines. Shanghai Volunteer Corps in steel helmets and shorts stand opposite. Saw a building on the Bund (river wharf) with Norwegian, Nazi German, and British flags flying from its roof. Broadway Mansions building flies Rising Sun and Nanking flags. The bus up Edward VII Avenue to Jessfield Park has its route signs in English and French. On Bubbling Well Road there are scores of small shops run by Viennese Jews who have sought refuge from Hitler. Other refugees try to sell newspapers or even beg. As I walked at least 150 wildly gesticulating barefoot rickshaw pullers offered their services. “Hey mister, you want ricksha? Where you want to go?” Passed several groups of people fighting each other on the streets without hindrance from the police or much notice from bystanders. The Fourth Marines Club is an enlisted man’s paradise. Streets crowded by night as well as by day and passing cars honk unceasingly. Tiny rouged Chinese prostitutes roam. Saw “Raffles,” a better movie.

Spent a good part of my third day in Shanghai between the offices of the Nippon Yusen Kaisha at the end of the Bund and the American President Lines on narrow Canton Road. APL’s Kobe office had forgotten to send authorization of my ticket transfer here, but after much cabling my passage was arranged for the Coolidge on Wednesday. The European/American staffs of both lines need to get sobered up and given schedules to study. A relief to get this straightened out, anyway. To the British Consulate General, behind green lawns, for a Hong Kong visa. Offices filled with propaganda posters illustrating decaying Britain’s might. Officials so unpleasantly inquisitive that I thought I was back in Japan. Clearly visible across Garden Bridge is Japan, which by the way, hosts the USSR embassy. Apart from its rickshaws and cosmopolitanism, downtown Shanghai might be like any in the West. For the equivalent of 11 cents I bought a pirated copy of Ernest O. Hauser’s Shangahi: City for Sale. His statements on Chinese policy are a bit imaginative; his style florid, but in tracing the rise (1842) and fall of the British taipan (1937) at the hands of the very Japanese whom he once used against the Chinese he puts Shanghai’s present troubles in a different light and this is the day of reckoning.

It was about one o’clock Wednesday morning and I was being pulled rapidly up the deserted asphalt of Nanking Road when who should appear but Ted Winebrenner and Charlie Fogg. They were bound for a bar and I was headed for my hotel after two hours of walking around the eerie, deserted (curfew) streets of the French town, so we started looking for a bar. We wandered around alleys where thousands slept in rows on sidewalks, passed armored cars, policemen on bicycles and all-night workshops. Laughed at a tailor’s sign reading: “Ladies have fits upstairs.” Bars proved disappointing. Ugly Russian women sat around listening to tinny bands. We had three beers apiece, a lot of conversation and walked to our hotels.

My last day in Shanghai was rainy. From Ted’s room on the 12th floor of the Cathay we could see fat into the countryside beyond the towering structure of the shell-pocked old North Station. At this remove the scene didn’t appear Oriental. It must have been an exciting place during the 1937 battles. We spent the afternoon at the Cathay bar, where Russian hostesses really entertain. Then the boys took the tender with me and hundreds of others to board the President Coolidge, tied up at buoys in the Whangpoo River before saying goodbye again. The ship left its moorings at 8 p.m. We went slowly down the muddy river and its miles of wharves dotted with solitary lights, freighters, launches, sampans, junks with white cotton patches on their sails to the Yangtze estuary to await a high tide to cross the outer bar. It looks good to see the Stars and Stripes flying from the mast of an American ship, the flag and blue and red funnels with eagles on their sides illuminated by floodlights. I know some of the passengers but they don’t seem very friendly.

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James J. Halsema in realtion to the study of Japanese history

by:
Grant K. Goodman,
KU professor emeritus of history

Follow this link for photos of Jim and his parents.

For historians of modern Japan, of whom I happen to be one, the search for clues to a better understanding of Japan’s imperial expansion as well as of Japan’s concurrent internal authoritarianism is never ending. That same search usually leads us to try to find new documentary sources, especially those which are contemporary in the sense that they record events, personalities, and in particular, an environment revelatory of evolving Japanese developments. Remarkably, I believe, this is what is so important about the diary of James Halsema.

Several years ago in a casual conversation Jim Halsema not only told me that he was a student delegate to the 7th Japan-America Student Conference (JASC) held in Japan, but that he had kept a diary of that experience. Luckily for us Jim had that diary in his possession and has been willing to share it with us. Because Jim Halsema was an incredibly astute and careful observer, even at the relatively tender age of 21, we are able to share his keen perceptions of Japan, Korea, Manchuria, and China on the eve of the Pacific War. And what we are able to discern in retrospect from the Halsema diary is that a) the Japanese government had no intention whatever of diminishing its imperial state in Northeast Asia and b) that Japanese public opinion was extremely supportive of that position. From Halsema’s observations one easily deduces that, behind the rhetoric of comity which is endemic in the nature of the Japan-America Student Conference, there was already evident a significant degree of tension at the base of Japanese-American relations. That Halsema was as insightful as he was can surely be attributed to his native intelligence and to his education and in particular, to his exposure to Asia including Japan from his earliest childhood.

James Halsema was born Jan. 1, 1919 in Warren, Ohio while his father, who had joined the Philippine Islands Bureau of Public Works as an engineer in 1908, was serving in the US Army Corps of Engineers. At the age of six months, James, together with his mother and sister joined their father E.J. Halsema in Zamboanga where he resumed his career with the Bureau of Public Works. Seconded to develop the Malangas coalmine, E.H. Halsema barely survived an epidemic of blackwater (cerebral malaria) fever that killed 600 Cebuano workers. Sent to Baguio to recuperate, E.H. Halsema stayed there 17 years serving as city mayor and district engineer for Benguet.

James Halsema attended the prestigious Brent School in Baguio, graduating in 1936 proceeding to Duke University where he graduated with honors in History in 1940. He returned to the Philippines after the JASC and was interned by the Imperial Japanese Army, which captured Baguio Dec. 27, 1941.

It was Paul Linebarger, the outstanding Asianist on the Duke faculty at the time, who acquainted Jim Halsema with the JASC and urged him to apply. Halsema himself notes, “Japan was not exotic to me or my family. Growing up in the Philippines as the son of an American official in the American colonial era, I visited Japanese ports, usually Kobe and Yokohama, en route to Manila from San Francisco. In 1938 on my one and only summer at home in Baguio… I saw both Japanese ports twice and encountered a very suspicious attitude on the part of Japanese officialdom (as well as having to provide stool samples on the eastward return to prove that I hadn’t picked up any tropical diseases). In 1903-4 Japanese skilled labor was used in the construction of the Benguet (now Kennon) Road from the lowland railhead to the hill station of Baguio. Many remained, and more joined them. The 1940 census showed that in Baguio and its suburbs there were 1064 Japanese citizens as contrasted with 635 Americans. There was a Japanese school. Japanese radio stations like JOAK provided strong signals at night. Taiwan was only a few hundred kilometers north… Japanese were active in retailing and vegetable farming. My hair was cut by Japanese women barbers.”The 1940 Japan America Student ConferenceThe 1940 Japan America Student ConferenceJames J. HalsemaJames J. HalsemaPictured, A Japanese woman delegate andPictured, A Japanese woman delegate andJim Halsema at Tsuda CollegeJim Halsema at Tsuda CollegeIn the spring of 1940 at the age of 21, I graduated from Duke University and prepared to return, despite my father’s opposition, to my home, the Philippines. My parents had retired in Baguio, its former summer capital, at the end of a 30-year career in Philippine Government service, during which my father served 17 years as Mayor and City Engineer of Baguio. My father felt that I should seek a career in the United States rather than return to the Philippines, which I considered home.In the spring of 1940 at the age of 21, I graduated from Duke University and prepared to return, despite my father’s opposition, to my home, the Philippines. My parents had retired in Baguio, its former summer capital, at the end of a 30-year career in Philippine Government service, during which my father served 17 years as Mayor and City Engineer of Baguio. My father felt that I should seek a career in the United States rather than return to the Philippines, which I considered home.At Duke one of my young professors was Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger. Paul’s youth had largely paralleled mine. His father, an American judge in the Philippines, became involved in the Chinese Nationalist movement and went on to be the principal advisor to Sun Yat-sen. In 1940, Duke had few ties to East Asia. Oriental students were so rare as to be discriminated for rather than against. Paul became one of my closest friends, for we had shared the student plight of being considered an oddball by our peers. Duke’s obsession with football consumed most student argument; we argued foreign policy. We agreed that lacking any real American interest in the Orient, the Roosevelt administration was free to do – or not do – whatever it wanted in the area.At Duke one of my young professors was Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger. Paul’s youth had largely paralleled mine. His father, an American judge in the Philippines, became involved in the Chinese Nationalist movement and went on to be the principal advisor to Sun Yat-sen. In 1940, Duke had few ties to East Asia. Oriental students were so rare as to be discriminated for rather than against. Paul became one of my closest friends, for we had shared the student plight of being considered an oddball by our peers. Duke’s obsession with football consumed most student argument; we argued foreign policy. We agreed that lacking any real American interest in the Orient, the Roosevelt administration was free to do – or not do – whatever it wanted in the area.One day Paul asked if I would like to be Duke’s delegate to the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. Begun in 1934, the annual meeting sites alternated between the two countries. Ostensibly sponsored by universities, the Japanese government undoubtedly had a strong role. The 1940 conference would meet in Japan. During my junior and senior years I’d urged my classmates to apply for tour scholarships offered by the Germans and Italians as part of their country’s efforts to win American sympathy. “Sure,” I’d said, “You’ll be fed a lot of propaganda, but think of all the free travel, food and drink you’ll get.” Japanese scholarships offered no travel costs outside Japan, but my own homeward steamship passage was to be via Japan anyway. With no job commitments, why not apply? I had no real competition for the slot since only one other senior was interested in the Orient, and his grade was too low to be considered. It was easy to accept the offer.One day Paul asked if I would like to be Duke’s delegate to the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. Begun in 1934, the annual meeting sites alternated between the two countries. Ostensibly sponsored by universities, the Japanese government undoubtedly had a strong role. The 1940 conference would meet in Japan. During my junior and senior years I’d urged my classmates to apply for tour scholarships offered by the Germans and Italians as part of their country’s efforts to win American sympathy. “Sure,” I’d said, “You’ll be fed a lot of propaganda, but think of all the free travel, food and drink you’ll get.” Japanese scholarships offered no travel costs outside Japan, but my own homeward steamship passage was to be via Japan anyway. With no job commitments, why not apply? I had no real competition for the slot since only one other senior was interested in the Orient, and his grade was too low to be considered. It was easy to accept the offer.With three classmates as paying passengers in my Buick, we drove cross-country on two-lane back roads, including a stretch of dirt track through Monument Valley in Utah, to the west coast. After ten sybaritic days at the southern California beach resort, Balboa Island, I went on to San Francisco to ship my car to Manila and rendezvous with the rest of the American delegation.With three classmates as paying passengers in my Buick, we drove cross-country on two-lane back roads, including a stretch of dirt track through Monument Valley in Utah, to the west coast. After ten sybaritic days at the southern California beach resort, Balboa Island, I went on to San Francisco to ship my car to Manila and rendezvous with the rest of the American delegation.The delegation of 58 came mostly from prestige schools on the Pacific Coast; a handful from east of the Rockies. Two delegates, Kay Kitagawa and Kay Uchida, were Nisei, Japanese born in America. Earlier groups had more Nisei, since they were actively recruited by students from Japan. Several in our delegation had attended the Sixth Conference in 1939 at the University of Southern California. Stanford University had the largest number of student delegates, and, since Edmund W. Pugh, Jr. served as Conference Executive Chairman, its eight-person delegation tended to dominate.The delegation of 58 came mostly from prestige schools on the Pacific Coast; a handful from east of the Rockies. Two delegates, Kay Kitagawa and Kay Uchida, were Nisei, Japanese born in America. Earlier groups had more Nisei, since they were actively recruited by students from Japan. Several in our delegation had attended the Sixth Conference in 1939 at the University of Southern California. Stanford University had the largest number of student delegates, and, since Edmund W. Pugh, Jr. served as Conference Executive Chairman, its eight-person delegation tended to dominate.I felt intimidated until I suddenly realized that I had more East Asia experience than most of my colleagues; my experience began at the age of five months. In June 1919, a U.S. Army transport took my seasick mother, my sister and me via Vladivostok to rejoin my father in Baguio. In later years mother recounted the ship refueling in Nagasaki, where women carried coal aboard in baskets supported by tump lines over their foreheads. Baguio in the 20’s had a resident population of a thousand Japanese, and several of its stores were Japanese-owned. Japanese women barbers cut my hair and the barbershop had thick magazines I couldn’t read, but which were illustrated with fascinating drawings of long-ago samurai in elaborate armor. In 1940, my most recent visit to Japan had been in 1938 en route to my one and only college summer vacation at home in Baguio. That summer, my Kobe “sex store” purchases gained me prestige with my North Carolina fraternity brothers. Although in 1940 I was familiar with recent events in East Asia, I spoke no Japanese and knew little of Japan or its culture. My only contacts had been at Pacific ports and on a train trip from Kobe to Yokohama.I felt intimidated until I suddenly realized that I had more East Asia experience than most of my colleagues; my experience began at the age of five months. In June 1919, a U.S. Army transport took my seasick mother, my sister and me via Vladivostok to rejoin my father in Baguio. In later years mother recounted the ship refueling in Nagasaki, where women carried coal aboard in baskets supported by tump lines over their foreheads. Baguio in the 20’s had a resident population of a thousand Japanese, and several of its stores were Japanese-owned. Japanese women barbers cut my hair and the barbershop had thick magazines I couldn’t read, but which were illustrated with fascinating drawings of long-ago samurai in elaborate armor. In 1940, my most recent visit to Japan had been in 1938 en route to my one and only college summer vacation at home in Baguio. That summer, my Kobe “sex store” purchases gained me prestige with my North Carolina fraternity brothers. Although in 1940 I was familiar with recent events in East Asia, I spoke no Japanese and knew little of Japan or its culture. My only contacts had been at Pacific ports and on a train trip from Kobe to Yokohama.We sailed June 23, 1940 from San Francisco on the Asama Maru, one of the largest and best of Japan’s passenger liners. The traditional departure, replete with streamers thrown to friends on the pier, music by the ship’s orchestra and blasts of the ship’s whistle, had become unique in a world torn by war. I shared #260, a small second-class cabin with two double-decked bunks. My cabin roommates were Jack Baird of USC, a stout pedantic graduate student who ran the university library circulation desk and was accustomed to telling younger people what to do; Donald Earl McInnis of UCLA, “the kid” who was proud of “not drinking, not smoking, not chewing and not going with the boys who do”; and Harold Clifton Gould, McInnis’s antithesis. Baird was easier to get along with than I had first feared.We sailed June 23, 1940 from San Francisco on the Asama Maru, one of the largest and best of Japan’s passenger liners. The traditional departure, replete with streamers thrown to friends on the pier, music by the ship’s orchestra and blasts of the ship’s whistle, had become unique in a world torn by war. I shared #260, a small second-class cabin with two double-decked bunks. My cabin roommates were Jack Baird of USC, a stout pedantic graduate student who ran the university library circulation desk and was accustomed to telling younger people what to do; Donald Earl McInnis of UCLA, “the kid” who was proud of “not drinking, not smoking, not chewing and not going with the boys who do”; and Harold Clifton Gould, McInnis’s antithesis. Baird was easier to get along with than I had first feared.Among the passengers, was a group of 54 Nisei who were being given a tour of a land in which most of them would not understand the language or customs any more than I. One husky 6’ 2″ Sacramento High School football player complained: “They feed us rice all the time. I’d sure like to get my hands on a good steak.” Our cabin “boy”, Uchida-san, was a quick little fellow who wakened us at 7 a.m., collected laundry, cleaned the social hall and sneaked an occasional beer with us. I made friends with Leo Goldberg, a pleasant New Yorker with a neatly trimmed mustache, who exported Kobe products. A great talker with a smooth manner, he knew his way around the Orient and got along in the way Americans who live there get along if they expect to stay there very long.Among the passengers, was a group of 54 Nisei who were being given a tour of a land in which most of them would not understand the language or customs any more than I. One husky 6’ 2″ Sacramento High School football player complained: “They feed us rice all the time. I’d sure like to get my hands on a good steak.” Our cabin “boy”, Uchida-san, was a quick little fellow who wakened us at 7 a.m., collected laundry, cleaned the social hall and sneaked an occasional beer with us. I made friends with Leo Goldberg, a pleasant New Yorker with a neatly trimmed mustache, who exported Kobe products. A great talker with a smooth manner, he knew his way around the Orient and got along in the way Americans who live there get along if they expect to stay there very long.We spent the usual day in Honolulu, which seemed the same old place of my first remembered visit in 1927. People on the mainland think of Hawaii in romantic terms. In reality Honolulu is a fairly pleasant town where, with proper friends, I felt it might be good for a summer or two. In July 1940 my main concerns were shopping, the heat and the remarkable combination of races, all of whom in the second generation spoke, acted and dressed 102% American. A Hawaiian bus driver explained with amused tolerance and simple English to a kimono and geta-clad Japanese woman how to get to the Asama Maru to bid farewell to her friends, then turned to glance at the rest of us as if to say: “These foreigners!” We had a drink at the pink-stuccoed Royal Hawaiian Hotel on Waikiki Beach, a touristy clip joint equipped with beautiful lawns and trees, dance instructors and shops selling Philippine-made ukeleles. Lunched at a Chinese restaurant, also a clip joint. Wesley Fishel and I spent the afternoon touring Honolulu and its eastern suburbs beyond Diamond Head by bus. Many fine homes surround the fortified point and farther out, frame farmhouses and a golf course.We spent the usual day in Honolulu, which seemed the same old place of my first remembered visit in 1927. People on the mainland think of Hawaii in romantic terms. In reality Honolulu is a fairly pleasant town where, with proper friends, I felt it might be good for a summer or two. In July 1940 my main concerns were shopping, the heat and the remarkable combination of races, all of whom in the second generation spoke, acted and dressed 102% American. A Hawaiian bus driver explained with amused tolerance and simple English to a kimono and geta-clad Japanese woman how to get to the Asama Maru to bid farewell to her friends, then turned to glance at the rest of us as if to say: “These foreigners!” We had a drink at the pink-stuccoed Royal Hawaiian Hotel on Waikiki Beach, a touristy clip joint equipped with beautiful lawns and trees, dance instructors and shops selling Philippine-made ukeleles. Lunched at a Chinese restaurant, also a clip joint. Wesley Fishel and I spent the afternoon touring Honolulu and its eastern suburbs beyond Diamond Head by bus. Many fine homes surround the fortified point and farther out, frame farmhouses and a golf course.While we crossed an almost empty ocean, momentous events were taking place in Europe and our own country. The ship radio receiver for passengers was “out of order,” but having sold radios in my high school days, it was easy to restore the antenna connection with a screwdriver. En route to Honolulu, we picked up the news of Wendell Willkie’s nomination from KNX in Los Angeles. The ship’s radio was irreparable after we left Hawaii but Eduardo Zabarete, a Manila accountant, had a small Emerson battery set. By straining our ears, we could hear Honolulu stations telling of the evacuation of Hong Kong by Americans and British dependents because of Japanese encirclement of the colony. I asked myself: “Will Britain fight if Japan seizes the rock? And where would that leave us?” I tried deliberately not giving much thought to the matter but eventually decided it would be a while before the Japanese made any actual move against the colony. I believed they would wait until Britain was beaten by Germany—if and when such a dreadful thing happened. The white man’s loss is Japan’s gain, as Germany learned during the last world mess. I still found it hard to realize that France was finished as an independent nation. Only a few weeks before, any magazine would have said it had a long way to go yet. No France! Strange, but not overwhelmingly so.While we crossed an almost empty ocean, momentous events were taking place in Europe and our own country. The ship radio receiver for passengers was “out of order,” but having sold radios in my high school days, it was easy to restore the antenna connection with a screwdriver. En route to Honolulu, we picked up the news of Wendell Willkie’s nomination from KNX in Los Angeles. The ship’s radio was irreparable after we left Hawaii but Eduardo Zabarete, a Manila accountant, had a small Emerson battery set. By straining our ears, we could hear Honolulu stations telling of the evacuation of Hong Kong by Americans and British dependents because of Japanese encirclement of the colony. I asked myself: “Will Britain fight if Japan seizes the rock? And where would that leave us?” I tried deliberately not giving much thought to the matter but eventually decided it would be a while before the Japanese made any actual move against the colony. I believed they would wait until Britain was beaten by Germany—if and when such a dreadful thing happened. The white man’s loss is Japan’s gain, as Germany learned during the last world mess. I still found it hard to realize that France was finished as an independent nation. Only a few weeks before, any magazine would have said it had a long way to go yet. No France! Strange, but not overwhelmingly so.Familiar trans-Pacific trip activities. Played quoits with Emmajean Doddridge, the perky, pleasant blonde delegate from Earlham College in Indiana, and Walter E. “Ted” Winebrenner, who, like me, had college newspaper experience. Both were engaged to be married when they returned home. Another congenial companion was Ted Guenther, a vague cousin of the author of Inside Europe. A group of Germans returning home via Siberia was very friendly too.Familiar trans-Pacific trip activities. Played quoits with Emmajean Doddridge, the perky, pleasant blonde delegate from Earlham College in Indiana, and Walter E. “Ted” Winebrenner, who, like me, had college newspaper experience. Both were engaged to be married when they returned home. Another congenial companion was Ted Guenther, a vague cousin of the author of Inside Europe. A group of Germans returning home via Siberia was very friendly too.Observed lost Date Line Day (July 3) and Independence Day with a student party. Had a flag-raising ceremony on the sun deck and games in the afternoon. Cabin 260’s contribution was a two-story mama with two squalling brats, put together with curtains, towels and sheets and a large quantity of pins provided by a willing but baffled Uchida. I wore an enormous diaper. On the second round Harold Gould, the lower story, collapsed, and we could only watch the others compete. Later dozed in the sun thinking of