Iron Soldier

1941 Kowloon, port of Hong Kong, British colony

Real soldiers have no mothers. Not the hush-a-bye, cradle-you-when-you’re-sick kind, anyway. Soldiers are rugged and strong, and gloriously brave. This I knew. I saw it in movies; I heard it at school.

“China is our mother,” declared Mr. Soong, who taught me physical education. His muscles rippled as he strode across the platform. Just like a general, I thought. And we, obedient and loyal students of Dao Kwun Primary School, standing in neat rows across the courtyard as we did every morning, formed an invincible army. I stood straighter. My head rose a touch, if only to see above my classmates’ shoulders. Our commander’s voice rang out: “We must be ready to fight alongside our brothers.”

Like the famous Big Sabre Troop our teacher always told us about. On moonless nights, this troop would strip naked and noiselessly slip into enemy camps. Anyone wearing clothes must be Japanese. Snap. The Big Sabre soldier would break the enemies’ necks. How brave, how exciting. Someday that will be me. Yes, Mr. Soong, I will fight. I will be a man. We shouted the lyrics to “March of the Volunteers”—all two hundred of us boys and girls—loudly enough for the Japanese emperor to hear.

Arise! Thousands of hearts unite …
Face the enemy’s fire—march!

Chests swelling, we dared his men to set foot among us. We would tear them to shreds. I would tear them to shreds.

So what if I was only eight years old? I could learn. If only we hadn’t moved to Kowloon. If we were still in Swatow, I could run away and join the Chinese army. Our teachers assured us that the Kuomintang, China’s governing Nationalist party, would save our country. Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalists would chase the Japanese out of Manchuria and the occupied territories. The Kuomintang had even made peace with the rebels in central China, the Communist Eighth Route Army. Now they fought the Japanese together. Kowloon, though, was part of the British colony of Hong Kong. Here, we had the King’s troops to protect us. We didn’t have to fight—yet. Instead, we pooled our lunch money and cracked open our piggy banks to buy rifles and planes for the Chinese army.

“Bam! Bull’s eye!” yelled K.K., my older brother, as he fired his slingshot at a pebble. “That’s another one for me. I’ll wipe out an entire squadron by myself.”

Another shot bounced and stung my shin. I bit down hard—soldiers don’t cry. Not even eight-year-old ones. Instead, I yelled, “Hey! You hit your own troops. Don’t you remember what we just sang?” Marching stiffly with an imaginary rifle, I reminded him, “We are iron soldiers.”

Aim the gun outward, forward we march together.
Do not kill fellow citizens, do not hit our own people.

“Of course, I know that. You’re a Jap.”

“Am not.”

“Are too. Nyah, nyah, Kee Ngai is a Jap.”

I looked up at my big brother. Hmm. Two years made a huge difference. While he was built like a water buffalo, I looked more like a monkey. Time to switch tactics. Vrooom! I was an ace pilot. Ratta-tat-tat. Ratta-tat-tat. Shreeee-keboom. I bombed my big brother to smithereens. Song or no song.

Not that I had anything against K.K. In fact, since we had moved to Kowloon, I talked to him more than to anyone else. This was a big city, with buses, taxis, and lots of people who didn’t know you. It was bigger even than Swatow. That’s what I remembered of Swatow, anyway, which wasn’t much. We had left when I was four. All I recalled of the trip was throwing up on the ship.

Father didn’t join us in Kowloon until a year later. Shortly after, he left to go to Taishan, some hundred miles away. Even though he was a simple bank clerk, he had an important job there, transferring documents to Wuzhou, where they would be safe from the Japanese.

We didn’t see much of Mama either. Her patients kept her busy. Our baby sister, Mei Mei, was only four, too young to know anything. We had a nanny, but she was too old. At least forty, even older than Mama. Besides, all she cared about was keeping our school uniforms clean. So that left my brother for company. We loved to talk about the war. He wanted to join the Kuomintang army. The air force intrigued me more. For now, though, we couldn’t join either. We had to go to school.

It was Monday, December 8, 1941, 8 a.m., and we were running late for school, as usual. K.K. bounded down the street ahead of me. Although it was December, the days were still warm. We wore our summer uniforms—a short-sleeved white shirt that absorbed the sweat trickling down our backs and light brown shorts that left our legs free to race. A rattan bookbag banged against my hip. My black leather shoes slipped from time to time on the pavement as I struggled to catch up with my brother.

Street vendors squatted here and there with their charcoal stoves. They grinned at me over their steaming pots and tempted me with treats. Rolled rice noodles and porridge. Brown sugar rice cakes. Foot-long doughnuts. But there was no time to stop—I had to get to school on time; otherwise, the headmaster would make me sit on an imaginary chair, back straight, thighs taut, until fire coursed up and down my legs. That had happened to a classmate the week before, and I didn’t want it to happen to me.

About four blocks from home, I heard the sirens. No one paid any attention at first. We were used to air-raid drills. Then came the explosions, and people around me began to panic and run in all directions. “The Japanese bombed the airport,” someone shouted.

Kai Tak Airport was only five miles away. Rushing home in fear, I ran into Nanny. “Go home quickly,” she said. “Where is K.K.?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’ll keep looking for him. You go home to your mother.”

Home was 166 Fa Yuen Street, a three-storey concrete building. The ground floor consisted mostly of shops, with a few people living in the rear quarters. Two flats, side by side, made up the second and third floors. We lived in a second-floor flat with two tenant families: Mr. Hung and his daughter, and Mr. Chu and his wife. From the crowded street, I could see Mama pacing our balcony. Spotting me, she leaned over the railing to greet me. I raced up the stairs. Her eyes, usually sharp and bright, were clouded with worry. “Where could K.K. be?” she fretted, continuing to pace.

My brother came home half an hour later, smug and full of bravado. He had made it all the way to school, like a hero who made it through enemy territory. The administration, however, had ordered everyone to go home immediately. Little did we know then that we would never see our classmates or teachers again.

… … …
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