the States nostalgically in ways that to most seem superficial but to me and Paul Linebarger were integral parts of our culture: chewing gum and Coca-Colas, fine plumbing, concrete highways, easy intimacy between men and women, crisp morning newspapers full of comics and pictures, the friendliness of people on country roads, Florida in the winter sun, Radio City’s magic towers, the filling simplicity of a Middle Western meal, self-criticism, radio variety shows… As we sailed west and north the weather turned foggy and considerably cooler.Observed lost Date Line Day (July 3) and Independence Day with a student party. Had a flag-raising ceremony on the sun deck and games in the afternoon. Cabin 260’s contribution was a two-story mama with two squalling brats, put together with curtains, towels and sheets and a large quantity of pins provided by a willing but baffled Uchida. I wore an enormous diaper. On the second round Harold Gould, the lower story, collapsed, and we could only watch the others compete. Later dozed in the sun thinking of the States nostalgically in ways that to most seem superficial but to me and Paul Linebarger were integral parts of our culture: chewing gum and Coca-Colas, fine plumbing, concrete highways, easy intimacy between men and women, crisp morning newspapers full of comics and pictures, the friendliness of people on country roads, Florida in the winter sun, Radio City’s magic towers, the filling simplicity of a Middle Western meal, self-criticism, radio variety shows… As we sailed west and north the weather turned foggy and considerably cooler.We arrived at Yokohama on Monday, July 8 on a hot, humid morning. An approaching storm was heralded by strong winds that brought a heavy mist over the blue peninsulas. At 7 a.m., our expected arrival time, we were still wallowing in heavy Pacific water. At Yokohama by 11 a.m. and was irritated by having baggage, money, tobacco and books minutely inspected on a crowded, non-air conditioned ship before we were allowed ashore. At least we didn’t all have to provide stool samples as travelers from Asian points where required to do on my 1938 trip.We arrived at Yokohama on Monday, July 8 on a hot, humid morning. An approaching storm was heralded by strong winds that brought a heavy mist over the blue peninsulas. At 7 a.m., our expected arrival time, we were still wallowing in heavy Pacific water. At Yokohama by 11 a.m. and was irritated by having baggage, money, tobacco and books minutely inspected on a crowded, non-air conditioned ship before we were allowed ashore. At least we didn’t all have to provide stool samples as travelers from Asian points where required to do on my 1938 trip.Finally, cleared by the suspicious customs officers, we struggled through milling crowds to be met by our Japanese male counterparts, in black uniforms, white collars and visored caps, who would be our hosts henceforth. They took us by taxi to the station. Although the first right turn into the bustling left-hand traffic gave the usual surprise, the first Asian city I had seen in two years otherwise did not seem strange or foreign. We went to Tokyo on a swaying, bumpy interurban trolley through continuous urban areas, seeing not rice fields but electric transmission lines and straphangers in kimonos. We glimpsed little shops, passed by both paper houses and functionalist modern factories.Finally, cleared by the suspicious customs officers, we struggled through milling crowds to be met by our Japanese male counterparts, in black uniforms, white collars and visored caps, who would be our hosts henceforth. They took us by taxi to the station. Although the first right turn into the bustling left-hand traffic gave the usual surprise, the first Asian city I had seen in two years otherwise did not seem strange or foreign. We went to Tokyo on a swaying, bumpy interurban trolley through continuous urban areas, seeing not rice fields but electric transmission lines and straphangers in kimonos. We glimpsed little shops, passed by both paper houses and functionalist modern factories.In Tokyo we changed to the Seibu Line for a long ride to Kokubunji in what were then the distant suburbs of Tokyo, where we took a charcoal gas-powered bus to Tsuda Women’s college, where the Conference was held. We were quartered in concrete single room dormitories. The big Westerners had problems fitting into Japanese doorways and beds and squatting on Japanese toilets. We found the meals meager. It was mid-summer but not even electric fans were provided.In Tokyo we changed to the Seibu Line for a long ride to Kokubunji in what were then the distant suburbs of Tokyo, where we took a charcoal gas-powered bus to Tsuda Women’s college, where the Conference was held. We were quartered in concrete single room dormitories. The big Westerners had problems fitting into Japanese doorways and beds and squatting on Japanese toilets. We found the meals meager. It was mid-summer but not even electric fans were provided.The hundred-odd Japanese delegates, who greatly outnumbered us, were friendly and very pleasant despite the increasing tensions between our governments. Some spoke excellent English; others had accents difficult to understand. We got together in the village our first evening for a bit of sake, rice wine served hot in small cups from small earthen bottles.The hundred-odd Japanese delegates, who greatly outnumbered us, were friendly and very pleasant despite the increasing tensions between our governments. Some spoke excellent English; others had accents difficult to understand. We got together in the village our first evening for a bit of sake, rice wine served hot in small cups from small earthen bottles.It soon became obvious that we were going to be spending much of our time being shown famous sights and model institutions. We saw no factories except those making household products. On Tuesday morning we went into Tokyo on a narrow asphalt road lined with thick trees and houses close to the pavement. We rode with three buses, whose charcoal fuel so reduced their engine power that they barely crawled up grades. Just as in the U.S., many streets were torn up for utility line repairs.It soon became obvious that we were going to be spending much of our time being shown famous sights and model institutions. We saw no factories except those making household products. On Tuesday morning we went into Tokyo on a narrow asphalt road lined with thick trees and houses close to the pavement. We rode with three buses, whose charcoal fuel so reduced their engine power that they barely crawled up grades. Just as in the U.S., many streets were torn up for utility line repairs.Our first stop was a ceremonial visit to the gates of the Imperial Palace, where we were lined up to make a small bow while being officially photographed. We were not allowed to take pictures ourselves. Groups of schoolgirls in middy blouses marched past us, watched by policemen with white-topped hats standing on every corner.Our first stop was a ceremonial visit to the gates of the Imperial Palace, where we were lined up to make a small bow while being officially photographed. We were not allowed to take pictures ourselves. Groups of schoolgirls in middy blouses marched past us, watched by policemen with white-topped hats standing on every corner.Next we visited Nagatamachi, a model primary school aided by Rockefeller Foundation funds, whose classrooms rivaled mine at Duke, but whose bathrooms had the familiar stink. We saw children, many wearing eyeglasses, poring over and laboriously copying samples of characters. Much of the classroom work involved recitation in unison. Other students were doing the same kinds of artwork as eight year-old Americans. The kindly, chubby-faced, mustached principal beamed as a six foot four American gave some of his pupils rides on his shoulders.Next we visited Nagatamachi, a model primary school aided by Rockefeller Foundation funds, whose classrooms rivaled mine at Duke, but whose bathrooms had the familiar stink. We saw children, many wearing eyeglasses, poring over and laboriously copying samples of characters. Much of the classroom work involved recitation in unison. Other students were doing the same kinds of artwork as eight year-old Americans. The kindly, chubby-faced, mustached principal beamed as a six foot four American gave some of his pupils rides on his shoulders.After what seemed like hours of tramping around, we lunched at Tokyo Imperial University and were impressed by its large library with attached coffee rooms, modeled on Harvard’s Widener Library. In a brief talk, Professor Takayanagi Kenzo reminded us that modern Japan is founded on a strong foundation of feudalism.After what seemed like hours of tramping around, we lunched at Tokyo Imperial University and were impressed by its large library with attached coffee rooms, modeled on Harvard’s Widener Library. In a brief talk, Professor Takayanagi Kenzo reminded us that modern Japan is founded on a strong foundation of feudalism.Returned to Tsuda College for the official opening of the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. A banquet in the gymnasium was followed by a speech emphasizing that the Japanese were the way they are because it is not for an individual to question “Why?” to the world around him. They must obey the commands of their parents, teachers, and leaders.Returned to Tsuda College for the official opening of the Seventh Japan-America Student Conference. A banquet in the gymnasium was followed by a speech emphasizing that the Japanese were the way they are because it is not for an individual to question “Why?” to the world around him. They must obey the commands of their parents, teachers, and leaders.Finished a long day in a Japanese bath, begun with a diaper of water to clean off, followed by immersion in a large circular tub filled with very hot water into which I lowered myself very gingerly, gently burning. No unisex bathing here.Finished a long day in a Japanese bath, begun with a diaper of water to clean off, followed by immersion in a large circular tub filled with very hot water into which I lowered myself very gingerly, gently burning. No unisex bathing here.Decided in a round table Wednesday that the major difference between the American and Japanese educational system lies in our varying concept of what the nation is. A Japanese girl compared Japan to a mother who tells her children what they must do. Most of the Japanese students say they do not resent government censorship or “thought control.” Three delegates particularly impressed me: Naoto Ii of Waseda University, Bill Root from the University of Washington, and Kotaro Tsuda of Yokohama Commercial Institute. The women of both countries are either being shy or don’t know very much about world politics.Decided in a round table Wednesday that the major difference between the American and Japanese educational system lies in our varying concept of what the nation is. A Japanese girl compared Japan to a mother who tells her children what they must do. Most of the Japanese students say they do not resent government censorship or “thought control.” Three delegates particularly impressed me: Naoto Ii of Waseda University, Bill Root from the University of Washington, and Kotaro Tsuda of Yokohama Commercial Institute. The women of both countries are either being shy or don’t know very much about world politics.After lunch we went into Tokyo central station by electric suburban train, a route that has tunnels and crosses canals and that is already becoming familiar. I stood in the front car watching the shiny narrow rails click by station platforms, sidings, frogs, switches, substations just like any other electric suburban railway in the States or Europe. We walked a long distance along streets bare of traffic to the unique low buff modernism of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Imperial Hotel. Its ceilings seem to have been built for Japanese-statured guests. I find the building dark and confining. We dined in style with music at the New Grand Hotel’s air-conditioned roof garden. Most of the American students made boors of themselves, jumping up to look at the sunset. Later, on the Ginza, Ted Winebrenner and I ditched the rest and wandered by ourselves, ending at a beer hall with a geisha serving us excellent draft beer. She and her colleagues were intrigued by my size 11 shoes. Apparently no tips are accepted. Returned on a late evening train. To judge by their snores and florid complexions, several of our fellow passengers has more than enough to drink after they left their offices. They don’t hold their liquor well.After lunch we went into Tokyo central station by electric suburban train, a route that has tunnels and crosses canals and that is already becoming familiar. I stood in the front car watching the shiny narrow rails click by station platforms, sidings, frogs, switches, substations just like any other electric suburban railway in the States or Europe. We walked a long distance along streets bare of traffic to the unique low buff modernism of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Imperial Hotel. Its ceilings seem to have been built for Japanese-statured guests. I find the building dark and confining. We dined in style with music at the New Grand Hotel’s air-conditioned roof garden. Most of the American students made boors of themselves, jumping up to look at the sunset. Later, on the Ginza, Ted Winebrenner and I ditched the rest and wandered by ourselves, ending at a beer hall with a geisha serving us excellent draft beer. She and her colleagues were intrigued by my size 11 shoes. Apparently no tips are accepted. Returned on a late evening train. To judge by their snores and florid complexions, several of our fellow passengers has more than enough to drink after they left their offices. They don’t hold their liquor well.We hold roundtable meetings in the college library, which is uncomfortably hot and humid. We argued the concept of patriotism: in Japan admiration for one’s country is a moral matter not open for questioning. We agreed with the proposition that “science is unlimited; it’s the scientists that are limited.” I was struck by a casual reference to the Philippines, a Commonwealth scheduled for independence in 1946, as a country whose future guarantees unspecified “changing conditions.” The sticky heat and lowering drizzle reminded me of Manila, and I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll be able to cope with its climate again.We hold roundtable meetings in the college library, which is uncomfortably hot and humid. We argued the concept of patriotism: in Japan admiration for one’s country is a moral matter not open for questioning. We agreed with the proposition that “science is unlimited; it’s the scientists that are limited.” I was struck by a casual reference to the Philippines, a Commonwealth scheduled for independence in 1946, as a country whose future guarantees unspecified “changing conditions.” The sticky heat and lowering drizzle reminded me of Manila, and I’m beginning to wonder if I’ll be able to cope with its climate again.When we went into town that afternoon and the others, we were constantly accompanied by male Japanese students. Apparently we’re not supposed to wander around by ourselves. Why? Because the police have a hard time shadowing 58 foreign students in they go their separate ways. We had time for drinks at the Imperial, followed by a tempura (batter fried seafood) snack with chop sticks, rice bowls and little dishes of horse radish, soy sauce and pickles, plus green tea in a hole in the wall called a cha-mise, which translates as “tea shop.” Walked down the Ginza shopping district, looking into Mitsukoshi Department Store. Its attractive displays included much artificial fiber clothing and magnificently packed but smelly preserved fish. Drank foaming steins at the very German-looking Lion Beer Hall, whose murals displayed Nazi peasant girls carrying similar steins. Dinner at Lohmeyer’s restaurant was pleasantly filling. Ach, du lieber!When we went into town that afternoon and the others, we were constantly accompanied by male Japanese students. Apparently we’re not supposed to wander around by ourselves. Why? Because the police have a hard time shadowing 58 foreign students in they go their separate ways. We had time for drinks at the Imperial, followed by a tempura (batter fried seafood) snack with chop sticks, rice bowls and little dishes of horse radish, soy sauce and pickles, plus green tea in a hole in the wall called a cha-mise, which translates as “tea shop.” Walked down the Ginza shopping district, looking into Mitsukoshi Department Store. Its attractive displays included much artificial fiber clothing and magnificently packed but smelly preserved fish. Drank foaming steins at the very German-looking Lion Beer Hall, whose murals displayed Nazi peasant girls carrying similar steins. Dinner at Lohmeyer’s restaurant was pleasantly filling. Ach, du lieber!Among our fellow passengers on the Asama was the staff of the Italian Consulate General in New York, who had been expelled by the U.S. Government for subversive activities. With their country at war with Great Britain, they could not return to Italy via the Atlantic. They were a pleasant and friendly lot who bore no grudge against Americans and were glad to educate us in the ways of the world. Their leader, Count Allessandri, went to the International Settlement in Shanghai. The Soviet Union was reluctant to allow the rest to cross its territory on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, so they spent many days sitting in the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo awaiting visas. Each time we visited its lobby we were treated to drinks and talk. One evening in low voices they identified other people in the low-ceilinged room. Half of them seemed to be spies of one sort or another. It takes one to know one.Among our fellow passengers on the Asama was the staff of the Italian Consulate General in New York, who had been expelled by the U.S. Government for subversive activities. With their country at war with Great Britain, they could not return to Italy via the Atlantic. They were a pleasant and friendly lot who bore no grudge against Americans and were glad to educate us in the ways of the world. Their leader, Count Allessandri, went to the International Settlement in Shanghai. The Soviet Union was reluctant to allow the rest to cross its territory on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, so they spent many days sitting in the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo awaiting visas. Each time we visited its lobby we were treated to drinks and talk. One evening in low voices they identified other people in the low-ceilinged room. Half of them seemed to be spies of one sort or another. It takes one to know one.The Italians pointed out that the Japanese had at least three sets of security personnel trailing us: the local regular police, the kempei-tai (military police with power over civilians that made them kin to the Gestapo), and the Foreign Ministry people whose main aim was to keep us out of trouble. They felt that while the Japanese civilian government would do its best to show us the most favorable side of their country, the actions of the military and police were at cross-purposes.The Italians pointed out that the Japanese had at least three sets of security personnel trailing us: the local regular police, the kempei-tai (military police with power over civilians that made them kin to the Gestapo), and the Foreign Ministry people whose main aim was to keep us out of trouble. They felt that while the Japanese civilian government would do its best to show us the most favorable side of their country, the actions of the military and police were at cross-purposes.Our daily round tables grew increasingly dull. Their agenda is obviously organized by the Japanese authorities, and the arguments are not genuine convictions but designed to convince us of the rightness of their cause, the strength of their patriotism and their dislike for war. And we have to listen to papers like one advocating ” A New Order for Women’s Education in Japan.” However, we hear from our ex-shipmates at the Imperial—whose lobby always hums with whispered stories–of growing armed opposition to the present cabinet. Perhaps it is symbolic that at times the engine noises and practice machine gun fire from silvery planes at a nearby military aviation base drown out our discussions at Tsuda. We really have done little but thresh out Japanese problems, with little mention of our own. The Japanese women not only are shy but also their English is not up to that of the males. They apparently don’t desire equality.Our daily round tables grew increasingly dull. Their agenda is obviously organized by the Japanese authorities, and the arguments are not genuine convictions but designed to convince us of the rightness of their cause, the strength of their patriotism and their dislike for war. And we have to listen to papers like one advocating ” A New Order for Women’s Education in Japan.” However, we hear from our ex-shipmates at the Imperial—whose lobby always hums with whispered stories–of growing armed opposition to the present cabinet. Perhaps it is symbolic that at times the engine noises and practice machine gun fire from silvery planes at a nearby military aviation base drown out our discussions at Tsuda. We really have done little but thresh out Japanese problems, with little mention of our own. The Japanese women not only are shy but also their English is not up to that of the males. They apparently don’t desire equality.Excursions, planned or out on our own, help overcome the boredom. One afternoon Emmajean and I persuaded two Japanese students from Tokyo to accompany us on a walk across vegetable fields to a gravel road that brought us to a small village, where we were instant celebrities. The kids stood amazed at the enormous Americans. Kindly adults lent us their bicycles so we could ride up to see the huge, half-empty Murayama Reservoir of the Tokyo water supply system. Hot and tired from pedaling, we rested at a roadside restaurant, drinking bottled beer. Next day we were bused to the Nagano Sericultural Laboratory to observe elaborate scientific studies of boiling silkworms so their fiber could be unreeled by deft women operators. During a hurried visit to the spacious, magnificent new Imperial Household Museum, we enjoyed phases of Japanese arts. I admired Stone Age pottery and Hiroshige prints but was most impressed by the gorgeous court costumes in perfect preservation.Excursions, planned or out on our own, help overcome the boredom. One afternoon Emmajean and I persuaded two Japanese students from Tokyo to accompany us on a walk across vegetable fields to a gravel road that brought us to a small village, where we were instant celebrities. The kids stood amazed at the enormous Americans. Kindly adults lent us their bicycles so we could ride up to see the huge, half-empty Murayama Reservoir of the Tokyo water supply system. Hot and tired from pedaling, we rested at a roadside restaurant, drinking bottled beer. Next day we were bused to the Nagano Sericultural Laboratory to observe elaborate scientific studies of boiling silkworms so their fiber could be unreeled by deft women operators. During a hurried visit to the spacious, magnificent new Imperial Household Museum, we enjoyed phases of Japanese arts. I admired Stone Age pottery and Hiroshige prints but was most impressed by the gorgeous court costumes in perfect preservation.Dinner Saturday night July 13 at the Kokusai Bunka Shinkokai (Society for International Cultural Relations) was the major event of the Conference. I was seated next to Toshi Go, editor of the semi-official English language Japan Times, considered to be the mouthpiece of the Foreign Office. We quickly established the relationship of fellow journalists. After the platitudes we’d been hearing at Tsuda, I was impressed by the frankness of the speech on “The America-Japan Relationship” given by Yusuke Tsurumi, a member of the Diet and Parliamentary Vice-Minister of Home Affairs. “Since 1931 Japan’s actions on the Asiatic continent have begun to conflict with the status quo system established by the Washington (1921-1922 Naval) Conference,” he said. Now Japan faced either social upheaval at home or expansion abroad. The old system could be maintained only if Japan had freer trade relations and access to raw materials and could export some of its excess population. He complained that the United States had started talk of war with Japan two decades ago. Japan had suffered three major blows: 1. Emigration restrictions and outright exclusions such as the 1924 U.S. Immigration Act; 2. Tariff barriers like those endorsed by the Ottawa Trade Conference, and 3. China’s anti-Japanese attitude. He concluded by saying America should not judge the world exclusively by its own sense of values.Dinner Saturday night July 13 at the Kokusai Bunka Shinkokai (Society for International Cultural Relations) was the major event of the Conference. I was seated next to Toshi Go, editor of the semi-official English language Japan Times, considered to be the mouthpiece of the Foreign Office. We quickly established the relationship of fellow journalists. After the platitudes we’d been hearing at Tsuda, I was impressed by the frankness of the speech on “The America-Japan Relationship” given by Yusuke Tsurumi, a member of the Diet and Parliamentary Vice-Minister of Home Affairs. “Since 1931 Japan’s actions on the Asiatic continent have begun to conflict with the status quo system established by the Washington (1921-1922 Naval) Conference,” he said. Now Japan faced either social upheaval at home or expansion abroad. The old system could be maintained only if Japan had freer trade relations and access to raw materials and could export some of its excess population. He complained that the United States had started talk of war with Japan two decades ago. Japan had suffered three major blows: 1. Emigration restrictions and outright exclusions such as the 1924 U.S. Immigration Act; 2. Tariff barriers like those endorsed by the Ottawa Trade Conference, and 3. China’s anti-Japanese attitude. He concluded by saying America should not judge the world exclusively by its own sense of values.On Sunday we took a long bus ride through Tokyo’s western suburbs to another rooftop restaurant for a luncheon given by the “O.B.”s (Old Boys, a Briticism for alumni) and “O.G.”s of the Japan Student Association. A good meal served by deft waitresses. Dr. Masaharu Anesaki emphasized that the main aim of the Conference was not “good will” but education. He had many other words, but they were difficult for me to hear. Downtown to see the Imperial Diet, a gaudy imitation of all the world’s parliament buildings: marble, neo-Gothic, with a red silk and pure gold emperor’s room. As usual, no pictures were allowed. Finally went back out our way to the Jiyu Gakuen, a school whose president, Mrs. Motoko Hani, a short, half-blind woman, is said to be one of Japan’s most progressive educators. After we had been shown the grounds, she greeted us at dinner with a rather unusual plea for pacifism. The buildings, designed by a pupil of Wright, are simple, airy and full of windows. Pupils are encouraged to work on their own initiatives, and have done such things as building a tiny hydro-electric plant. They prepared the largest and best meal of our week here. Alumni are active at settlement schools in Peking (loving the Chinese) and in northern Japan. The classical concert by students was pretty good, except the woodwinds. We were escorted out with lanterns held by pupils. Ted and I spent two hours in the bathroom having a water battle. Finally, while killing a quart of wine with Dick Takauchi and Ted we had an earthquake strong enough to knock fire extinguishers off the walls. I’ve been through a lot of them but they always scare me.On Sunday we took a long bus ride through Tokyo’s western suburbs to another rooftop restaurant for a luncheon given by the “O.B.”s (Old Boys, a Briticism for alumni) and “O.G.”s of the Japan Student Association. A good meal served by deft waitresses. Dr. Masaharu Anesaki emphasized that the main aim of the Conference was not “good will” but education. He had many other words, but they were difficult for me to hear. Downtown to see the Imperial Diet, a gaudy imitation of all the world’s parliament buildings: marble, neo-Gothic, with a red silk and pure gold emperor’s room. As usual, no pictures were allowed. Finally went back out our way to the Jiyu Gakuen, a school whose president, Mrs. Motoko Hani, a short, half-blind woman, is said to be one of Japan’s most progressive educators. After we had been shown the grounds, she greeted us at dinner with a rather unusual plea for pacifism. The buildings, designed by a pupil of Wright, are simple, airy and full of windows. Pupils are encouraged to work on their own initiatives, and have done such things as building a tiny hydro-electric plant. They prepared the largest and best meal of our week here. Alumni are active at settlement schools in Peking (loving the Chinese) and in northern Japan. The classical concert by students was pretty good, except the woodwinds. We were escorted out with lanterns held by pupils. Ted and I spent two hours in the bathroom having a water battle. Finally, while killing a quart of wine with Dick Takauchi and Ted we had an earthquake strong enough to knock fire extinguishers off the walls. I’ve been through a lot of them but they always scare me.We had some hot arguments at our round table Monday, July 15. They brought forth two admissions—already known to us, of course, but seldom admitted in Japan. First, Japan has fortified the Pacific islands mandated to it by the League of Nations under the condition they not be. Second, even before 1930 Japan had laid full plans for expansion in Asia. We’re hearing much talk of regional blocs led by Japan, which is claimed to be a “bulwark against Red imperialism.”We had some hot arguments at our round table Monday, July 15. They brought forth two admissions—already known to us, of course, but seldom admitted in Japan. First, Japan has fortified the Pacific islands mandated to it by the League of Nations under the condition they not be. Second, even before 1930 Japan had laid full plans for expansion in Asia. We’re hearing much talk of regional blocs led by Japan, which is claimed to be a “bulwark against Red imperialism.”Takauchi accompanied Ted and me to the Tokyo Nichi-Nichi’s air-conditioned offices, where Ted asked a lot of questions about present day Japanese journalism but got unsatisfactory answers on the degree of press freedom it is permitted. After getting a haircut, I went by myself for a heart-warming visit with Harold and Ethel Amos, people who had known me since I was eight years old and who could discuss my Baguio friends, since he had been headmaster of Brent School there before coming to Japan in 1934. Not knowing Japanese, my trip there from the Ginza downtown area was confusing. First I took the wrong train on the Yamate Belt Line. Then I got off at the wrong station to wander about helplessly, trying in vain to ask directions. When I got them, I took two wrong buses. Finally, a policeman put me on the right train. I arrived at Tokyo American School in the Meguro ward bearing two priceless gifts: a can of American coffee under one arm and a carton of Kodachrome film in the other.Takauchi accompanied Ted and me to the Tokyo Nichi-Nichi’s air-conditioned offices, where Ted asked a lot of questions about present day Japanese journalism but got unsatisfactory answers on the degree of press freedom it is permitted. After getting a haircut, I went by myself for a heart-warming visit with Harold and Ethel Amos, people who had known me since I was eight years old and who could discuss my Baguio friends, since he had been headmaster of Brent School there before coming to Japan in 1934. Not knowing Japanese, my trip there from the Ginza downtown area was confusing. First I took the wrong train on the Yamate Belt Line. Then I got off at the wrong station to wander about helplessly, trying in vain to ask directions. When I got them, I took two wrong buses. Finally, a policeman put me on the right train. I arrived at Tokyo American School in the Meguro ward bearing two priceless gifts: a can of American coffee under one arm and a carton of Kodachrome film in the other.Tuesday’s hot round-table discussions (we’re getting to know each other enough to speak our minds) evoked a reprise of Tsurumi’s arguments, but more baldly couched. Japan is assuming control of East Asia in its national self-interest in order to secure an outlet for its excess population (not by their settlement there but through increased industrial activity at home) and for its raw materials. This policy was forced on Japan by foreign tariff barriers against its expanding exports. Why not control population growth, one of us asked. Because birth control is against a national policy to make the nation strong and also because it would affect popular morale. Despite the “accidental” bombing of the U.S. Navy gunboat Panay on the Yangtze in 1937, the U.S. should loan money to Japan to develop a new China. The emperor is and should be venerated. A good Japanese also believes in the three greatest virtues: silent obedience, filial piety and loyalty to superiors, we were told.Tuesday’s hot round-table discussions (we’re getting to know each other enough to speak our minds) evoked a reprise of Tsurumi’s arguments, but more baldly couched. Japan is assuming control of East Asia in its national self-interest in order to secure an outlet for its excess population (not by their settlement there but through increased industrial activity at home) and for its raw materials. This policy was forced on Japan by foreign tariff barriers against its expanding exports. Why not control population growth, one of us asked. Because birth control is against a national policy to make the nation strong and also because it would affect popular morale. Despite the “accidental” bombing of the U.S. Navy gunboat Panay on the Yangtze in 1937, the U.S. should loan money to Japan to develop a new China. The emperor is and should be venerated. A good Japanese also believes in the three greatest virtues: silent obedience, filial piety and loyalty to superiors, we were told.After a good siesta (for once), went downtown with Ted, Emmajean, “George” Fujioka of Kyoto University and another student to eat at a real Japanese restaurant with straw matting on its floors, paper walls, low tables and attentive waitresses in kimonos. We had over 40 cups of sake and two bottles of beer. Sake acts like all wine—it makes me sleepy, so I prefer rum. Back on the street we saw little sheets of newsprint that George says are what we call extras, announcing the fall of the (Mitsumasa) Yonai cabinet, said to be largely because of Army dissatisfaction with his foreign policy.After a good siesta (for once), went downtown with Ted, Emmajean, “George” Fujioka of Kyoto University and another student to eat at a real Japanese restaurant with straw matting on its floors, paper walls, low tables and attentive waitresses in kimonos. We had over 40 cups of sake and two bottles of beer. Sake acts like all wine—it makes me sleepy, so I prefer rum. Back on the street we saw little sheets of newsprint that George says are what we call extras, announcing the fall of the (Mitsumasa) Yonai cabinet, said to be largely because of Army dissatisfaction with his foreign policy.We heard in our July 17 meeting that America did not enter the World War until 1917 because it was afraid of Japan at its back. The best arguments were from Nobuo Ito, whose father is a director of the dominant Mitsui Trading Company. They live in the fashionable Azabu ward of Tokyo. Ito, who knows the outside world from first-hand experience, is shrewd. He speaks excellent American-accented English, knows his naval vessels and displays a much more realistic attitude than most of the other Japanese delegates. When we discussed treaty breaking, he explained it as “induced by desperation.”We heard in our July 17 meeting that America did not enter the World War until 1917 because it was afraid of Japan at its back. The best arguments were from Nobuo Ito, whose father is a director of the dominant Mitsui Trading Company. They live in the fashionable Azabu ward of Tokyo. Ito, who knows the outside world from first-hand experience, is shrewd. He speaks excellent American-accented English, knows his naval vessels and displays a much more realistic attitude than most of the other Japanese delegates. When we discussed treaty breaking, he explained it as “induced by desperation.”The long train ride downtown is becoming boringly familiar. We are constantly watched, and I am not really comfortable here. I crave Coca-Colas, automobiles to drive, house servants, good modern plumbing and home cooking: the comforts of living in the American-controlled part of the Orient. Visited B. Wilfred Fleisher of the English-language Japan Advertiser, who talked with me awhile as he received Domei news agency flashes on the cabinet situation. Not until evening did I learn that Prince Fumimaro Konoye, who had served once before, is the new premier. Will he bring totalitarianism? Meanwhile, I took a ride in a bright and clean subway car to the Mitsukoshi department store to inspect its wide selection of poor quality goods. Ordered greeting cards. Had dinner at the American Club. We have had no contact with the American Embassy. Our government seems as disinterested as the Japanese are anxious to make an impression on us.The long train ride downtown is becoming boringly familiar. We are constantly watched, and I am not really comfortable here. I crave Coca-Colas, automobiles to drive, house servants, good modern plumbing and home cooking: the comforts of living in the American-controlled part of the Orient. Visited B. Wilfred Fleisher of the English-language Japan Advertiser, who talked with me awhile as he received Domei news agency flashes on the cabinet situation. Not until evening did I learn that Prince Fumimaro Konoye, who had served once before, is the new premier. Will he bring totalitarianism? Meanwhile, I took a ride in a bright and clean subway car to the Mitsukoshi department store to inspect its wide selection of poor quality goods. Ordered greeting cards. Had dinner at the American Club. We have had no contact with the American Embassy. Our government seems as disinterested as the Japanese are anxious to make an impression on us.According to the old-timers who hang around the Imperial Hotel lobby, Jimmy Young, who was tossed into a Tokyo jail a few months ago and then was deported, deserved what he got. Larry Smith of International News Service says that, before going to Chungking, Young boasted that the only thing he hadn’t done in his career was to land in jail. He got his wish.According to the old-timers who hang around the Imperial Hotel lobby, Jimmy Young, who was tossed into a Tokyo jail a few months ago and then was deported, deserved what he got. Larry Smith of International News Service says that, before going to Chungking, Young boasted that the only thing he hadn’t done in his career was to land in jail. He got his wish.Thursday, July 18, was the last day of the Conference per se. At the closing ceremony the reports of the committee chairmen indicated much disagreement between the American and Japanese positions. We had a lot of picture taking. Our USC faculty chaperones, Drs. Francis Bacon and Catherine Beers, are getting on my nerves with their petty instructions. “Your passport is your most valuable possession in these difficult times,” biology professor Beers solemnly advises me, speaking from her vast experience of travel—around Los Angeles. Today both went around making sure we all remain until the end of receptions. Lots of picture taking by the Japanese, who are camera fiends when they can get film. I took a picture of Emmajean in her newly acquired Japanese costume, complete with fan. Good farewell buffet on the campus lawns under a bright moon.Thursday, July 18, was the last day of the Conference per se. At the closing ceremony the reports of the committee chairmen indicated much disagreement between the American and Japanese positions. We had a lot of picture taking. Our USC faculty chaperones, Drs. Francis Bacon and Catherine Beers, are getting on my nerves with their petty instructions. “Your passport is your most valuable possession in these difficult times,” biology professor Beers solemnly advises me, speaking from her vast experience of travel—around Los Angeles. Today both went around making sure we all remain until the end of receptions. Lots of picture taking by the Japanese, who are camera fiends when they can get film. I took a picture of Emmajean in her newly acquired Japanese costume, complete with fan. Good farewell buffet on the campus lawns under a bright moon.Now we are starting a trip through western Honshu, Korea and “Manchukuo.” In Japan, we will be accompanied by students from the areas we visit, who represent the Kokusai Gakuyu-kai or International Student Institution. A representative of the Gaimusho (Foreign Office, and a few students to serve as interpreters will be with us in the occupied areas. The group will return to Japan and get back to San Francisco August 30. However, I want to continue to the Philippines and have talked with Gaimusho officials up to the level of Viscount Masayoshi Inaba to see if I can get a visa to Japanese-occupied North China so I can leave the group at Dairen and travel to Peking and Shanghai, where I can take a ship to Manila. I haven’t discussed this with the tour leaders yet but Ted and Emmajean are aware of my plans.Now we are starting a trip through western Honshu, Korea and “Manchukuo.” In Japan, we will be accompanied by students from the areas we visit, who represent the Kokusai Gakuyu-kai or International Student Institution. A representative of the Gaimusho (Foreign Office, and a few students to serve as interpreters will be with us in the occupied areas. The group will return to Japan and get back to San Francisco August 30. However, I want to continue to the Philippines and have talked with Gaimusho officials up to the level of Viscount Masayoshi Inaba to see if I can get a visa to Japanese-occupied North China so I can leave the group at Dairen and travel to Peking and Shanghai, where I can take a ship to Manila. I haven’t discussed this with the tour leaders yet but Ted and Emmajean are aware of my plans.We left Tsuda College at 10 a.m. Friday, July 19, after frantic searches for laundry, paying bills and autographing for fans. It was one of the hottest and muggiest days in Tokyo’s history. Trading was suspended for nearly a minute in the Tokyo Stock Exchange as we entered its air-conditioned visitors’ gallery to a prolonged burst of applause. That was a real thrill. I have two uncles who are members of the New York Exchange but my visits went unnoticed there. Here sales are by auction on the floor and are announced above it: short term on the one side, long term on the other. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was today’s most heavily traded issue.We left Tsuda College at 10 a.m. Friday, July 19, after frantic searches for laundry, paying bills and autographing for fans. It was one of the hottest and muggiest days in Tokyo’s history. Trading was suspended for nearly a minute in the Tokyo Stock Exchange as we entered its air-conditioned visitors’ gallery to a prolonged burst of applause. That was a real thrill. I have two uncles who are members of the New York Exchange but my visits went unnoticed there. Here sales are by auction on the floor and are announced above it: short term on the one side, long term on the other. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries was today’s most heavily traded issue.We had tea in the directors’ boardroom. Lunch was at the Tokyo City Hall, where we got a forgettable speech from aide Nobuo Tanikawa, preceded by that old bromide: “The Mayor regrets but the pressure of other business… ” Then to the new marble building of the Japan Broadcasting Corporation, ostentatious with items like cloth covered walls but not very original. We were received by the government radio’s chief, R. Nakayama. He stressed that mutual respect was absolutely necessary as the basis for international understanding: our use of terms like “Jap” conveys contempt as well as ignorance. He compared the widespread knowledge by Japanese school children of people like Washington and Lincoln with the utter ignorance our students have about Japanese heroes. I was particularly struck by his statement that crossing the Pacific involves a great change of perspective rather than only an adjustment of watches. The implication of the talks we heard was that some day the U.S. may really need Japanese friendship. We ended the long day in Tokyo with dinner at the Rotary Club and entertainment at the big Mitsukoshi department store.We had tea in the directors’ boardroom. Lunch was at the Tokyo City Hall, where we got a forgettable speech from aide Nobuo Tanikawa, preceded by that old bromide: “The Mayor regrets but the pressure of other business… ” Then to the new marble building of the Japan Broadcasting Corporation, ostentatious with items like cloth covered walls but not very original. We were received by the government radio’s chief, R. Nakayama. He stressed that mutual respect was absolutely necessary as the basis for international understanding: our use of terms like “Jap” conveys contempt as well as ignorance. He compared the widespread knowledge by Japanese school children of people like Washington and Lincoln with the utter ignorance our students have about Japanese heroes. I was particularly struck by his statement that crossing the Pacific involves a great change of perspective rather than only an adjustment of watches. The implication of the talks we heard was that some day the U.S. may really need Japanese friendship. We ended the long day in Tokyo with dinner at the Rotary Club and entertainment at the big Mitsukoshi department store.Somehow the Conference planners neglected or rejected the idea that we needed a good night’s sleep. The Americans and Japanese delegates found themselves aboard two day coaches on the narrow gauge Tokaido mainline of Japan Railways, riding all night down the Pacific coast of Honshu on the 375 kilometer (233 mile) journey to Nagoya. My mother often spoke of taking this route with Dad on her way to the Philippines after her marriage in 1912. Silvery moonlight lent a surrealist note to the waves below the tracks, rice fields beside them and mountains above. Electric traction passed through the Hakone Mountains tunnel via Atami and a stop to get a coal-burning steam engine at Numazu. We bought ice cream and hot tea in pots from vendors. The tea with pot cost 5 sen. As the hour grew later and later the exhausted travelers attempted to sleep. The agony of their effort was etched on their open mouths and sprawling limbs. I stayed up, part of the time watching from the corridor between cars (with Emmajean) the scenery go by, catching several glimpses of soaring Fujiyama with its snow covered flat top. Outside of that it was no fun. Dawn changed the picture from black and white and gray to vivid colors: green rice fields, blue mountains and an occasional dried-up river. Nearing Nagoya, scores of factory chimneys broke the skyline and we were joined by a suburban electric line. Students from Nagoya Commercial College met us, dragged us on crowded streetcars to the rambling, old-fashioned and comfortable Nagoya Hotel, where we left our luggage but were then taken without pause on a tour of the Nagoya Pottery Factory. We were given lunch at Kinjo Women’s College and forced to listen, tired and dirty, to the inevitable speeches hoping for “goodwill between our two great countries.” At that point we didn’t have much. A program of classical dances should have been mildly entertaining but Ted and I were too tired to give a damn. Sneaked away from the group and slept from 3 to 8 p.m. and had room service bring us supper. This was real Asian personal indulgence. The toilets were even Western Style. Emmajean and her friend Shandy came back to report that the reception at the Nagoya Town Hall wasn’t much and that our absence hadn’t been noted. Pugh’s group put themselves up at the newest and best hotel. Had two beers with the gals before going back to sleep.Somehow the Conference planners neglected or rejected the idea that we needed a good night’s sleep. The Americans and Japanese delegates found themselves aboard two day coaches on the narrow gauge Tokaido mainline of Japan Railways, riding all night down the Pacific coast of Honshu on the 375 kilometer (233 mile) journey to Nagoya. My mother often spoke of taking this route with Dad on her way to the Philippines after her marriage in 1912. Silvery moonlight lent a surrealist note to the waves below the tracks, rice fields beside them and mountains above. Electric traction passed through the Hakone Mountains tunnel via Atami and a stop to get a coal-burning steam engine at Numazu. We bought ice cream and hot tea in pots from vendors. The tea with pot cost 5 sen. As the hour grew later and later the exhausted travelers attempted to sleep. The agony of their effort was etched on their open mouths and sprawling limbs. I stayed up, part of the time watching from the corridor between cars (with Emmajean) the scenery go by, catching several glimpses of soaring Fujiyama with its snow covered flat top. Outside of that it was no fun. Dawn changed the picture from black and white and gray to vivid colors: green rice fields, blue mountains and an occasional dried-up river. Nearing Nagoya, scores of factory chimneys broke the skyline and we were joined by a suburban electric line. Students from Nagoya Commercial College met us, dragged us on crowded streetcars to the rambling, old-fashioned and comfortable Nagoya Hotel, where we left our luggage but were then taken without pause on a tour of the Nagoya Pottery Factory. We were given lunch at Kinjo Women’s College and forced to listen, tired and dirty, to the inevitable speeches hoping for “goodwill between our two great countries.” At that point we didn’t have much. A program of classical dances should have been mildly entertaining but Ted and I were too tired to give a damn. Sneaked away from the group and slept from 3 to 8 p.m. and had room service bring us supper. This was real Asian personal indulgence. The toilets were even Western Style. Emmajean and her friend Shandy came back to report that the reception at the Nagoya Town Hall wasn’t much and that our absence hadn’t been noted. Pugh’s group put themselves up at the newest and best hotel. Had two beers with the gals before going back to sleep.Started out our second day in Nagoya with a visit to Atsuta Jingu, a drab shrine in a drab city. No photographs allowed but didn’t plan to take any. Then Nagoya Castle with its gray stone walls, green roofs and golden dolphins protected with wires against thieves. Bought a suitcase at the Matsuzakaya department store, since my old one has had one too many moves. The store has a roof garden, zoo, and a view of the city with the chimneys of munitions, textiles, and pottery factories as well as the modernistic Asahi Shimbun building. Lots of air raid sirens. Travel by hot, crowded bus. The police must be spending much time, money, and effort trailing us around, and I’m fairly sure my diary is being read. Ito-san, a youngish millionaire, had us out to his magnificent estate this afternoon. First looked at an indoor classic fencing match with elaborate ceremony but few bullseyes, then took part in a traditional tea ceremony with a noted tea master who whipped powdered green tea and boiling water to produce a product that looked and tasted like pea soup. We inspected his 350 year-old house and had refreshments in a garden decorated by strutting peacocks. All quite luxurious, especially when compared to downtown Nagoya.Started out our second day in Nagoya with a visit to Atsuta Jingu, a drab shrine in a drab city. No photographs allowed but didn’t plan to take any. Then Nagoya Castle with its gray stone walls, green roofs and golden dolphins protected with wires against thieves. Bought a suitcase at the Matsuzakaya department store, since my old one has had one too many moves. The store has a roof garden, zoo, and a view of the city with the chimneys of munitions, textiles, and pottery factories as well as the modernistic Asahi Shimbun building. Lots of air raid sirens. Travel by hot, crowded bus. The police must be spending much time, money, and effort trailing us around, and I’m fairly sure my diary is being read. Ito-san, a youngish millionaire, had us out to his magnificent estate this afternoon. First looked at an indoor classic fencing match with elaborate ceremony but few bullseyes, then took part in a traditional tea ceremony with a noted tea master who whipped powdered green tea and boiling water to produce a product that looked and tasted like pea soup. We inspected his 350 year-old house and had refreshments in a garden decorated by strutting peacocks. All quite luxurious, especially when compared to downtown Nagoya.A 30 kilometer (19 mile) train ride across a level stretch of rice fields to foothills where the Stanford group stayed at a hotel while we were housed in a traditional Japanese inn with paper sliding walls, beds on the matted floor and everyone running around half-dressed in the heat. We were taken up the Nagara River in barges pulled by men, our way lit by fires burning in pots on their bows, to see trained cormorants fishing in the swift mountain stream. After the birds caught the fish they were prevented from swallowing by restraints on their gullets and the wiggling fish were pulled out. Judging by the small number of ayu caught this must be more of a tourist sight than an actual paying proposition. But no shortage of mosquitoes: we were plagued by enough to stuff a museum and between insect bites and the hot and sticky night I slept poorly.A 30 kilometer (19 mile) train ride across a level stretch of rice fields to foothills where the Stanford group stayed at a hotel while we were housed in a traditional Japanese inn with paper sliding walls, beds on the matted floor and everyone running around half-dressed in the heat. We were taken up the Nagara River in barges pulled by men, our way lit by fires burning in pots on their bows, to see trained cormorants fishing in the swift mountain stream. After the birds caught the fish they were prevented from swallowing by restraints on their gullets and the wiggling fish were pulled out. Judging by the small number of ayu caught this must be more of a tourist sight than an actual paying proposition. But no shortage of mosquitoes: we were plagued by enough to stuff a museum and between insect bites and the hot and sticky night I slept poorly.We took an old interurban trolley through narrow streets to Gifu station and got into sleeping cars with facing blue plush seats. Perspired our way up through pleasant hills, green with trees and grass, with a fair gravel road alongside. We noted the continuing and very obvious presence of a gumshoe from Tokyo, equipped with straw hat and magazine. One of my colleagues doesn’t know a word of Japanese except the expression “Ah so!” which he repeats with different inflections so well that he’s caused some of our Japanese seatmates to lower their voices in conversations. My food and drink vocabulary is growing. “Biru” came naturally and I’ve learned in train dining cars that “katsuretsu” are pork cutlets and “curryandrisu” is actually curry with rice. Eventually pulled into Otsu, an ancient town at the southern end of Lake Biwa, a large fresh water lake almost entirely surrounded by wooded mountains rising steeply up from its waters. Lunch in a broken-down lakeside pavilion, enjoying cool breezes off the water. We had consumed enough beer that even the usual welcoming speeches sounded extremely pleasant. The Biwako Hotel with its spacious grounds appears traditionally Japanese outside but inside is modern and luxurious. I slept all afternoon in one of its 38 comfortable Western-style rooms. From my windows I can see Mt. Hiei, about whose combative priests I wrote a paper for my comparative religions class at Duke. After a skimpy dinner took a moonlight sailboat ride with my pals Ted and Emmajean. Much talk of Conference politics. We think that if such get-togethers are to continue the American organizers will have to place much more emphasis on Eastern colleges.We took an old interurban trolley through narrow streets to Gifu station and got into sleeping cars with facing blue plush seats. Perspired our way up through pleasant hills, green with trees and grass, with a fair gravel road alongside. We noted the continuing and very obvious presence of a gumshoe from Tokyo, equipped with straw hat and magazine. One of my colleagues doesn’t know a word of Japanese except the expression “Ah so!” which he repeats with different inflections so well that he’s caused some of our Japanese seatmates to lower their voices in conversations. My food and drink vocabulary is growing. “Biru” came naturally and I’ve learned in train dining cars that “katsuretsu” are pork cutlets and “curryandrisu” is actually curry with rice. Eventually pulled into Otsu, an ancient town at the southern end of Lake Biwa, a large fresh water lake almost entirely surrounded by wooded mountains rising steeply up from its waters. Lunch in a broken-down lakeside pavilion, enjoying cool breezes off the water. We had consumed enough beer that even the usual welcoming speeches sounded extremely pleasant. The Biwako Hotel with its spacious grounds appears traditionally Japanese outside but inside is modern and luxurious. I slept all afternoon in one of its 38 comfortable Western-style rooms. From my windows I can see Mt. Hiei, about whose combative priests I wrote a paper for my comparative religions class at Duke. After a skimpy dinner took a moonlight sailboat ride with my pals Ted and Emmajean. Much talk of Conference politics. We think that if such get-togethers are to continue the American organizers will have to place much more emphasis on Eastern colleges.After the past strenuous fortnight it is most pleasant to spend a quiet, cool, comfortable and restful day in a tourist area. Spent the morning on the hotel porch writing postcards, catching up with diary entries and watching the clouds over the hazy mountains behind the semi-American Colonial style Shiga prefectural offices. At noon we scrambled aboard a rickety ferry to sit on a mat on the stern as it leisurely plodded from one landing to another on the lake. Passing occasional factories such as the Toyo Rayon works, one of Japan’s largest textile producers. After going under a two part bridge at the lake outlet into the River Seta we reached Ishiyama (“Stony Hill” for the rocks in its grounds) temple for a picnic lunch of “citron” (from the French word for lemonade) and a few sandwiches. I was impressed to learn that in one of its buildings lady Murasaki Shikibu composed the long and (to me boring) romance, Tale of Genji. Relaxed at last, we spent our return to Otsu seated on stern mats singing college songs and doing much horsing around. We had a tea party featuring iced “coffee” at Rinshoen, the country villa of Kinya Nagao, director of the Wakamoto patent medicine firm. Extremely simple, it is made of bamboo, wood, plaster and paper in early Tokugawa style and blends with its natural surroundings. At the water’s edge is a tea ceremony building, surrounded by a rock garden, tall reeds and a little artificial stream. Walked back to our hotel through the rice fields in a narrow strip between Hiei ridge and the lake, passing a naval seaplane training school. Had a meeting and elected Carl Ronning as next year’s conference chairman. Our politicking seems to work once in a while. This evening Ted, Emmajean and I went swimming in the cool, fresh waters of Biwako. The group has received orders from the local police to observe an 11 p.m. curfew. They must be tiring of paying overtime.After the past strenuous fortnight it is most pleasant to spend a quiet, cool, comfortable and restful day in a tourist area. Spent the morning on the hotel porch writing postcards, catching up with diary entries and watching the clouds over the hazy mountains behind the semi-American Colonial style Shiga prefectural offices. At noon we scrambled aboard a rickety ferry to sit on a mat on the stern as it leisurely plodded from one landing to another on the lake. Passing occasional factories such as the Toyo Rayon works, one of Japan’s largest textile producers. After going under a two part bridge at the lake outlet into the River Seta we reached Ishiyama (“Stony Hill” for the rocks in its grounds) temple for a picnic lunch of “citron” (from the French word for lemonade) and a few sandwiches. I was impressed to learn that in one of its buildings lady Murasaki Shikibu composed the long and (to me boring) romance, Tale of Genji. Relaxed at last, we spent our return to Otsu seated on stern mats singing college songs and doing much horsing around. We had a tea party featuring iced “coffee” at Rinshoen, the country villa of Kinya Nagao, director of the Wakamoto patent medicine firm. Extremely simple, it is made of bamboo, wood, plaster and paper in early Tokugawa style and blends with its natural surroundings. At the water’s edge is a tea ceremony building, surrounded by a rock garden, tall reeds and a little artificial stream. Walked back to our hotel through the rice fields in a narrow strip between Hiei ridge and the lake, passing a naval seaplane training school. Had a meeting and elected Carl Ronning as next year’s conference chairman. Our politicking seems to work once in a while. This evening Ted, Emmajean and I went swimming in the cool, fresh waters of Biwako. The group has received orders from the local police to observe an 11 p.m. curfew. They must be tiring of paying overtime.”George” Fujioka, the perspiring and efficient Kansai area program chairman, had us up at 6 a.m. July 24 to begin a full day of sightseeing. We put our bags in the hotel lobby, grabbed a bit of breakfast and then waited for the bus to take us to Sakamoto village on a bumpy gravel road that led steeply up to the terminus of a cableway. Every temple, railroad station, hotel and point of tourist interest in Japan has a rubber stamp, usually with an illustration, that tourists can use to mark their souvenir books. A damned good idea and in this scenic and historic area I am accumulating many on my diary pages. We amused ourselves with stamps before we rushed into the cable car for a rapid and smooth ride to near the summit of Hiei-san, whose 843 meter (2,800 foot) altitude provided a cooler and damper climate. Looked at many temples of the Enrakuji complex among the cypress trees nearby, not particularly interesting except for age. One bright new one was included among the lot. After a last look at Biwako, we descended on a pilgrim trail worn by millions of feet over the ages past little shops. One sold clay pigeons the buyer could toss over the cliff. Had iced tea at Shimeigatake’s new Eizan Hotel, with a view over the plain that holds Kyoto, one of the world’s oldest cultural centers. A short ride on an electric train and we were in the city for lunch at Doshisha University’s colonial Amherst-style building. Then, once more perspiring, we took a train to narrow Shinmonzen, Kyoto’s foreign style shopping center. I bought several color prints, which were very cheap. Stayed at the Miyako Hotel on a hill in a room with private bath. Dinner at Rotary Club with usual speech expressing how glad its members are to see that we have “lost our false ideas.” Have we?”George” Fujioka, the perspiring and efficient Kansai area program chairman, had us up at 6 a.m. July 24 to begin a full day of sightseeing. We put our bags in the hotel lobby, grabbed a bit of breakfast and then waited for the bus to take us to Sakamoto village on a bumpy gravel road that led steeply up to the terminus of a cableway. Every temple, railroad station, hotel and point of tourist interest in Japan has a rubber stamp, usually with an illustration, that tourists can use to mark their souvenir books. A damned good idea and in this scenic and historic area I am accumulating many on my diary pages. We amused ourselves with stamps before we rushed into the cable car for a rapid and smooth ride to near the summit of Hiei-san, whose 843 meter (2,800 foot) altitude provided a cooler and damper climate. Looked at many temples of the Enrakuji complex among the cypress trees nearby, not particularly interesting except for age. One bright new one was included among the lot. After a last look at Biwako, we descended on a pilgrim trail worn by millions of feet over the ages past little shops. One sold clay pigeons the buyer could toss over the cliff. Had iced tea at Shimeigatake’s new Eizan Hotel, with a view over the plain that holds Kyoto, one of the world’s oldest cultural centers. A short ride on an electric train and we were in the city for lunch at Doshisha University’s colonial Amherst-style building. Then, once more perspiring, we took a train to narrow Shinmonzen, Kyoto’s foreign style shopping center. I bought several color prints, which were very cheap. Stayed at the Miyako Hotel on a hill in a room with private bath. Dinner at Rotary Club with usual speech expressing how glad its members are to see that we have “lost our false ideas.” Have we?With its surrounding mountains, dry rivers, ancient temples, modern buildings, gardens, and millennial continuing culture, Kyoto is a pleasant city indeed. Many contrasts: after passing modernistic Kyoto Imperial University Hospital’s buildings and a silk weaving mill our sightseeing bus took us to the white stucco buildings and chanting priests at Nanzen-ji, the 17th century center of the ascetic Buddhist Zen sect that did so much to foster simplicity in Japanese life. We also saw the three story Kinkakuji or Golden Pavilion in a lake surrounded by a garden. I was too hot and itchy to enjoy it as much as I should. Entrances full of gaudy junk created with great labor. How can men stand the routine boredom of the handwork and the charging and overcharging for souvenirs? Lunch at a beautiful Japanese style restaurant, with smooth carpentry, mats, chopsticks, low lacquer tables, green tea, food in red lacquer boxes. A Doshisha professor performed a ritual dance. Back in the bus for a ride to the railroad station with a timid girl conductor looking like a frightened kitten and repeating “gozaimasu” at every turn. Fast electric cars on a curvy track through rice fields and occasional hills 24 kilometers south to really ancient Nara, where we were met by a long procession of jinrikshas decorated with American flags. A quaint old town with an inquisitive populace. In Nara Park I dragged through the National museum but picked up feeding the deer, especially when the animals bowed to us. A movie company was making a firm with actors in ancient costumes resembling those in the Baguio barber shop magazines and heavy brown makeup. Our human horses strained uphill to the Kasugajinja, four small shrines set among giant cryptomeria trees, torii gates and 3,000 stone lanterns, with eating and souvenir shops for Buddhist and Shinto pilgrims and sightseers. I was impressed by the quality of 8th century architecture and metallurgy displayed by Nara temples and by the Fu Manchu-looking Daibutsu or giant Buddha at a time when my ancestors were huddled in huts along the North Sea. Most are justly labeled as “National Treasures” or “Important Cultural property.” Staying at the fine Nara Hotel nearby. Celebrated my saint’s day in the hotel bar with Emmajean.With its surrounding mountains, dry rivers, ancient temples, modern buildings, gardens, and millennial continuing culture, Kyoto is a pleasant city indeed. Many contrasts: after passing modernistic Kyoto Imperial University Hospital’s buildings and a silk weaving mill our sightseeing bus took us to the white stucco buildings and chanting priests at Nanzen-ji, the 17th century center of the ascetic Buddhist Zen sect that did so much to foster simplicity in Japanese life. We also saw the three story Kinkakuji or Golden Pavilion in a lake surrounded by a garden. I was too hot and itchy to enjoy it as much as I should. Entrances full of gaudy junk created with great labor. How can men stand the routine boredom of the handwork and the charging and overcharging for souvenirs? Lunch at a beautiful Japanese style restaurant, with smooth carpentry, mats, chopsticks, low lacquer tables, green tea, food in red lacquer boxes. A Doshisha professor performed a ritual dance. Back in the bus for a ride to the railroad station with a timid girl conductor looking like a frightened kitten and repeating “gozaimasu” at every turn. Fast electric cars on a curvy track through rice fields and occasional hills 24 kilometers south to really ancient Nara, where we were met by a long procession of jinrikshas decorated with American flags. A quaint old town with an inquisitive populace. In Nara Park I dragged through the National museum but picked up feeding the deer, especially when the animals bowed to us. A movie company was making a firm with actors in ancient costumes resembling those in the Baguio barber shop magazines and heavy brown makeup. Our human horses strained uphill to the Kasugajinja, four small shrines set among giant cryptomeria trees, torii gates and 3,000 stone lanterns, with eating and souvenir shops for Buddhist and Shinto pilgrims and sightseers. I was impressed by the quality of 8th century architecture and metallurgy displayed by Nara temples and by the Fu Manchu-looking Daibutsu or giant Buddha at a time when my ancestors were huddled in huts along the North Sea. Most are justly labeled as “National Treasures” or “Important Cultural property.” Staying at the fine Nara Hotel nearby. Celebrated my saint’s day in the hotel bar with Emmajean.Friday another short trip, only 40 minutes from ancient Nara to bustling Osaka on the double-track standard gauge Daiichi electric railway, which runs through a long tunnel. Osaka, with its busy streets, tile-roofed tenements, smoking chimneys, modern office buildings and businessmen’s hotels is a great contrast. “Every land must have its commercial nerve center,” the Rotary Club president explained. “You have Chicago, we have Osaka.” He spoke in the air-conditioned banquet hall of the New Osaka Hotel. On the top floor of the white-towered Asahi newspaper, that resembles an airport control tower, we watched a documentary film. Also we could sit down for a show of the heavens at the planetarium atop the municipal electric building. The relaxation of being entertained without any exertion on my part hasn’t come my way in a long time. At the rival Mainichi some of the American delegates gave speeches on how they had “come to love and appreciate Japan.” I learned from S. Fukuoka, Osaka bureau manager of Domei Tsushin, that Prince Konoye and his cabinet took office July 22. His all-important Army minister is Lieutenant General Hideki Tojo. Toured the press room with its deafening roar and walked through long rows of type fonts that are said to contain 30 million hira-gana and kata-kana characters as well as type for the newspaper’s English-language and Braille editions. We heard 27 speeches today, mostly saying the same things. Ted agrees that our hotel room view could as well be in Chicago. I received a piece of very goods news from Suma of the Gaimusho, in a translation of a letter he has sent to the Japanese consul-general to the Wang Ching-wei puppet government in Nanking established this March asking him to offer me courtesies, including interviews with officials. Part of my China trip seems to be on the tracks.Friday another short trip, only 40 minutes from ancient Nara to bustling Osaka on the double-track standard gauge Daiichi electric railway, which runs through a long tunnel. Osaka, with its busy streets, tile-roofed tenements, smoking chimneys, modern office buildings and businessmen’s hotels is a great contrast. “Every land must have its commercial nerve center,” the Rotary Club president explained. “You have Chicago, we have Osaka.” He spoke in the air-conditioned banquet hall of the New Osaka Hotel. On the top floor of the white-towered Asahi newspaper, that resembles an airport control tower, we watched a documentary film. Also we could sit down for a show of the heavens at the planetarium atop the municipal electric building. The relaxation of being entertained without any exertion on my part hasn’t come my way in a long time. At the rival Mainichi some of the American delegates gave speeches on how they had “come to love and appreciate Japan.” I learned from S. Fukuoka, Osaka bureau manager of Domei Tsushin, that Prince Konoye and his cabinet took office July 22. His all-important Army minister is Lieutenant General Hideki Tojo. Toured the press room with its deafening roar and walked through long rows of type fonts that are said to contain 30 million hira-gana and kata-kana characters as well as type for the newspaper’s English-language and Braille editions. We heard 27 speeches today, mostly saying the same things. Ted agrees that our hotel room view could as well be in Chicago. I received a piece of very goods news from Suma of the Gaimusho, in a translation of a letter he has sent to the Japanese consul-general to the Wang Ching-wei puppet government in Nanking established this March asking him to offer me courtesies, including interviews with officials. Part of my China trip seems to be on the tracks.Spent a hot morning in the enormous Kanegafuchi cotton mills in Osaka. The huge building was steaming with more than natural dampness to the point that I left marks when I sat down. This is supposed to be the world’s largest textile mill. We saw miles of cloth being steamed, sized, dyed, printed and put into bolts with labels in many languages. They have put a lot of American mills out of business. The clean worker dormitories have mat beds but nothing else. Swimming pool was scummy. Judo room had more mats. As usual, no photographs allowed, since this is a heavy industrial zone. Lunched at the municipality’s University of Commerce, with more welcome speeches.Spent a hot morning in the enormous Kanegafuchi cotton mills in Osaka. The huge building was steaming with more than natural dampness to the point that I left marks when I sat down. This is supposed to be the world’s largest textile mill. We saw miles of cloth being steamed, sized, dyed, printed and put into bolts with labels in many languages. They have put a lot of American mills out of business. The clean worker dormitories have mat beds but nothing else. Swimming pool was scummy. Judo room had more mats. As usual, no photographs allowed, since this is a heavy industrial zone. Lunched at the municipality’s University of Commerce, with more welcome speeches.One of the features promised on this trip was a home stay. At four this afternoon the hotel lobby was a hive of activity as the American students left with their hosts to spend two nights in the area along the extremely fast Hankyu electric line west of Osaka. This evening we are sitting in the very Western parlor of Saburo Shimada on Showa-en in Nishonomiya, a residential town on Osaka Bay halfway between Osaka and Kobe. Mr. Shimada, who received us in his book-lined living room in short-sleeved shirt with tie and slacks, is a wealthy manufacturer of glass, including the water glasses all over the country that bear his “SGF” in diamond logo. His wife wore traditional clothes. Masao, his son, is interested in jazz records, often listening to Manila broadcasts on his father’s big radio. He and his sister were in Western dress. In the living room with its overstuffed furniture we hardly feel in a foreign country but tomorrow we will awake on tatami mats in rooms with sliding paper doors. What a dinner we had! After the meal we walked across the tracks for a formal tea with the Shimadas’ friend Mrs. Amaike.One of the features promised on this trip was a home stay. At four this afternoon the hotel lobby was a hive of activity as the American students left with their hosts to spend two nights in the area along the extremely fast Hankyu electric line west of Osaka. This evening we are sitting in the very Western parlor of Saburo Shimada on Showa-en in Nishonomiya, a residential town on Osaka Bay halfway between Osaka and Kobe. Mr. Shimada, who received us in his book-lined living room in short-sleeved shirt with tie and slacks, is a wealthy manufacturer of glass, including the water glasses all over the country that bear his “SGF” in diamond logo. His wife wore traditional clothes. Masao, his son, is interested in jazz records, often listening to Manila broadcasts on his father’s big radio. He and his sister were in Western dress. In the living room with its overstuffed furniture we hardly feel in a foreign country but tomorrow we will awake on tatami mats in rooms with sliding paper doors. What a dinner we had! After the meal we walked across the tracks for a formal tea with the Shimadas’ friend Mrs. Amaike.Had a fine breakfast on the Shimada terrace before another tiring day of travel by jammed tramcars and trains across the port city of Kobe, pinched between mountains and sea. Much evidence of the disastrous 1938 floods. We were on our feet for hours, sweat coming off our backs like rain. First to Rokko by train and up the mountain to the impressive new buildings at Kobe College of Commerce. After a small plate lunch we enjoyed a view of the Inland Sea, mountains, factory chimneys, German and Italian ships taking refuge in Kobe harbor from the British Navy, quaint sailing boats, a continuous line of cities along the water. The college president showed me their South American collection among 100,000 volumes in the library and I put in a plug for my Duke Professor John Tate Lanning’s new book on Colonial American Thought. After lunch a long ride across town to Sannoura Park to wearily climb to the municipality’s kanko house for scanty supplies of iced tea and cakes. Didn’t think it was worth the effort. Jolted back east to the Chinese style Toka-ro Restaurant, authentic to the dirty tablecloths and ancient eggs, but fairly good food, which I much prefer to Japanese. Good to get back to the Shimada, where I listened to KZRH in Manila to learn there is a growing possibility the U.S. may impose oil and steel embargoes on Japan in retaliation for its aggression in Asia. Congress is considering another big expansion of U.S. naval power.Had a fine breakfast on the Shimada terrace before another tiring day of travel by jammed tramcars and trains across the port city of Kobe, pinched between mountains and sea. Much evidence of the disastrous 1938 floods. We were on our feet for hours, sweat coming off our backs like rain. First to Rokko by train and up the mountain to the impressive new buildings at Kobe College of Commerce. After a small plate lunch we enjoyed a view of the Inland Sea, mountains, factory chimneys, German and Italian ships taking refuge in Kobe harbor from the British Navy, quaint sailing boats, a continuous line of cities along the water. The college president showed me their South American collection among 100,000 volumes in the library and I put in a plug for my Duke Professor John Tate Lanning’s new book on Colonial American Thought. After lunch a long ride across town to Sannoura Park to wearily climb to the municipality’s kanko house for scanty supplies of iced tea and cakes. Didn’t think it was worth the effort. Jolted back east to the Chinese style Toka-ro Restaurant, authentic to the dirty tablecloths and ancient eggs, but fairly good food, which I much prefer to Japanese. Good to get back to the Shimada, where I listened to KZRH in Manila to learn there is a growing possibility the U.S. may impose oil and steel embargoes on Japan in retaliation for its aggression in Asia. Congress is considering another big expansion of U.S. naval power.On Monday morning visited the spacious and spotless laboratory in the harbor area in which silk from the Kansai district is inspected before export. Some of the trial rooms are air-conditioned. Watched men testing color, evenness, and strength of the fibers. Silk means a hell of a lot to Japan—and American women. Behind the group, Ted and I used a taxi to try to get to the university luncheon but the driver thought we wanted its previous location and we took an electric railway that took us almost to the Takarazuka “Girls Opera” hall in the suburbs before we got off at the new Kansai Gakuen campus with its California Mission-style buildings. But the event was being held in downtown Kobe, so we went to the Oriental Hotel’s grillroom and then joined Leo Goldberg for a convivial afternoon at the house he has rented on a hill near the Tor Hotel. Drinks served by his amah while we listened to risqué American phonograph records whose points I didn’t really understand. Later wandered around town under the elevated railway tracks. Read about the leading English businessman in Kobe being arrested on an espionage charge. Had a good dinner but didn’t feel too well afterward, so Ted and I took an ancient Packard taxi to rejoin the group at the decidedly second-rate Rokko House with winding corridors on a mountainside (but not high enough up to be cool). Got instructions for our Manchukuo trip. Practically no picture taking from now on. In Japan proper photographs may not be taken from places over 20 meters high, of naval vessels, dockyards, harbors, large buildings, industrial areas (especially any kind of heavy industry) and certain fortified coastal areas.On Monday morning visited the spacious and spotless laboratory in the harbor area in which silk from the Kansai district is inspected before export. Some of the trial rooms are air-conditioned. Watched men testing color, evenness, and strength of the fibers. Silk means a hell of a lot to Japan—and American women. Behind the group, Ted and I used a taxi to try to get to the university luncheon but the driver thought we wanted its previous location and we took an electric railway that took us almost to the Takarazuka “Girls Opera” hall in the suburbs before we got off at the new Kansai Gakuen campus with its California Mission-style buildings. But the event was being held in downtown Kobe, so we went to the Oriental Hotel’s grillroom and then joined Leo Goldberg for a convivial afternoon at the house he has rented on a hill near the Tor Hotel. Drinks served by his amah while we listened to risqué American phonograph records whose points I didn’t really understand. Later wandered around town under the elevated railway tracks. Read about the leading English businessman in Kobe being arrested on an espionage charge. Had a good dinner but didn’t feel too well afterward, so Ted and I took an ancient Packard taxi to rejoin the group at the decidedly second-rate Rokko House with winding corridors on a mountainside (but not high enough up to be cool). Got instructions for our Manchukuo trip. Practically no picture taking from now on. In Japan proper photographs may not be taken from places over 20 meters high, of naval vessels, dockyards, harbors, large buildings, industrial areas (especially any kind of heavy industry) and certain fortified coastal areas.Finally a relaxed day with no program. Sat around the Oriental Hotel bar with several red-faced American businessmen who live on expense accounts and apparently have little to do but drink beer and eat the free bar lunch. Made tentative reservations to leave Shanghai August 28 on the President Coolidge for Manila. With world events happening so quickly and unexpectedly, I wonder if I’ll be able to make the trip. Took the Hankyu line back to our hotel. Ted wanted to write, so went with Emmajean to the 920 meter (3050 ft.) summit of Mt. Rokko, hiking up a steep hill to the lower station of the mile-long cable railway. We didn’t puff but we sweated profusely. Much of the line had been washed out in 1938 and repairs were still underway. On top it was cool but damp. We walked along the mountainside to the Rokko Oriental Hotel for beers and a dim view through the haze down to the harbor. Then we walked another kilometer to the summit before descending.Finally a relaxed day with no program. Sat around the Oriental Hotel bar with several red-faced American businessmen who live on expense accounts and apparently have little to do but drink beer and eat the free bar lunch. Made tentative reservations to leave Shanghai August 28 on the President Coolidge for Manila. With world events happening so quickly and unexpectedly, I wonder if I’ll be able to make the trip. Took the Hankyu line back to our hotel. Ted wanted to write, so went with Emmajean to the 920 meter (3050 ft.) summit of Mt. Rokko, hiking up a steep hill to the lower station of the mile-long cable railway. We didn’t puff but we sweated profusely. Much of the line had been washed out in 1938 and repairs were still underway. On top it was cool but damp. We walked along the mountainside to the Rokko Oriental Hotel for beers and a dim view through the haze down to the harbor. Then we walked another kilometer to the summit before descending.On July 31 we took an all day 533 kilometer (329 mile) long ride westward on a steam powered, fairly fast express train on the Sanyo line, much of it along the Inland Sea on the southwest coast of Honshu. I’d seen the lovely scenery several times on trans-Pacific ship trips, as it is on the main route from Kobe to Shanghai. Each time we cut away from the sea with its narrow channels and mountainous islands we climbed up valleys green with rice fields and towns clustered along narrow, dusty gravel roads. Our puffing engine filled tunnels with smoke as it labored along the double-track narrow gauge line, then descended rapidly on clacking rails. At stations we were met by vendors of boxed lunches, watery ice cream, hot tea in earthenware cups and porters in red caps. Station names were bawled in toneless voices from tinny loudspeakers: Hi-me-ji, O-ka-ya-ma, Fu-ku-ya-ma, Hi-ro-shi-ma. Got a distant view of Miyajima across a narrow channel crowded with fishing boats. Factories every place that had enough room to hold them. A businessman full of sake going back to Shimonoseki with rice cakes donated some of them to us in the interest of international good will, only to fall off the train as we pulled into his home station. Many soldiers among the crowd at the pier sheds. “You can’t see Asia without a program,” I yelled at my compatriots as our air-conditioned express ferry with modern décor pulled out of the harbor at high speed, dodging junks by a few meters, leaving behind the clusters of lights of Shimonoseki and Moji on Kyushu across the narrow strait that was our last glimpse of Japan. I can do without its shortages, filtered news and sticky summer heat. Very strange to be aboard with wedge head rests in a big common room among men in underwear and squalling children. Cathie Beers threw a fit about such conditions. Bathrooms had squat equipment without toilet paper; wash basins had hot water but no towels or soap.On July 31 we took an all day 533 kilometer (329 mile) long ride westward on a steam powered, fairly fast express train on the Sanyo line, much of it along the Inland Sea on the southwest coast of Honshu. I’d seen the lovely scenery several times on trans-Pacific ship trips, as it is on the main route from Kobe to Shanghai. Each time we cut away from the sea with its narrow channels and mountainous islands we climbed up valleys green with rice fields and towns clustered along narrow, dusty gravel roads. Our puffing engine filled tunnels with smoke as it labored along the double-track narrow gauge line, then descended rapidly on clacking rails. At stations we were met by vendors of boxed lunches, watery ice cream, hot tea in earthenware cups and porters in red caps. Station names were bawled in toneless voices from tinny loudspeakers: Hi-me-ji, O-ka-ya-ma, Fu-ku-ya-ma, Hi-ro-shi-ma. Got a distant view of Miyajima across a narrow channel crowded with fishing boats. Factories every place that had enough room to hold them. A businessman full of sake going back to Shimonoseki with rice cakes donated some of them to us in the interest of international good will, only to fall off the train as we pulled into his home station. Many soldiers among the crowd at the pier sheds. “You can’t see Asia without a program,” I yelled at my compatriots as our air-conditioned express ferry with modern décor pulled out of the harbor at high speed, dodging junks by a few meters, leaving behind the clusters of lights of Shimonoseki and Moji on Kyushu across the narrow strait that was our last glimpse of Japan. I can do without its shortages, filtered news and sticky summer heat. Very strange to be aboard with wedge head rests in a big common room among men in underwear and squalling children. Cathie Beers threw a fit about such conditions. Bathrooms had squat equipment without toilet paper; wash basins had hot water but no towels or soap.Although often disturbed by squalling infants, I slept fairly well on my mat until a squawky public address set up a toneless spiel and music on records. After 7 1&Mac218;2 hours we already were entering the almost landlocked harbor of Fusan, 120 miles from Shimonoseki, and at the southern end of the Korean peninsula. The sun was just coming up over hazy blue mountains as we slipped around the breakwater past camouflaged oil tanks for our first look at Asia and the first mainland portion of the Japanese empire, “Tyosen.” A great fuss before we docked as we were accused of photographing military installations. The Gaimusho man came immediately to our rescue, pointing out that none of his charges had their cameras out but that a German passenger was the guilty party. At the pier we stepped into standard gauge railway cars with individual chairs. Apart from saturating clouds of soft coal soot from the locomotive in the many short tunnels, the trip was quite comfortable but the food in the dining car was skimpy and there was no beer. Railway being double-tracked. Adjacent gravel road still washed out in many places. Red soil, mud villages with Rising Sun flags flying in observance of a national Thrift and Fast Day, but also steeples of two Christian churches. Few electric power lines or factories. Wide, shallow, gravel-banked rivers and blue hills gradually rising into real mountains that reminded me of the hazy jaggedness of Chinese scrolls. About 450 kilometers to the capital of Keijo (Seoul to the Koreans). We took our suitcases and our sooty faces to the big 1915 vintage Tyosen Hotel, owned by the Japanese Government Railways. Washed our blackened faces as best we could but in vain before taking a bus to the Government General building, a five story pile of marble, brick, and frescoes vaguely reminiscent of the original Library of Congress building. Shown an English-language documentary film on 30 years of Japanese achievement in bringing Korea into the modern world. Afterwards an official remarked wearily in tones worthy of a European colonial counterpart, “We are trying to reforest the mountains but as fast as we plant trees the local people cut them down for firewood.”Although often disturbed by squalling infants, I slept fairly well on my mat until a squawky public address set up a toneless spiel and music on records. After 7 1&Mac218;2 hours we already were entering the almost landlocked harbor of Fusan, 120 miles from Shimonoseki, and at the southern end of the Korean peninsula. The sun was just coming up over hazy blue mountains as we slipped around the breakwater past camouflaged oil tanks for our first look at Asia and the first mainland portion of the Japanese empire, “Tyosen.” A great fuss before we docked as we were accused of photographing military installations. The Gaimusho man came immediately to our rescue, pointing out that none of his charges had their cameras out but that a German passenger was the guilty party. At the pier we stepped into standard gauge railway cars with individual chairs. Apart from saturating clouds of soft coal soot from the locomotive in the many short tunnels, the trip was quite comfortable but the food in the dining car was skimpy and there was no beer. Railway being double-tracked. Adjacent gravel road still washed out in many places. Red soil, mud villages with Rising Sun flags flying in observance of a national Thrift and Fast Day, but also steeples of two Christian churches. Few electric power lines or factories. Wide, shallow, gravel-banked rivers and blue hills gradually rising into real mountains that reminded me of the hazy jaggedness of Chinese scrolls. About 450 kilometers to the capital of Keijo (Seoul to the Koreans). We took our suitcases and our sooty faces to the big 1915 vintage Tyosen Hotel, owned by the Japanese Government Railways. Washed our blackened faces as best we could but in vain before taking a bus to the Government General building, a five story pile of marble, brick, and frescoes vaguely reminiscent of the original Library of Congress building. Shown an English-language documentary film on 30 years of Japanese achievement in bringing Korea into the modern world. Afterwards an official remarked wearily in tones worthy of a European colonial counterpart, “We are trying to reforest the mountains but as fast as we plant trees the local people cut them down for firewood.”At breakfast Emmajean read out her transcription of the sign in her hotel room: “The Devotion Day for new Oriental recreation. Day that people keep mind to meet any trouble to make racial happiness in the future. Dinning room will be served only light dishes by economic style and dry in bar room.” Via bus (gasoline powered here) to Nanzan Mountain to view Keizyo, Keijo or Seoul from the Chosen Zingu, a Shinto shrine. Saw many substantial modern buildings, dominated by a red Church of England, backed by hazy mountains. Parks paved with gravel, lined with stone lanterns, with many weird stone dogs. Went by Tokuzyu Palace and its fine gardens but didn’t enter the buildings. Many old men with straggly beards, horsehair top hats and flowing white garments. Look like less healthy versions of bearded man on bank notes. Women dressed in puffy white blouses and blue skirts. It was good to be on American soil at the Consulate General, which occupies the grounds of an old palace. Consul General March, a fat and pompous old school diplomat, showed us his Korean house, which had been made much more comfortable with American heating and furniture, plus a WPA painting competing with his wife’s traditional wood blocks. Had afternoon tea with Oda, the English language secretary to the Government-General—a sort of good will man. He was frank about the true status of Manchukuo and says this will not be the case with China proper. On the other hand Korea, which he compares to U.S. territories like Hawaii, will eventually become part of Japan, as Algeria is now part of France.At breakfast Emmajean read out her transcription of the sign in her hotel room: “The Devotion Day for new Oriental recreation. Day that people keep mind to meet any trouble to make racial happiness in the future. Dinning room will be served only light dishes by economic style and dry in bar room.” Via bus (gasoline powered here) to Nanzan Mountain to view Keizyo, Keijo or Seoul from the Chosen Zingu, a Shinto shrine. Saw many substantial modern buildings, dominated by a red Church of England, backed by hazy mountains. Parks paved with gravel, lined with stone lanterns, with many weird stone dogs. Went by Tokuzyu Palace and its fine gardens but didn’t enter the buildings. Many old men with straggly beards, horsehair top hats and flowing white garments. Look like less healthy versions of bearded man on bank notes. Women dressed in puffy white blouses and blue skirts. It was good to be on American soil at the Consulate General, which occupies the grounds of an old palace. Consul General March, a fat and pompous old school diplomat, showed us his Korean house, which had been made much more comfortable with American heating and furniture, plus a WPA painting competing with his wife’s traditional wood blocks. Had afternoon tea with Oda, the English language secretary to the Government-General—a sort of good will man. He was frank about the true status of Manchukuo and says this will not be the case with China proper. On the other hand Korea, which he compares to U.S. territories like Hawaii, will eventually become part of Japan, as Algeria is now part of France.After a good dinner we took the night train for Manchukuo. We had a special sleeping car but weren’t allowed to take down the seats to use as beds. Couldn’t see much in the darkness but stood on the platform talking with Emmajean. Soot coming through the partly opened windows, especially in many of the tunnels, makes it hard to keep clean. We were late all along the single-track line, stopping at almost every siding to let southbound trains—mostly passenger—pass. A long stop at Heijo (Pyongyang). I had a hard time curling up in my seat but nevertheless got quite a lot of sleep. Rained all night. By morning the hills were flattening out and rice paddies were displaced by fields of corn, millet and soybeans. After the frontier station of Singisyu (Sinuiju in Korean) we crossed the wide and muddy Yalu on a long steel bridge. Another is under construction for a double track project. No road traffic. Antung is in Manchukuo, the country created by Japan to hide its annexation of Manchuria. A perfunctory customs examination while a South Manchuria Railway locomotive and dining car and SMR crew are added. Faces outside window are definitely Chinese. Surprised to be going by more mountains on the 240 kilometer run to Mukden. They are bright green in the summer rain. Soldiers instead of gendarmes guard the stations and there are pillboxes and barbed wire. Many new towns and dams. A muddy rawness about everything. At Penhsihu a coal and iron works in a valley that reminded me of West Virginia, but still mostly under construction. Countryside much more familiar to me than to our Japanese escorts. It’s much cooler this far north, with temperatures in the pleasant 70s. Went straight through to Mukden in a broad plain that could have been in the American Middle West. Staying at the Yamato Hotel built about 1931. While relaxing in a hot tub I read the Manchuria Daily News of America’s increasing marriage rate. Napped until 7 p.m., when I was awakened to attend a dinner given by the Seven Seas Society, a creature of the ubiquitous South Manchurian Railway, along with the Kwantung Army, the real authority in this puppet state. Food composed of everything from sea, land and air. It didn’t pay to investigate. Wound up the day with ice cream, cakes and good music at a Russian candy store near our hotel.After a good dinner we took the night train for Manchukuo. We had a special sleeping car but weren’t allowed to take down the seats to use as beds. Couldn’t see much in the darkness but stood on the platform talking with Emmajean. Soot coming through the partly opened windows, especially in many of the tunnels, makes it hard to keep clean. We were late all along the single-track line, stopping at almost every siding to let southbound trains—mostly passenger—pass. A long stop at Heijo (Pyongyang). I had a hard time curling up in my seat but nevertheless got quite a lot of sleep. Rained all night. By morning the hills were flattening out and rice paddies were displaced by fields of corn, millet and soybeans. After the frontier station of Singisyu (Sinuiju in Korean) we crossed the wide and muddy Yalu on a long steel bridge. Another is under construction for a double track project. No road traffic. Antung is in Manchukuo, the country created by Japan to hide its annexation of Manchuria. A perfunctory customs examination while a South Manchuria Railway locomotive and dining car and SMR crew are added. Faces outside window are definitely Chinese. Surprised to be going by more mountains on the 240 kilometer run to Mukden. They are bright green in the summer rain. Soldiers instead of gendarmes guard the stations and there are pillboxes and barbed wire. Many new towns and dams. A muddy rawness about everything. At Penhsihu a coal and iron works in a valley that reminded me of West Virginia, but still mostly under construction. Countryside much more familiar to me than to our Japanese escorts. It’s much cooler this far north, with temperatures in the pleasant 70s. Went straight through to Mukden in a broad plain that could have been in the American Middle West. Staying at the Yamato Hotel built about 1931. While relaxing in a hot tub I read the Manchuria Daily News of America’s increasing marriage rate. Napped until 7 p.m., when I was awakened to attend a dinner given by the Seven Seas Society, a creature of the ubiquitous South Manchurian Railway, along with the Kwantung Army, the real authority in this puppet state. Food composed of everything from sea, land and air. It didn’t pay to investigate. Wound up the day with ice cream, cakes and good music at a Russian candy store near our hotel.Next morning we took a bus ride through the city of Mukden, comprised of the modern Japanese section, Yamato-ku, with paved streets, new steel and concrete buildings, and the old Chinese town of Fengtien with a wall, muddy streets full of pedestrians, pigs and sheep, gaudy signs, and smells. Our bus driver really could handle his steed, blowing his horn like mad to keep up with the general din. It’s still drizzling and cool. My Japanese Government Railways Baededeker-style Guide to China, compiled in 1923, mentions Mukden only as the chief city of Manchuria and the gateway to China from Europe via the Trans-Siberian Railway. It contains a picture of the North Mausoleum, built in 1644, which is still impressive. Flagstones succeeding the muddy approach, curving tile roofs, red walls, and stone animal figures facing the courtyard make a perfect Hollywood set for a Fu Manchu mystery movie. As an unusual privilege for foreigners, we were given entrance to the inner court through a 30-foot wall. We wondered why we were shown two other complexes: Northeastern University, now used by the Japanese as a barracks, its stadium made into a stable and Tung-shang-tang or Municipal Orphanage/Poor House, which is run-down, its yards pools of water covered with green scum, odd piles of stone, flies, old men sitting on their mats and staring into space.Next morning we took a bus ride through the city of Mukden, comprised of the modern Japanese section, Yamato-ku, with paved streets, new steel and concrete buildings, and the old Chinese town of Fengtien with a wall, muddy streets full of pedestrians, pigs and sheep, gaudy signs, and smells. Our bus driver really could handle his steed, blowing his horn like mad to keep up with the general din. It’s still drizzling and cool. My Japanese Government Railways Baededeker-style Guide to China, compiled in 1923, mentions Mukden only as the chief city of Manchuria and the gateway to China from Europe via the Trans-Siberian Railway. It contains a picture of the North Mausoleum, built in 1644, which is still impressive. Flagstones succeeding the muddy approach, curving tile roofs, red walls, and stone animal figures facing the courtyard make a perfect Hollywood set for a Fu Manchu mystery movie. As an unusual privilege for foreigners, we were given entrance to the inner court through a 30-foot wall. We wondered why we were shown two other complexes: Northeastern University, now used by the Japanese as a barracks, its stadium made into a stable and Tung-shang-tang or Municipal Orphanage/Poor House, which is run-down, its yards pools of water covered with green scum, odd piles of stone, flies, old men sitting on their mats and staring into space.Leaving Mukden at 4:40 p.m. on the dot, we took the South Manchurian’s “HatoHaot” Express north to Hsinking (“New Capital”) called Chinchow or Changchun before the Japanese eight years ago decreed it would be the capital of their Manchukuo. Its first-class observation car held generals and colonels of the occupiers’ Kwantung Army. We rode with officers of lesser rank. Chinese sat in third class. The Hato was an all-steel, quiet, fairly fast train that took us through soybean fields, low hills, and much green foliage, including a few rice fields at the same latitude as South Dakota. We saw a magnificent sunset as we ate an unappetizing dinner in the dining car. Always dessert is ice cream and watermelon. Took a long bus ride from the station to a Japanese hotel, naturally named Yamato, and far from luxury establishment. As usual, the toilets stink. We entertained and were entertained by four huge sumo wrestlers in kimonos, their hair in topknots. After a pillow fight, most of our group went to the Paradise Cabaret to be entertained properly by White Russians. Huge draft beer 70 sen in a fine grill room. I talked with Emmajean in the hotel over a bottle of sake.Leaving Mukden at 4:40 p.m. on the dot, we took the South Manchurian’s “HatoHaot” Express north to Hsinking (“New Capital”) called Chinchow or Changchun before the Japanese eight years ago decreed it would be the capital of their Manchukuo. Its first-class observation car held generals and colonels of the occupiers’ Kwantung Army. We rode with officers of lesser rank. Chinese sat in third class. The Hato was an all-steel, quiet, fairly fast train that took us through soybean fields, low hills, and much green foliage, including a few rice fields at the same latitude as South Dakota. We saw a magnificent sunset as we ate an unappetizing dinner in the dining car. Always dessert is ice cream and watermelon. Took a long bus ride from the station to a Japanese hotel, naturally named Yamato, and far from luxury establishment. As usual, the toilets stink. We entertained and were entertained by four huge sumo wrestlers in kimonos, their hair in topknots. After a pillow fight, most of our group went to the Paradise Cabaret to be entertained properly by White Russians. Huge draft beer 70 sen in a fine grill room. I talked with Emmajean in the hotel over a bottle of sake.Hsingking is a Japanese-dominated city full of Kwantung Army soldiers in dark khaki uniforms, generals riding in Buicks flying Rising Suns and flags with stars. We drove around in a dusty bus. Since this is ostensibly the capital of an independent state (not recognized by most nations), the Japanese have a magnificent Consulate General in the center of town. We didn’t see the headquarters of Manchukuo’s General Wu. The capital city evidently was inspired by the District of Columbia with traffic circles and much space between government buildings constructed in a bastard Chinese neo-classical style. The yellow tile-roofed palace of the Emperor, the last Manchu, who was once called Henry Pu-yi, has a stout wall to protect him against “bandits.” The jail is on the other side of town. We were shown the battlefield where the Japanese triumphed over the Chinese in 1931. Dinner tonight in the New Capital Chinese restaurant given by the Dai Ichi Club, the largest I have seen, occupying a neo-classical building with white columns. Consumed enormous quantities of beer and 23 courses of food. Ted argued with the assertions of T. Okada, California-born translator for the official Kokutsu News Agency, that this is really an independent country under Japanese protection and Emmajean also asked him sarcastic questions about who really runs this country. So far we haven’t hard of any official who is not Japanese. After six weeks of togetherness our gang has developed cohesiveness and has heard so much propaganda that we kid around and refuse to believe anything we are told. I hope I’ve contributed to some background history on Japanese-Russian rivalry. Told them that as an infant in 1919 I had been in Vladiovostok when American troops sent from Manila were trying not only to help Czech ex-POWs escape the Red Army but also to restrain the Japanese from trying to take over Siberia. Ted says he has “a medal given to me by the Czar for extraordinary bravery—using an Oriental john.” Cathie Beers still vainly tries to keep us in line. Walked back to the hotel in the cool night.Hsingking is a Japanese-dominated city full of Kwantung Army soldiers in dark khaki uniforms, generals riding in Buicks flying Rising Suns and flags with stars. We drove around in a dusty bus. Since this is ostensibly the capital of an independent state (not recognized by most nations), the Japanese have a magnificent Consulate General in the center of town. We didn’t see the headquarters of Manchukuo’s General Wu. The capital city evidently was inspired by the District of Columbia with traffic circles and much space between government buildings constructed in a bastard Chinese neo-classical style. The yellow tile-roofed palace of the Emperor, the last Manchu, who was once called Henry Pu-yi, has a stout wall to protect him against “bandits.” The jail is on the other side of town. We were shown the battlefield where the Japanese triumphed over the Chinese in 1931. Dinner tonight in the New Capital Chinese restaurant given by the Dai Ichi Club, the largest I have seen, occupying a neo-classical building with white columns. Consumed enormous quantities of beer and 23 courses of food. Ted argued with the assertions of T. Okada, California-born translator for the official Kokutsu News Agency, that this is really an independent country under Japanese protection and Emmajean also asked him sarcastic questions about who really runs this country. So far we haven’t hard of any official who is not Japanese. After six weeks of togetherness our gang has developed cohesiveness and has heard so much propaganda that we kid around and refuse to believe anything we are told. I hope I’ve contributed to some background history on Japanese-Russian rivalry. Told them that as an infant in 1919 I had been in Vladiovostok when American troops sent from Manila were trying not only to help Czech ex-POWs escape the Red Army but also to restrain the Japanese from trying to take over Siberia. Ted says he has “a medal given to me by the Czar for extraordinary bravery—using an Oriental john.” Cathie Beers still vainly tries to keep us in line. Walked back to the hotel in the cool night.Our train from Hsingking to Harbin on a sunny morning went so fast we could milk cows from its windows, as the saying goes. We stopped in a soybean field for an hour to let the Asia Express pass. The siding was guarded by an armed soldier and across the tracks was an old sod breastworks. Bridges have blockhouses at either end. Many fine looking Japanese officers, many with families, were on our crowded train. Manchuria must get the cream of the crop. We walked up a very European street to a lousy hotel being converted from Western to Japanese style with tatami and squat toilets. It has the same discomforts as the one we left this morning. Once again the other section of our group got the better accommodations. Harbin, full of animals, their dung, and mud, is a city where Chinese and émigré Russians still predominate. Few Japanese are on the streets. Most signs still are Cyrillic. We hired a drosky at two yen an hour (33 minutes by the red-faced old Russian bandit driver’s calculation) to tour the European-style Pristan quarter. Since the Russians had a “concession” here from 1896 to 1924 as part of its Chinese Eastern Railway shortcut across Manchuria to Vladivostok, it has no wood buildings but many stone, brick and concrete relics of the ancient regime. After the 1917 revolution it contained so many refugees that it was the largest white city in East Asia. The Soviets invaded Manchuria only a decade ago to convince warlord Chang Hsueh-liang that they maintained the Czarist share in control of the line. Now everything is run down; paint is peeling, and holes make sidewalks dangerous walking. Stores sell furs, embroidered blouses, candy, and South Manchurian “White Wolf Scotch” whiskey in Johnnie Walker bottles. On the wide, brown Sungari River we saw two Germans in a noisy motorboat flying the Nazi swastika and a sailboat almost capsizing under the weight of too many blonde Russian passengers. After a dinner of borsch and steak at the New Moderne Grille we had tea and cakes at a nearby Russian tearoom. Tap water is unsafe to drink. Thanks to the occupiers, we are still on Tokyo time and darkness does not fall until around 9 p.m. When the gaudy neon sign on our hotel came on, it illuminated in its rosy glow a synagogue across the street.Our train from Hsingking to Harbin on a sunny morning went so fast we could milk cows from its windows, as the saying goes. We stopped in a soybean field for an hour to let the Asia Express pass. The siding was guarded by an armed soldier and across the tracks was an old sod breastworks. Bridges have blockhouses at either end. Many fine looking Japanese officers, many with families, were on our crowded train. Manchuria must get the cream of the crop. We walked up a very European street to a lousy hotel being converted from Western to Japanese style with tatami and squat toilets. It has the same discomforts as the one we left this morning. Once again the other section of our group got the better accommodations. Harbin, full of animals, their dung, and mud, is a city where Chinese and émigré Russians still predominate. Few Japanese are on the streets. Most signs still are Cyrillic. We hired a drosky at two yen an hour (33 minutes by the red-faced old Russian bandit driver’s calculation) to tour the European-style Pristan quarter. Since the Russians had a “concession” here from 1896 to 1924 as part of its Chinese Eastern Railway shortcut across Manchuria to Vladivostok, it has no wood buildings but many stone, brick and concrete relics of the ancient regime. After the 1917 revolution it contained so many refugees that it was the largest white city in East Asia. The Soviets invaded Manchuria only a decade ago to convince warlord Chang Hsueh-liang that they maintained the Czarist share in control of the line. Now everything is run down; paint is peeling, and holes make sidewalks dangerous walking. Stores sell furs, embroidered blouses, candy, and South Manchurian “White Wolf Scotch” whiskey in Johnnie Walker bottles. On the wide, brown Sungari River we saw two Germans in a noisy motorboat flying the Nazi swastika and a sailboat almost capsizing under the weight of too many blonde Russian passengers. After a dinner of borsch and steak at the New Moderne Grille we had tea and cakes at a nearby Russian tearoom. Tap water is unsafe to drink. Thanks to the occupiers, we are still on Tokyo time and darkness does not fall until around 9 p.m. When the gaudy neon sign on our hotel came on, it illuminated in its rosy glow a synagogue across the street.Toured Harbin officially on Wednesday, August 7 in a big glassed-in bus with a handsome Russian driver and a chubby-cheeked Japanese guide. They took us to a new Japanese shrine; to the log Central Church where Orthodox services were being sung by white-robed priests with long blonde beards; past the USSR embassy, flying a big red flag (hard to believe the Kwantung Army was licked in the Nomonhan Incident on the Outer Mongolian border a few hundred kilometers west of here only a year ago); past 1890s European-style mansions with walls and gates and large gardens and to the new obelisk, modeled after the Washington monument but not as high. On its grounds soldiers drilled with a light machine gun while two fighter planes tumbled around overhead like flies in a skillful, nerve-tingling dogfight. No one of our group can say now that the Japanese don’t know how to fly. The Chinese section is a mass of animals and humans crowding muddy streets. Saw the big Sungari River that held large steamers and a gunboat. It even boasts a naval institute. Again lunched at the New Moderne, each course a la carte and colossal. Tasted first white cheese since I was in Europe four years ago. Tried taking a nap but was bothered by flies. Tea and cakes at the Mars confectionery, proudly displaying its American electric refrigerator in the front room. Its Russian proprietors long to rejoin their relatives in San Francisco. “We have no future here,” they lamented out of earshot of our guide. At 5:40 we assembled in the station waiting room, which is still equipped with icons and candles, to be bundled south. Several washouts slowed us and we had to wait until we got to Hsinking in the middle of the night to obtain a private 2nd class sleeping car with wide, dirty plush seats and closed beds. Succeeded in opening them enough to use as beds, stretching out with fair comfort and using raincoats for pillows as we turned out the lights.Toured Harbin officially on Wednesday, August 7 in a big glassed-in bus with a handsome Russian driver and a chubby-cheeked Japanese guide. They took us to a new Japanese shrine; to the log Central Church where Orthodox services were being sung by white-robed priests with long blonde beards; past the USSR embassy, flying a big red flag (hard to believe the Kwantung Army was licked in the Nomonhan Incident on the Outer Mongolian border a few hundred kilometers west of here only a year ago); past 1890s European-style mansions with walls and gates and large gardens and to the new obelisk, modeled after the Washington monument but not as high. On its grounds soldiers drilled with a light machine gun while two fighter planes tumbled around overhead like flies in a skillful, nerve-tingling dogfight. No one of our group can say now that the Japanese don’t know how to fly. The Chinese section is a mass of animals and humans crowding muddy streets. Saw the big Sungari River that held large steamers and a gunboat. It even boasts a naval institute. Again lunched at the New Moderne, each course a la carte and colossal. Tasted first white cheese since I was in Europe four years ago. Tried taking a nap but was bothered by flies. Tea and cakes at the Mars confectionery, proudly displaying its American electric refrigerator in the front room. Its Russian proprietors long to rejoin their relatives in San Francisco. “We have no future here,” they lamented out of earshot of our guide. At 5:40 we assembled in the station waiting room, which is still equipped with icons and candles, to be bundled south. Several washouts slowed us and we had to wait until we got to Hsinking in the middle of the night to obtain a private 2nd class sleeping car with wide, dirty plush seats and closed beds. Succeeded in opening them enough to use as beds, stretching out with fair comfort and using raincoats for pillows as we turned out the lights.The trip south form Harbin to Dairen is 943 kilometers (581 miles), a 23 hour journey. Most of the train is composed of coolie cars smelling of unwashed, hard-working, blue-coated Chinese laborers. We went through six such cars to get to the diner as an orange-red dawn came up across the plains. We were having oatmeal for breakfast as we passed the Anshan steel mills and its row upon row of workers’ houses. At lunch we sat drinking beer and eating Manchurian stew with rice. Emmajean writing scores of postcards to family and friends in Indiana. Further south, hills, then jagged topped mountains appeared. No formalities except one more stamp in my passport as we crossed back into admittedly Japanese territory on the southern end of the Liaotung Peninsula, which Japan called Kwantung. Raining as we emerged from the Dairen station into a clean, brightly lit, brick and concrete modern city to deposit our suitcases and wash up at the multi-story Yamato Hotel before going to the Hoshigawa (Star River) Hotel on the beach for a colossal dinner given by the South Manchuria Railway. We were encouraged to sing college songs but as the sole Duke delegate I stumbled on the words of my own. Had a bull session with Emmajean, Fran, Greg, Vinton, and Yamanaka. The Japanese students on this trip probably had their political ideas changed more than we (but not all those about what they regard as the free and easy behavior of American college women.) They and other Japanese sometimes appear racists, looking condescendingly on fellow Asians, yet resenting Americans who do not treat them as equals. They are afraid of both the political and military threat posed by the Russians. The Americans have become much more knowledgeable and sophisticated about Japan, although they (including me) still have a lot to learn. We know that while they share the belief that Japan is entitled to more access to raw materials and markets, many influential people don’t like to see it gained by brute force. Free speech is no longer safe and this has been conveyed by indirection, hints, even by what is not said. I’m sure my diary is being read while I’m out of my room.The trip south form Harbin to Dairen is 943 kilometers (581 miles), a 23 hour journey. Most of the train is composed of coolie cars smelling of unwashed, hard-working, blue-coated Chinese laborers. We went through six such cars to get to the diner as an orange-red dawn came up across the plains. We were having oatmeal for breakfast as we passed the Anshan steel mills and its row upon row of workers’ houses. At lunch we sat drinking beer and eating Manchurian stew with rice. Emmajean writing scores of postcards to family and friends in Indiana. Further south, hills, then jagged topped mountains appeared. No formalities except one more stamp in my passport as we crossed back into admittedly Japanese territory on the southern end of the Liaotung Peninsula, which Japan called Kwantung. Raining as we emerged from the Dairen station into a clean, brightly lit, brick and concrete modern city to deposit our suitcases and wash up at the multi-story Yamato Hotel before going to the Hoshigawa (Star River) Hotel on the beach for a colossal dinner given by the South Manchuria Railway. We were encouraged to sing college songs but as the sole Duke delegate I stumbled on the words of my own. Had a bull session with Emmajean, Fran, Greg, Vinton, and Yamanaka. The Japanese students on this trip probably had their political ideas changed more than we (but not all those about what they regard as the free and easy behavior of American college women.) They and other Japanese sometimes appear racists, looking condescendingly on fellow Asians, yet resenting Americans who do not treat them as equals. They are afraid of both the political and military threat posed by the Russians. The Americans have become much more knowledgeable and sophisticated about Japan, although they (including me) still have a lot to learn. We know that while they share the belief that Japan is entitled to more access to raw materials and markets, many influential people don’t like to see it gained by brute force. Free speech is no longer safe and this has been conveyed by indirection, hints, even by what is not said. I’m sure my diary is being read while I’m out of my room.The longest bus ride of our tour was as we were taken southwest to the tip of the Liaotung Peninsula. Our expert driver went 50 miles an hour in an American-made International on the narrow, winding asphalt road through tunnels and around rocky peninsulas to see the battlefields of Port Arthur (which the Japanese have renamed Ryojun), where from August 29, 1904 to January 1905 the Japanese attacked the circle of forts protecting this major Russian naval base from observation and bombardment. Looking at the ruins of the East Chikuka-shan north fort, where hand-to-hand combat inside tunnels went on for five months, I wondered at the bravery of these white and yellow men fighting so valiantly over a bit of ground. The stench of corpses must have been awful. We were shown the collapsed room where Major General Kondratenko was killed by a shell. Barbed wire and trenches are still visible. Much of Europe and China now resemble this. The ashes of 22,700 soldiers are enshrined on Monument Hill, which affords a view of the entire operation. Chiaki Tanaka, a Nisei who works for the Railway’s propaganda bureau, was our well-informed guide. Lunched at another Yamato Hotel, where many Europeans from China are spending the summer. At the government museum in the new Port Arthur saw much Manchu work from snuff bottles to mummies clad in the same blue jeans worn by their modern counterparts, bank notes, dolls and clothes.The longest bus ride of our tour was as we were taken southwest to the tip of the Liaotung Peninsula. Our expert driver went 50 miles an hour in an American-made International on the narrow, winding asphalt road through tunnels and around rocky peninsulas to see the battlefields of Port Arthur (which the Japanese have renamed Ryojun), where from August 29, 1904 to January 1905 the Japanese attacked the circle of forts protecting this major Russian naval base from observation and bombardment. Looking at the ruins of the East Chikuka-shan north fort, where hand-to-hand combat inside tunnels went on for five months, I wondered at the bravery of these white and yellow men fighting so valiantly over a bit of ground. The stench of corpses must have been awful. We were shown the collapsed room where Major General Kondratenko was killed by a shell. Barbed wire and trenches are still visible. Much of Europe and China now resemble this. The ashes of 22,700 soldiers are enshrined on Monument Hill, which affords a view of the entire operation. Chiaki Tanaka, a Nisei who works for the Railway’s propaganda bureau, was our well-informed guide. Lunched at another Yamato Hotel, where many Europeans from China are spending the summer. At the government museum in the new Port Arthur saw much Manchu work from snuff bottles to mummies clad in the same blue jeans worn by their modern counterparts, bank notes, dolls and clothes.Saturday morning August 10 I got up early to check with the Water Police to be sure I wouldn’t have problems leaving Dairen separately from the group. They didn’t give a damn where I went, so after breakfast we all went down to the long covered passenger wharf where the gang embarked for Kobe and home. I shook hands all around, walked down the gangplank and took a taxi to see the railway’s magnificent library. My ship leaves for Tientsin this afternoon. It’s been an exhausting but exhilarating two months.Saturday morning August 10 I got up early to check with the Water Police to be sure I wouldn’t have problems leaving Dairen separately from the group. They didn’t give a damn where I went, so after breakfast we all went down to the long covered passenger wharf where the gang embarked for Kobe and home. I shook hands all around, walked down the gangplank and took a taxi to see the railway’s magnificent library. My ship leaves for Tientsin this afternoon. It’s been an exhausting but exhilarating two months.Saturday, August 10 I lunched at the Russian-owned Victoria Restaurant together with a SMR accountant and a writer before embarking at 2 p.m. on the 2,300 ton Tientsin Maru of the Dairen Kisen Kaisha, a line which operates on the narrow Yellow Sea between Antung, Dairen and Tientsin every two or three days. Passengers include Chinese coolies jammed into steerage, businessmen and a few tourists. After rounding the cape beyond Port Arthur we were out to sea in the Gulf of Chihli. My cabin mate is J. Naruse, manager of the Toyo Cement Co.’s asbestos plant in Tientsin. The only Europeans are two Germans. The line’s claim of “Excellent accommodations for tourists” is well founded. I even got a stamp showing the ship for my diary. The muddy Yellow Sea is well named. Passed only two fishing boats before crossing Taku Bar at 9 a.m. to enter the Peiho River for a three hour trip upstream, making many abrupt turns between unfenced corn fields and mud villages that crowd its banks. Occasional huge mounds of brick kilns and old Chinese forts. Passed several tugs and barges flying Union Jacks, which were also painted on their sides. They haul goods from Tientsin to ocean-going freighters off Taku. Near Tientsin warehouses and tanks of Texaco and Standard Oil of New York, plastered with American flags and surrounded by electrified fences. Tientsin has been a treaty port since the 1860s, with exclusive settlements for major powers except the U.S. After a month in Japanese territory it was almost unbelievable to meet Chinese Maritime Customs officers, taxi drivers and porters who speak passable English and to see American and European goods displayed in store windows along Victoria Road No. 3. Over a dilapidated steel bridge to the ramshackle railway station. Thought I was doing well exchanging my travelers checks at one dollar for 15 “Mex” (ican) but learned later that the moneychanger, who kept his Chinese money in piles, had cheated me. Prices even at this rate are so favorable to dollar owners that foreigners live high for little. Took a crowded first-class SMR train through truck farms and cornfields, with a fairly good dirt road alongside. Felt lonely awhile, missing the horseplay and conversation of the Conference gang. Only 86 miles to the Chienmen station hard by the high, solid Peking walls, with the new building of the Japanese-run railway administration adjacent. Weather cool, dry, pleasant. Went through a second passport inspection of the day and on to the famous Grand Hotel de Pekin, a bit old and run down but with big airy rooms that cost 18 Mex. a day. They too now had a souvenir stamp. My parents and sister Betty stayed here in 1937 when Dad came up from the Philippines to meet them after they had crossed Eurasia by train. Ubiquitous service by Chinese room “boys” clad in white gowns. Took a short ricksha ride on busy, clean streets through the Legation Quarter, seeing U.S. Marines and tall radio towers near the American establishment. Went through huge Tartar City gate, plastered with OPPOSE BRITAIN signs in English. Had 9-course dinner on roof for 4 Mex. The deal looks damned interesting.Saturday, August 10 I lunched at the Russian-owned Victoria Restaurant together with a SMR accountant and a writer before embarking at 2 p.m. on the 2,300 ton Tientsin Maru of the Dairen Kisen Kaisha, a line which operates on the narrow Yellow Sea between Antung, Dairen and Tientsin every two or three days. Passengers include Chinese coolies jammed into steerage, businessmen and a few tourists. After rounding the cape beyond Port Arthur we were out to sea in the Gulf of Chihli. My cabin mate is J. Naruse, manager of the Toyo Cement Co.’s asbestos plant in Tientsin. The only Europeans are two Germans. The line’s claim of “Excellent accommodations for tourists” is well founded. I even got a stamp showing the ship for my diary. The muddy Yellow Sea is well named. Passed only two fishing boats before crossing Taku Bar at 9 a.m. to enter the Peiho River for a three hour trip upstream, making many abrupt turns between unfenced corn fields and mud villages that crowd its banks. Occasional huge mounds of brick kilns and old Chinese forts. Passed several tugs and barges flying Union Jacks, which were also painted on their sides. They haul goods from Tientsin to ocean-going freighters off Taku. Near Tientsin warehouses and tanks of Texaco and Standard Oil of New York, plastered with American flags and surrounded by electrified fences. Tientsin has been a treaty port since the 1860s, with exclusive settlements for major powers except the U.S. After a month in Japanese territory it was almost unbelievable to meet Chinese Maritime Customs officers, taxi drivers and porters who speak passable English and to see American and European goods displayed in store windows along Victoria Road No. 3. Over a dilapidated steel bridge to the ramshackle railway station. Thought I was doing well exchanging my travelers checks at one dollar for 15 “Mex” (ican) but learned later that the moneychanger, who kept his Chinese money in piles, had cheated me. Prices even at this rate are so favorable to dollar owners that foreigners live high for little. Took a crowded first-class SMR train through truck farms and cornfields, with a fairly good dirt road alongside. Felt lonely awhile, missing the horseplay and conversation of the Conference gang. Only 86 miles to the Chienmen station hard by the high, solid Peking walls, with the new building of the Japanese-run railway administration adjacent. Weather cool, dry, pleasant. Went through a second passport inspection of the day and on to the famous Grand Hotel de Pekin, a bit old and run down but with big airy rooms that cost 18 Mex. a day. They too now had a souvenir stamp. My parents and sister Betty stayed here in 1937 when Dad came up from the Philippines to meet them after they had crossed Eurasia by train. Ubiquitous service by Chinese room “boys” clad in white gowns. Took a short ricksha ride on busy, clean streets through the Legation Quarter, seeing U.S. Marines and tall radio towers near the American establishment. Went through huge Tartar City gate, plastered with OPPOSE BRITAIN signs in English. Had 9-course dinner on roof for 4 Mex. The deal looks damned interesting.It was interesting. I found it difficult to catalog my impressions of my first full day in ancient Peking on one diary page. First hired a ricksha coolie at 3 Mex. a day. He soon glistened with sweat and a brief rain, taking me and my suitcase to the Peking Language School through a muddy alley to arrange for room and board at 10 Mex. a day. This establishment provides American missionaries with instruction in Chinese so they can function in remote stations all over China. Next stop was a bookstore selling pirated reprints of recent American and British volumes. Finally to the Forbidden City through its Tung Hua or Eastern gate. My impressions were of yellow and green tile roofs with rows of animal figures on ridges ended by long tongued dragons; Chinese policemen in faded khaki uniforms; antique stores with row after row of looted art objects; ancient buildings with green and silver painted beams, red gates and pillars, a princess’s bath chamber, grass growing on paved courts, marble balustrades and bridges, bronze cranes and turtles, carved center pieces in stairways, crickets in trees, soft drink stands in the entrance ways, great arched gates. German-style lunch at Hotel du Nord. Orchestra consisted of seven Filipinos from Cavite and a Cossack who escaped the Reds by walking across the Gobi Desert. Many Japanese Army officers in hotel, which has a Nisei manager, but size of city population precludes their dominating the street scene. French Bookstore in hotel has an excellent Orientalia Collection. It sells rare items only for U.S. dollars. Visited American Consulate to have pictures taken for a Peking residence permit. So-called Temple of Heaven, visited in afternoon, had similar setup as Temple of Heaven. Marble-paved ramps connect levels. Rounded tile roofs in gorgeous blue. Throne nice and wide for fat emperors and empresses. Perfect symmetries. Real temple is round white marble. Pictures describe the precinct better than words. Lovely to watch sunset from Western Hills as neon lights came on across the city.It was interesting. I found it difficult to catalog my impressions of my first full day in ancient Peking on one diary page. First hired a ricksha coolie at 3 Mex. a day. He soon glistened with sweat and a brief rain, taking me and my suitcase to the Peking Language School through a muddy alley to arrange for room and board at 10 Mex. a day. This establishment provides American missionaries with instruction in Chinese so they can function in remote stations all over China. Next stop was a bookstore selling pirated reprints of recent American and British volumes. Finally to the Forbidden City through its Tung Hua or Eastern gate. My impressions were of yellow and green tile roofs with rows of animal figures on ridges ended by long tongued dragons; Chinese policemen in faded khaki uniforms; antique stores with row after row of looted art objects; ancient buildings with green and silver painted beams, red gates and pillars, a princess’s bath chamber, grass growing on paved courts, marble balustrades and bridges, bronze cranes and turtles, carved center pieces in stairways, crickets in trees, soft drink stands in the entrance ways, great arched gates. German-style lunch at Hotel du Nord. Orchestra consisted of seven Filipinos from Cavite and a Cossack who escaped the Reds by walking across the Gobi Desert. Many Japanese Army officers in hotel, which has a Nisei manager, but size of city population precludes their dominating the street scene. French Bookstore in hotel has an excellent Orientalia Collection. It sells rare items only for U.S. dollars. Visited American Consulate to have pictures taken for a Peking residence permit. So-called Temple of Heaven, visited in afternoon, had similar setup as Temple of Heaven. Marble-paved ramps connect levels. Rounded tile roofs in gorgeous blue. Throne nice and wide for fat emperors and empresses. Perfect symmetries. Real temple is round white marble. Pictures describe the precinct better than words. Lovely to watch sunset from Western Hills as neon lights came on across the city.The College of Chinese Studies, as the Language School is now officially called, is full of missionaries in from the back country for a few days of clean beds, good American-style food and conversation with compatriots. I moved from my hotel this morning after having had my suitcase packed by the room boy much more competently than I could have done and came down a narrow dirt back alley or hutung in my ricksha. Even after four years of Japanese rule, the missionaries are still unable to grasp The New Order. A month in Japan helps me. It still seems unusual to be allowed to take photographs from high places. Hot and sticky this morning, so I rested all morning. That was a mistake, since the accumulated weariness of our strenuous trip took hold at once. After lunch, braving the rain underneath the ricksha canopy while the coolie got soaked, I visited Coal Hill, a high artificial mound with steep sides and three pavilions. Climbed steeply up a slippery trail to the top for a view of the city. To the south the Forbidden City’s yellow roofs and wall-defined courtyards. On the east Peking National University in the same ugly style we saw so often in Mukden. To the west; hills, one crowned by the Lama Temple, looking like a huge white bottle. Saw Japanese soldiers operating a field radio on another hill that had an air raid siren tower. Ah, progress! Tonight I’m snug in bed reading a pirated edition of Christopher Morley’s Kitty Foyle. Its language is frank but the novel is only fair.The College of Chinese Studies, as the Language School is now officially called, is full of missionaries in from the back country for a few days of clean beds, good American-style food and conversation with compatriots. I moved from my hotel this morning after having had my suitcase packed by the room boy much more competently than I could have done and came down a narrow dirt back alley or hutung in my ricksha. Even after four years of Japanese rule, the missionaries are still unable to grasp The New Order. A month in Japan helps me. It still seems unusual to be allowed to take photographs from high places. Hot and sticky this morning, so I rested all morning. That was a mistake, since the accumulated weariness of our strenuous trip took hold at once. After lunch, braving the rain underneath the ricksha canopy while the coolie got soaked, I visited Coal Hill, a high artificial mound with steep sides and three pavilions. Climbed steeply up a slippery trail to the top for a view of the city. To the south the Forbidden City’s yellow roofs and wall-defined courtyards. On the east Peking National University in the same ugly style we saw so often in Mukden. To the west; hills, one crowned by the Lama Temple, looking like a huge white bottle. Saw Japanese soldiers operating a field radio on another hill that had an air raid siren tower. Ah, progress! Tonight I’m snug in bed reading a pirated edition of Christopher Morley’s Kitty Foyle. Its language is frank but the novel is only fair.On August 14 I got my Peking residential permit and applied at Japanese military headquarters for a pass to go to Shanghai. Another example of who really controls Chinese territory. Then back to the Forbidden City, the city of royal palaces within a city, now empty of inhabitants. Entrance through the tile-roofed North Gate requires a 50 Mex. cent yellow ticket that keeps out the hoi polloi. It’s an overwhelming maze of beautiful buildings, gardens, red walls, museums, halls of heavenly this and that. Even though much looted of its contents, there is still far too much detail to permit me to absorb the details item by item. Without occupants or use it has lost its personality. Maintenance is spotty and many murals are flaking away to nothingness. Courts, pavilions, tea stands without number. I must confess my tastes are more for Chinese architecture than interior decoration. Japanese simplicity is superior. The most interesting relics are the palaces containing some of the original furniture of the Manchu Ching dynasty that came to an end only three decades ago. The royal artifacts included a bicycle with hard rubber tires, bathtubs ancient and fairly modern, clocks and brass bedsteads. Toured with Herr Bramer, a Shanghai International Settlement Police constable with an English mother and accent. After lunch, accompanied him to the very well equipped Rockefeller-endowed Peking Union Medical College to see his seriously ill brother. I am both anxious to get home to see my family and at the same time dreading the search for a job and the career decision that it must entail. I really don’t like being away from American-style comforts and government any more. This may change in time, but listening to Tirso Cruz’s tinny Manila Hotel dance band over KZRM makes me realize how provincial it all is there. And I don’t get along well in a hot, wet climate like Manila’s. Felt better after a few beers at the Wagon Lits Hotel and a look into the excellent Central Park of the palace city with gardens and tubs filled with fantastic goldfish.On August 14 I got my Peking residential permit and applied at Japanese military headquarters for a pass to go to Shanghai. Another example of who really controls Chinese territory. Then back to the Forbidden City, the city of royal palaces within a city, now empty of inhabitants. Entrance through the tile-roofed North Gate requires a 50 Mex. cent yellow ticket that keeps out the hoi polloi. It’s an overwhelming maze of beautiful buildings, gardens, red walls, museums, halls of heavenly this and that. Even though much looted of its contents, there is still far too much detail to permit me to absorb the details item by item. Without occupants or use it has lost its personality. Maintenance is spotty and many murals are flaking away to nothingness. Courts, pavilions, tea stands without number. I must confess my tastes are more for Chinese architecture than interior decoration. Japanese simplicity is superior. The most interesting relics are the palaces containing some of the original furniture of the Manchu Ching dynasty that came to an end only three decades ago. The royal artifacts included a bicycle with hard rubber tires, bathtubs ancient and fairly modern, clocks and brass bedsteads. Toured with Herr Bramer, a Shanghai International Settlement Police constable with an English mother and accent. After lunch, accompanied him to the very well equipped Rockefeller-endowed Peking Union Medical College to see his seriously ill brother. I am both anxious to get home to see my family and at the same time dreading the search for a job and the career decision that it must entail. I really don’t like being away from American-style comforts and government any more. This may change in time, but listening to Tirso Cruz’s tinny Manila Hotel dance band over KZRM makes me realize how provincial it all is there. And I don’t get along well in a hot, wet climate like Manila’s. Felt better after a few beers at the Wagon Lits Hotel and a look into the excellent Central Park of the palace city with gardens and tubs filled with fantastic goldfish.On Tuesday I had a cold and “summer complaint” that left me worn out although I did little. I did drag myself into my ricksha to go north to the Temple of Confucius, which In Search of Old Peking tells me was built in the 13th Century. Most notable to me was its three-arched stone gate. Its side buildings are being sanded down and repainted. Not much else in Peking is being restored these days. Such temples resemble the ax that belonged to George Washington: “It’s exactly the same ax he used but the head was replaced twice and the handle three times.” The hall of Classics, various tablets to the memory of the sage, his disciples and men who passed examinations would have been much more interesting had I been able to read the characters on them. To me they were just a collection of old stone tablets. An old geezer angling for a tip rushed around unlocking doors and I had to tip him. Not many tourists any more. Down a dusty street to the Drum and Bell towers: old buildings and not much more. Spent much of the evening listening to a short-wave radio. Heard an anti-independence talk by a Filipino who said that in this day and age his countrymen should be satisfied with the substance they already had rather than seeking an illusory form of absolute freedom.On Tuesday I had a cold and “summer complaint” that left me worn out although I did little. I did drag myself into my ricksha to go north to the Temple of Confucius, which In Search of Old Peking tells me was built in the 13th Century. Most notable to me was its three-arched stone gate. Its side buildings are being sanded down and repainted. Not much else in Peking is being restored these days. Such temples resemble the ax that belonged to George Washington: “It’s exactly the same ax he used but the head was replaced twice and the handle three times.” The hall of Classics, various tablets to the memory of the sage, his disciples and men who passed examinations would have been much more interesting had I been able to read the characters on them. To me they were just a collection of old stone tablets. An old geezer angling for a tip rushed around unlocking doors and I had to tip him. Not many tourists any more. Down a dusty street to the Drum and Bell towers: old buildings and not much more. Spent much of the evening listening to a short-wave radio. Heard an anti-independence talk by a Filipino who said that in this day and age his countrymen should be satisfied with the substance they already had rather than seeking an illusory form of absolute freedom.By August 16 the military pass enabling me to travel to Shanghai by rail had been issued but after chasing around having the buck passed between the Japan Travel Bureau, the airplane company and the Peking Hotel concierge, the military told me that they didn’t want me to go by plane. “We are afraid that it will be so crowded,” an officer said. At least the train trip won’t break my banks. First class including sleeper to Pukow opposite Nanking, a trip of 714 miles, is 64.60 Mex. Or about $4. Afternoon trip up to Peihai, a lake that until 1925 had been the private preserve of royalty. Its chief feature is a white bottle shaped pagoda bearing a mystic Tibetan inscription. It is on a hill on an island in a lake. Lotus plants in flower float upon the lake, which is bordered by the graceful fronds of willows. My sightseeing was interrupted by frequent need to find a w.c. They’re not easy to find but my ricksha boy understood my problem. Around the lake are various temples with fancy names. The Nine Dragon Wall is a mass of writing tiled color. One miniature mountain covered with figures reminded me of Coney Island. Sitting in my lonely room tonight I feel a need to get away from this dead and dying city quickly.By August 16 the military pass enabling me to travel to Shanghai by rail had been issued but after chasing around having the buck passed between the Japan Travel Bureau, the airplane company and the Peking Hotel concierge, the military told me that they didn’t want me to go by plane. “We are afraid that it will be so crowded,” an officer said. At least the train trip won’t break my banks. First class including sleeper to Pukow opposite Nanking, a trip of 714 miles, is 64.60 Mex. Or about $4. Afternoon trip up to Peihai, a lake that until 1925 had been the private preserve of royalty. Its chief feature is a white bottle shaped pagoda bearing a mystic Tibetan inscription. It is on a hill on an island in a lake. Lotus plants in flower float upon the lake, which is bordered by the graceful fronds of willows. My sightseeing was interrupted by frequent need to find a w.c. They’re not easy to find but my ricksha boy understood my problem. Around the lake are various temples with fancy names. The Nine Dragon Wall is a mass of writing tiled color. One miniature mountain covered with figures reminded me of Coney Island. Sitting in my lonely room tonight I feel a need to get away from this dead and dying city quickly.My internal problems subsiding but my ricksha boy must be really worn out after trotting all over the city. He trotted up a dusty avenue past rattling trolley cars and open air markets, turned right on a narrow and bumpier street, found himself involved in a great funeral procession led by a big red coffin carried on great poles by men in green costumes and hats with red feathers that made them look like Oriental Robin Hoods, but finally reached Flower Street, headquarters for jewelers who deal with the tourist trade. Went with Bramer to the Altar of Heaven again to photograph the rounded beauty of its blue tiles. A hot, dry day with blue sky. The nearby Altar of Agriculture, where the emperors tried their dainty hands at plowing each year. With all the ceremonies they had to go to each year it is a wonder they ever got the time to do any governing. It is all gone to ruin now except for a half-hearted park. Saw a mosque across two fields and a garbage dump. After lunch slept three hours to visit Nanhai or South Sea Lake, now a semi-public park. Coolies can’t afford to pay the small admission charge. It has many pavilions, extensive rock gardens, lotus ponds and distant views of white towers. Around it are government offices, big cars and the office of the “Manchutikuo Trade Commission.” I liked much better the view of the big red and white striped Marine radio towers against the blue sky and white clouds.My internal problems subsiding but my ricksha boy must be really worn out after trotting all over the city. He trotted up a dusty avenue past rattling trolley cars and open air markets, turned right on a narrow and bumpier street, found himself involved in a great funeral procession led by a big red coffin carried on great poles by men in green costumes and hats with red feathers that made them look like Oriental Robin Hoods, but finally reached Flower Street, headquarters for jewelers who deal with the tourist trade. Went with Bramer to the Altar of Heaven again to photograph the rounded beauty of its blue tiles. A hot, dry day with blue sky. The nearby Altar of Agriculture, where the emperors tried their dainty hands at plowing each year. With all the ceremonies they had to go to each year it is a wonder they ever got the time to do any governing. It is all gone to ruin now except for a half-hearted park. Saw a mosque across two fields and a garbage dump. After lunch slept three hours to visit Nanhai or South Sea Lake, now a semi-public park. Coolies can’t afford to pay the small admission charge. It has many pavilions, extensive rock gardens, lotus ponds and distant views of white towers. Around it are government offices, big cars and the office of the “Manchutikuo Trade Commission.” I liked much better the view of the big red and white striped Marine radio towers against the blue sky and white clouds.By Sunday my internal upset had lasted three days and I felt the shadow of my former self. It draws off my energy while my mind works overtime remembering more pleasant times and worrying about what I’ll do for a living in Manila. The missionaries are full of war stories, some of which might well be discounted as wish-fulfillment dreams. The central section of the Forbidden City ended my visits there until the next time I get stuck here. Many separate buildings in individual courts down walled lanes. With scores to choose from, the emperors couldn’t complain of being tired of sitting on the same throne each time. Many policemen in faded khaki uniforms stand around doing nothing. Liked some Chinese drawings of horses and a series of sketches in a style similar to 14th century Italian that show the production of rice and silk. Afterwards had ice cream and fruit sundae in a Chinese tearoom.By Sunday my internal upset had lasted three days and I felt the shadow of my former self. It draws off my energy while my mind works overtime remembering more pleasant times and worrying about what I’ll do for a living in Manila. The missionaries are full of war stories, some of which might well be discounted as wish-fulfillment dreams. The central section of the Forbidden City ended my visits there until the next time I get stuck here. Many separate buildings in individual courts down walled lanes. With scores to choose from, the emperors couldn’t complain of being tired of sitting on the same throne each time. Many policemen in faded khaki uniforms stand around doing nothing. Liked some Chinese drawings of horses and a series of sketches in a style similar to 14th century Italian that show the production of rice and silk. Afterwards had ice cream and fruit sundae in a Chinese tearoom.Slept so poorly that I stayed abed all morning, missing a scheduled visit to Yenching University. I just didn’t feel up to it, and dozed away until 1:30 p.m. Had no lunch and only milk and toast for supper. I’m sure hungry tonight! Cheered by the prospect of moving again. Walked with Kramer to the Peking Union Medical College again, en route visiting a big arcade that sold everything. To judge by the number of copies of the pirated edition of his How to Win Friends and Influence People on sale, Dale Carnegie soon will have created a chummy nation. Pearl Buck also goes well here. Note that ricksha boys always tell foreign customers they haven’t been given enough money for the ride: the thing to do is get off and pay no attention. Caroll Alcott, the American commentator on XMHA, a Shanghai International Settlement radio station, is eagerly awaited by foreigners here for his 15 minute noon and evening news broadcasts, delivered in a dry, toneless voice but full of cracks against the Japanese and their collaborators and news about their activities. Amid commercials for familiar products like Jello and Ovaltine, he refers to “the New Odor” in East Asia. The Japanese attempt but do not completely succeed in jamming XMHA’s shortwave signal. Attempts have been made to assassinate him,Slept so poorly that I stayed abed all morning, missing a scheduled visit to Yenching University. I just didn’t feel up to it, and dozed away until 1:30 p.m. Had no lunch and only milk and toast for supper. I’m sure hungry tonight! Cheered by the prospect of moving again. Walked with Kramer to the Peking Union Medical College again, en route visiting a big arcade that sold everything. To judge by the number of copies of the pirated edition of his How to Win Friends and Influence People on sale, Dale Carnegie soon will have created a chummy nation. Pearl Buck also goes well here. Note that ricksha boys always tell foreign customers they haven’t been given enough money for the ride: the thing to do is get off and pay no attention. Caroll Alcott, the American commentator on XMHA, a Shanghai International Settlement radio station, is eagerly awaited by foreigners here for his 15 minute noon and evening news broadcasts, delivered in a dry, toneless voice but full of cracks against the Japanese and their collaborators and news about their activities. Amid commercials for familiar products like Jello and Ovaltine, he refers to “the New Odor” in East Asia. The Japanese attempt but do not completely succeed in jamming XMHA’s shortwave signal. Attempts have been made to assassinate him,Tuesday, August 20 was my last day in Peking and went very well. I felt well again and dared take an 11-mile bus ride into the countryside to visit Yenching University. At the city gates the Chinese passengers had to get out and walk through a police patting down. Several freshly painted anti-British signs have been erected for the edification of the English-speaking tourists. The university, sponsored by Harvard and aluminum king Hall, is built in modified Chinese style. The water tower is disguised as a pagoda and all the buildings have curving Chinese roofs in green tile but the interiors are fair—but only fair—examples of familiar classroom plaster. Evidently the educational system is mainly in the American tradition. An English-speaking Chinese political science student clad in a long white gown bargained ricksha coolies down from 1 Mex. dollar to 30 cents for a trip on a narrow asphalt road to the Summer Palace around a large lake on the Mountain of 10,000 Ancients or Garden of Peaceful Enjoyment. The British destroyed the original palaces in 1860 as a punishment for a truce violation, so the buildings and a marble boat are the creation of the Empress Dowager, who squandered the funds meant to build a Chinese navy. It’s all part of the decadence that led to China’s fall and Japan’s rise.Tuesday, August 20 was my last day in Peking and went very well. I felt well again and dared take an 11-mile bus ride into the countryside to visit Yenching University. At the city gates the Chinese passengers had to get out and walk through a police patting down. Several freshly painted anti-British signs have been erected for the edification of the English-speaking tourists. The university, sponsored by Harvard and aluminum king Hall, is built in modified Chinese style. The water tower is disguised as a pagoda and all the buildings have curving Chinese roofs in green tile but the interiors are fair—but only fair—examples of familiar classroom plaster. Evidently the educational system is mainly in the American tradition. An English-speaking Chinese political science student clad in a long white gown bargained ricksha coolies down from 1 Mex. dollar to 30 cents for a trip on a narrow asphalt road to the Summer Palace around a large lake on the Mountain of 10,000 Ancients or Garden of Peaceful Enjoyment. The British destroyed the original palaces in 1860 as a punishment for a truce violation, so the buildings and a marble boat are the creation of the Empress Dowager, who squandered the funds meant to build a Chinese navy. It’s all part of the decadence that led to China’s fall and Japan’s rise.Started south on Wednesday, August 21 after ten days in Peking. An early breakfast, then with myself in one ricksha and my baggage in another, went down the streets already bustling with people, to the Water Gate. A short walk to the 11-car train. Much SMR stock but the first-class sleeping car was built locally in 1923 and looks its age. It has compartments with connecting washrooms. Boys (really boys) come along at intervals with hot tea and hot towels. I share a compartment with Kenjiro Sawai, a Japanese broker visiting his firm’s branches in China. We exchange cards. The adjacent one holds two Canadian missionary ladies returning from vacation at Peitaho beach on the Gulf of Chihli. Same scenery all day: flat fields green with millet, corn and cotton broken by clumps of trees marking mud villages with mud walls and by flooded areas. Signs of recent track washouts. Frequent stations are from the towns they serve unless the places are large. Signs that the New Order is disputed: stations and bridges with barbed wire on concrete posts, low concrete pill boxes with loopholes of differing sizes, occasional sentries atop station roofs. As Chinese passengers leave the stations they form long lines to be searched for firearms by Japanese or Chinese soldiers. Very slow going. We didn’t get to Tientsin’s factory until noon and not until 9:30 p.m. did we cross the Hwang Ho or Yellow River on an enormous bridge, floodlighted and heavily guarded, into Tsinan in Shantung, a whole day to go 304 miles through a monotonous plain. Here we had our passports examined as we had in Tientsin. The examiner was obviously a Russian. A night guard of Japanese soldiers in full equipment boarded the train with us. We found our berths made up and all shades pulled down.Started south on Wednesday, August 21 after ten days in Peking. An early breakfast, then with myself in one ricksha and my baggage in another, went down the streets already bustling with people, to the Water Gate. A short walk to the 11-car train. Much SMR stock but the first-class sleeping car was built locally in 1923 and looks its age. It has compartments with connecting washrooms. Boys (really boys) come along at intervals with hot tea and hot towels. I share a compartment with Kenjiro Sawai, a Japanese broker visiting his firm’s branches in China. We exchange cards. The adjacent one holds two Canadian missionary ladies returning from vacation at Peitaho beach on the Gulf of Chihli. Same scenery all day: flat fields green with millet, corn and cotton broken by clumps of trees marking mud villages with mud walls and by flooded areas. Signs of recent track washouts. Frequent stations are from the towns they serve unless the places are large. Signs that the New Order is disputed: stations and bridges with barbed wire on concrete posts, low concrete pill boxes with loopholes of differing sizes, occasional sentries atop station roofs. As Chinese passengers leave the stations they form long lines to be searched for firearms by Japanese or Chinese soldiers. Very slow going. We didn’t get to Tientsin’s factory until noon and not until 9:30 p.m. did we cross the Hwang Ho or Yellow River on an enormous bridge, floodlighted and heavily guarded, into Tsinan in Shantung, a whole day to go 304 miles through a monotonous plain. Here we had our passports examined as we had in Tientsin. The examiner was obviously a Russian. A night guard of Japanese soldiers in full equipment boarded the train with us. We found our berths made up and all shades pulled down.At dawn Thursday we were passing a heavily populated region of low rounded rocky treeless hills. Almost every mile a villager stood with a white flag guaranteeing the absence of guerillas and stations were guarded by stone blockhouses. At sidings we passed armored trains camouflaged in gay colors. Meals in the dining care are almost as bad as the service. Tablecloths are dirty, there is no ice, no water, and soot blows in through banging loose screens. But I got a compartment to myself and was able to take a nap and read Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies, a tale of England’s Terrible Twenties. At the edge of the hills Hsuchow, where we exchanged at par our North China bank notes for 100 military yen bills, good only in (occupied) China. Made a long stop at Pengpu on the rapidly flowing Hwai-ho. It was attacked by Chinese troops last year. The country has changed noticeably to a wide, heavily cultivated plain where millet, hemp, cotton, peanuts, and wheat are grown. Walked along the platforms of the stations where we stopped. Those on this British-built part of the railway are much simpler than those the Germans constructed north of Hsuchow. A few more very low hills before we reached the terminus of Pukow on the Yangtze. Here we went through baggage and passport examinations again. Young Japanese soldiers in shirtsleeves were pushing old Chinese women around, an ugly sight I hadn’t seen before. Almost got into a fight with an angry porter for giving him the wrong kind of bank note. All passengers were jammed aboard an overcrowded ferry, which threatened to capsize in the broad river every time we passed a ship’s wake. Traffic included an army tranport, armored launches, a gunboat with anti-aircraft guns. On the south bank Nanking, with Japanese flags on all principal buildings and more examinations. Once British, now Japanese Yangtze Hotel a few blocks up from the river hot as hell in the August afternoon.At dawn Thursday we were passing a heavily populated region of low rounded rocky treeless hills. Almost every mile a villager stood with a white flag guaranteeing the absence of guerillas and stations were guarded by stone blockhouses. At sidings we passed armored trains camouflaged in gay colors. Meals in the dining care are almost as bad as the service. Tablecloths are dirty, there is no ice, no water, and soot blows in through banging loose screens. But I got a compartment to myself and was able to take a nap and read Evelyn Waugh’s Vile Bodies, a tale of England’s Terrible Twenties. At the edge of the hills Hsuchow, where we exchanged at par our North China bank notes for 100 military yen bills, good only in (occupied) China. Made a long stop at Pengpu on the rapidly flowing Hwai-ho. It was attacked by Chinese troops last year. The country has changed noticeably to a wide, heavily cultivated plain where millet, hemp, cotton, peanuts, and wheat are grown. Walked along the platforms of the stations where we stopped. Those on this British-built part of the railway are much simpler than those the Germans constructed north of Hsuchow. A few more very low hills before we reached the terminus of Pukow on the Yangtze. Here we went through baggage and passport examinations again. Young Japanese soldiers in shirtsleeves were pushing old Chinese women around, an ugly sight I hadn’t seen before. Almost got into a fight with an angry porter for giving him the wrong kind of bank note. All passengers were jammed aboard an overcrowded ferry, which threatened to capsize in the broad river every time we passed a ship’s wake. Traffic included an army tranport, armored launches, a gunboat with anti-aircraft guns. On the south bank Nanking, with Japanese flags on all principal buildings and more examinations. Once British, now Japanese Yangtze Hotel a few blocks up from the river hot as hell in the August afternoon.Tossed all night in the heat on a hard bed and was up early for a lousy breakfast and a long ricksha ride through the ancient gray city wall down a long boulevard of potholes past places familiar from 1937 newsreels: the rebuilt electric power plant, the newsmen’s hotel ruins, the burned and gutted rickshas are rundown. Shops alongside are in shacks and display a few pitiful articles for sale like looted beds. A steady stream of Japanese tanks, and Army and Navy staff cars. Visited the Japanese Consulate General. Yes, they had the Gaimusho letter but unfortunately Wang Ching-Wei was busy in conference with the Japanese envoy, so I’d have to make do with the Publicity Minister. Had lunch with a Miss Violet and three other lonely spinsters at the Presbyterian mission, its walls marked with posters bearing the American flag and the words “American Property” in English and Chinese. They still receive newspapers from Shanghai but in plain envelopes. They say Chinese guerillas are near the city and that it is blacked out at night. Their school operates up to the high school level and support destitute widows simultaneously. Walked around city three hours and had a name seal carved by hand. Most of the customers are Japanese soldiers. Their favorite purchase is a leather bag. At 5 p.m. (“Chinese time” rather than Tokyo’s) I was received by the Publicity Minister Lin Pai-sheng in a former bank building guarded by soldiers with fixed bayonets. He had a personal guard outside his luxurious office. Lin speaks good English and pretends to be very frank. Actually, he admits more and more as he waxes voluble. Although he first denied it, he later said “We are using pressure on American (and other) business to gain recognition for our government.” This would be followed by “cooperation.” “We have nothing against Chang personally,” he stated bluntly. Says Wang left him after Chang refused to enter peace negotiations. Japanese soldiers (“peasant boys”) had been taught to regard the Chinese as enemies but were now learning to treat them less roughly. Acknowledged that the Nanking regime could not yet survive without the help of the Japanese army, which would be withdrawn “gradually”—if there were peace. He compared the present situation to the American Civil War, when brother fought brother. Even to carpetbaggers in occupied area, I thought. Confessed that Nanking’s own army currently only has two battalions, equipped only with rifles. The Wang government is trying to obtain control of the railways. And so on. Obviously this is a puppet regime.Tossed all night in the heat on a hard bed and was up early for a lousy breakfast and a long ricksha ride through the ancient gray city wall down a long boulevard of potholes past places familiar from 1937 newsreels: the rebuilt electric power plant, the newsmen’s hotel ruins, the burned and gutted rickshas are rundown. Shops alongside are in shacks and display a few pitiful articles for sale like looted beds. A steady stream of Japanese tanks, and Army and Navy staff cars. Visited the Japanese Consulate General. Yes, they had the Gaimusho letter but unfortunately Wang Ching-Wei was busy in conference with the Japanese envoy, so I’d have to make do with the Publicity Minister. Had lunch with a Miss Violet and three other lonely spinsters at the Presbyterian mission, its walls marked with posters bearing the American flag and the words “American Property” in English and Chinese. They still receive newspapers from Shanghai but in plain envelopes. They say Chinese guerillas are near the city and that it is blacked out at night. Their school operates up to the high school level and support destitute widows simultaneously. Walked around city three hours and had a name seal carved by hand. Most of the customers are Japanese soldiers. Their favorite purchase is a leather bag. At 5 p.m. (“Chinese time” rather than Tokyo’s) I was received by the Publicity Minister Lin Pai-sheng in a former bank building guarded by soldiers with fixed bayonets. He had a personal guard outside his luxurious office. Lin speaks good English and pretends to be very frank. Actually, he admits more and more as he waxes voluble. Although he first denied it, he later said “We are using pressure on American (and other) business to gain recognition for our government.” This would be followed by “cooperation.” “We have nothing against Chang personally,” he stated bluntly. Says Wang left him after Chang refused to enter peace negotiations. Japanese soldiers (“peasant boys”) had been taught to regard the Chinese as enemies but were now learning to treat them less roughly. Acknowledged that the Nanking regime could not yet survive without the help of the Japanese army, which would be withdrawn “gradually”—if there were peace. He compared the present situation to the American Civil War, when brother fought brother. Even to carpetbaggers in occupied area, I thought. Confessed that Nanking’s own army currently only has two battalions, equipped only with rifles. The Wang government is trying to obtain control of the railways. And so on. Obviously this is a puppet regime.The railway runs on Tokyo time and I had to be up at almost dawn to catch the 8 a.m. express. South of the Yangtze service is back to normal. Trains runs quite fast. First-class had excellent upholstered individual seats and tea was passed out at frequent intervals into glasses inserted into holders. Adjacent seat occupied by a loud Chinese affiliated with the Finance Ministry in Nanking, who thought he spoke English. With difficulty I learned that a new China Central Bank is being organized to issue “fapu” notes at par with the Chungking dollar. Initial issue will be 500 million. Ruefully complained that “Japanese has got monopoly North China Federal Reserve. They issue about 8 billion dollar. Also half billion military yen every year.” He pointed to the electrified barbed wire fence between Tanyang and Changchow, where guerillas derailed a train only three weeks ago. As far as Soochow low mountains appeared alongside irregularly, then lakes, rice fields and canals. At many places, especially Wusih, ruined factories and empty tenements marked the grave of the real new China that existed until 1937. Acres of wrecked buildings marked our entry into Shanghai’s newly rebuilt North Station. Japanese sanitary efforts consisted of making us wash our hands in carbolic solution and having our trousers sprayed with it. Took a battered taxi around the wrecked railway administration building, full of shell holes but still standing, a Rising Sun flying over its roof, past sentries and barbed wire barricades and into the International Settlement. A great feeling of relief. Registered at the Park Hotel, 18 stories of modernity. It costs 60 Mex. (nearly $4) a day but I like luxury when I can afford it. Tramped miles along Bubbling Well Road in the summer heat, bewildered by real city traffic again. Bought a pirated copy of Hallett Abend’s, Chaos in Asia, strongly critical of everything we’ve been told in recent weeks, from a young Jewish refugee recently arrived from Germany who peddled books on the street. Celebrated my return to Western control with sundaes, real coffee and a lousy movie.The railway runs on Tokyo time and I had to be up at almost dawn to catch the 8 a.m. express. South of the Yangtze service is back to normal. Trains runs quite fast. First-class had excellent upholstered individual seats and tea was passed out at frequent intervals into glasses inserted into holders. Adjacent seat occupied by a loud Chinese affiliated with the Finance Ministry in Nanking, who thought he spoke English. With difficulty I learned that a new China Central Bank is being organized to issue “fapu” notes at par with the Chungking dollar. Initial issue will be 500 million. Ruefully complained that “Japanese has got monopoly North China Federal Reserve. They issue about 8 billion dollar. Also half billion military yen every year.” He pointed to the electrified barbed wire fence between Tanyang and Changchow, where guerillas derailed a train only three weeks ago. As far as Soochow low mountains appeared alongside irregularly, then lakes, rice fields and canals. At many places, especially Wusih, ruined factories and empty tenements marked the grave of the real new China that existed until 1937. Acres of wrecked buildings marked our entry into Shanghai’s newly rebuilt North Station. Japanese sanitary efforts consisted of making us wash our hands in carbolic solution and having our trousers sprayed with it. Took a battered taxi around the wrecked railway administration building, full of shell holes but still standing, a Rising Sun flying over its roof, past sentries and barbed wire barricades and into the International Settlement. A great feeling of relief. Registered at the Park Hotel, 18 stories of modernity. It costs 60 Mex. (nearly $4) a day but I like luxury when I can afford it. Tramped miles along Bubbling Well Road in the summer heat, bewildered by real city traffic again. Bought a pirated copy of Hallett Abend’s, Chaos in Asia, strongly critical of everything we’ve been told in recent weeks, from a young Jewish refugee recently arrived from Germany who peddled books on the street. Celebrated my return to Western control with sundaes, real coffee and a lousy movie.While lunching in the Park’s fine air-conditioned dining room I witnessed the last British soldiers in Shanghai, 600 Seaforth Highlanders, parade down the racecourse to embark, leaving only our 4th Marines to carry on. Seeking to interview Carroll Alcott, I rang the XHMA doorbell. A man opened the door, looked at me suspiciously and barred my way. “You’ll have to pardon me for being rude,” he apologized, “but we’ve been threatened.” Not once, I learned, but repeatedly. Alcott was almost kidnapped on the street. He twits the Japanese not only on the radio but when they call him on the telephone. Toured the International Settlement all day by foot and bus on a day when the temperature hit 95 but I was too fascinated to notice. This is an island in a Japanese-controlled ocean. At the other end of the Garden Road bridge Japanese sentries make each Chinese passenger bow and remove his hat but—in sight of foreign witnesses—do nothing else. In their area they use rickety Nissan pancake engines to replace the abandoned streetcar lines. Shanghai Volunteer Corps in steel helmets and shorts stand opposite. Saw a building on the Bund (river wharf) with Norwegian, Nazi German, and British flags flying from its roof. Broadway Mansions building flies Rising Sun and Nanking flags. The bus up Edward VII Avenue to Jessfield Park has its route signs in English and French. On Bubbling Well Road there are scores of small shops run by Viennese Jews who have sought refuge from Hitler. Other refugees try to sell newspapers or even beg. As I walked at least 150 wildly gesticulating barefoot rickshaw pullers offered their services. “Hey mister, you want ricksha? Where you want to go?” Passed several groups of people fighting each other on the streets without hindrance from the police or much notice from bystanders. The Fourth Marines Club is an enlisted man’s paradise. Streets crowded by night as well as by day and passing cars honk unceasingly. Tiny rouged Chinese prostitutes roam. Saw “Raffles,” a better movie.While lunching in the Park’s fine air-conditioned dining room I witnessed the last British soldiers in Shanghai, 600 Seaforth Highlanders, parade down the racecourse to embark, leaving only our 4th Marines to carry on. Seeking to interview Carroll Alcott, I rang the XHMA doorbell. A man opened the door, looked at me suspiciously and barred my way. “You’ll have to pardon me for being rude,” he apologized, “but we’ve been threatened.” Not once, I learned, but repeatedly. Alcott was almost kidnapped on the street. He twits the Japanese not only on the radio but when they call him on the telephone. Toured the International Settlement all day by foot and bus on a day when the temperature hit 95 but I was too fascinated to notice. This is an island in a Japanese-controlled ocean. At the other end of the Garden Road bridge Japanese sentries make each Chinese passenger bow and remove his hat but—in sight of foreign witnesses—do nothing else. In their area they use rickety Nissan pancake engines to replace the abandoned streetcar lines. Shanghai Volunteer Corps in steel helmets and shorts stand opposite. Saw a building on the Bund (river wharf) with Norwegian, Nazi German, and British flags flying from its roof. Broadway Mansions building flies Rising Sun and Nanking flags. The bus up Edward VII Avenue to Jessfield Park has its route signs in English and French. On Bubbling Well Road there are scores of small shops run by Viennese Jews who have sought refuge from Hitler. Other refugees try to sell newspapers or even beg. As I walked at least 150 wildly gesticulating barefoot rickshaw pullers offered their services. “Hey mister, you want ricksha? Where you want to go?” Passed several groups of people fighting each other on the streets without hindrance from the police or much notice from bystanders. The Fourth Marines Club is an enlisted man’s paradise. Streets crowded by night as well as by day and passing cars honk unceasingly. Tiny rouged Chinese prostitutes roam. Saw “Raffles,” a better movie.Spent a good part of my third day in Shanghai between the offices of the Nippon Yusen Kaisha at the end of the Bund and the American President Lines on narrow Canton Road. APL’s Kobe office had forgotten to send authorization of my ticket transfer here, but after much cabling my passage was arranged for the Coolidge on Wednesday. The European/American staffs of both lines need to get sobered up and given schedules to study. A relief to get this straightened out, anyway. To the British Consulate General, behind green lawns, for a Hong Kong visa. Offices filled with propaganda posters illustrating decaying Britain’s might. Officials so unpleasantly inquisitive that I thought I was back in Japan. Clearly visible across Garden Bridge is Japan, which by the way, hosts the USSR embassy. Apart from its rickshaws and cosmopolitanism, downtown Shanghai might be like any in the West. For the equivalent of 11 cents I bought a pirated copy of Ernest O. Hauser’s Shangahi: City for Sale. His statements on Chinese policy are a bit imaginative; his style florid, but in tracing the rise (1842) and fall of the British taipan (1937) at the hands of the very Japanese whom he once used against the Chinese he puts Shanghai’s present troubles in a different light and this is the day of reckoning.Spent a good part of my third day in Shanghai between the offices of the Nippon Yusen Kaisha at the end of the Bund and the American President Lines on narrow Canton Road. APL’s Kobe office had forgotten to send authorization of my ticket transfer here, but after much cabling my passage was arranged for the Coolidge on Wednesday. The European/American staffs of both lines need to get sobered up and given schedules to study. A relief to get this straightened out, anyway. To the British Consulate General, behind green lawns, for a Hong Kong visa. Offices filled with propaganda posters illustrating decaying Britain’s might. Officials so unpleasantly inquisitive that I thought I was back in Japan. Clearly visible across Garden Bridge is Japan, which by the way, hosts the USSR embassy. Apart from its rickshaws and cosmopolitanism, downtown Shanghai might be like any in the West. For the equivalent of 11 cents I bought a pirated copy of Ernest O. Hauser’s Shangahi: City for Sale. His statements on Chinese policy are a bit imaginative; his style florid, but in tracing the rise (1842) and fall of the British taipan (1937) at the hands of the very Japanese whom he once used against the Chinese he puts Shanghai’s present troubles in a different light and this is the day of reckoning.It was about one o’clock Wednesday morning and I was being pulled rapidly up the deserted asphalt of Nanking Road when who should appear but Ted Winebrenner and Charlie Fogg. They were bound for a bar and I was headed for my hotel after two hours of walking around the eerie, deserted (curfew) streets of the French town, so we started looking for a bar. We wandered around alleys where thousands slept in rows on sidewalks, passed armored cars, policemen on bicycles and all-night workshops. Laughed at a tailor’s sign reading: “Ladies have fits upstairs.” Bars proved disappointing. Ugly Russian women sat around listening to tinny bands. We had three beers apiece, a lot of conversation and walked to our hotels.It was about one o’clock Wednesday morning and I was being pulled rapidly up the deserted asphalt of Nanking Road when who should appear but Ted Winebrenner and Charlie Fogg. They were bound for a bar and I was headed for my hotel after two hours of walking around the eerie, deserted (curfew) streets of the French town, so we started looking for a bar. We wandered around alleys where thousands slept in rows on sidewalks, passed armored cars, policemen on bicycles and all-night workshops. Laughed at a tailor’s sign reading: “Ladies have fits upstairs.” Bars proved disappointing. Ugly Russian women sat around listening to tinny bands. We had three beers apiece, a lot of conversation and walked to our hotels.My last day in Shanghai was rainy. From Ted’s room on the 12th floor of the Cathay we could see fat into the countryside beyond the towering structure of the shell-pocked old North Station. At this remove the scene didn’t appear Oriental. It must have been an exciting place during the 1937 battles. We spent the afternoon at the Cathay bar, where Russian hostesses really entertain. Then the boys took the tender with me and hundreds of others to board the President Coolidge, tied up at buoys in the Whangpoo River before saying goodbye again. The ship left its moorings at 8 p.m. We went slowly down the muddy river and its miles of wharves dotted with solitary lights, freighters, launches, sampans, junks with white cotton patches on their sails to the Yangtze estuary to await a high tide to cross the outer bar. It looks good to see the Stars and Stripes flying from the mast of an American ship, the flag and blue and red funnels with eagles on their sides illuminated by floodlights. I know some of the passengers but they don’t seem very friendly.My last day in Shanghai was rainy. From Ted’s room on the 12th floor of the Cathay we could see fat into the countryside beyond the towering structure of the shell-pocked old North Station. At this remove the scene didn’t appear Oriental. It must have been an exciting place during the 1937 battles. We spent the afternoon at the Cathay bar, where Russian hostesses really entertain. Then the boys took the tender with me and hundreds of others to board the President Coolidge, tied up at buoys in the Whangpoo River before saying goodbye again. The ship left its moorings at 8 p.m. We went slowly down the muddy river and its miles of wharves dotted with solitary lights, freighters, launches, sampans, junks with white cotton patches on their sails to the Yangtze estuary to await a high tide to cross the outer bar. It looks good to see the Stars and Stripes flying from the mast of an American ship, the flag and blue and red funnels with eagles on their sides illuminated by floodlights. I know some of the passengers but they don’t seem very friendly.