Chizuko

“Chizuko’s mother divorced and left her with her grandparents at the age 3. She never knew who her father was. She was sent back to the family when her Mum remarried and moved to Shanghai, China. Chizuko’s Mum was the 9th child and the youngest in the family. Her grandparents adopted her and her grandfathers pension from the Navy service in the first World War would go to her when he passed so she was taken care of financially even though she was sent back. When the 2nd world war erupted the pension was cancelled so the eldest daughter adopted Chizuko when her grandparents became too old to care for her.

 

When Chizuko was 9 years old 2 dams burst above her village of Nikko, 80 kms north of Hiroshima.

Everyone, including the children who could swim were deployed to search for survivors. She remembers being very thankful she lived on the left hand side of the river as the whole right side got washed away. Even so they tied a big rope around her and sent her out in the water to search for bodies.

 

Chizuko’s Grandmother left her when she was 9 yrs old and went to Shanghai for better business. She was taken care of by an aunt and uncle after Grandma left. Grandma was a music and dance teacher. She had a 28 storey building with theatres and restaurants and a troupe of 400 people that made up her dance company. Grandma used silk to make the costumes and during the Japanese / Chinese war Grandma was asked by the Japanese government to use her silk to make parachutes for the Japanese soldiers caught as prisoners. When Grandma returned back to Japan she was an accredited music and dance teacher but was also known for her Shiatsu. Famous Sumo wrestlers would visit regularly from Tokyo to Hiroshima for treatments. Chizuko was deaf from contracting Meningitis at 3 years of age so Grandma made sure Chizuko was trained in Japanese massage, she said it would always give her work.

 

At 13 years of age Chizuko was living in Nikko approximately 100kms north of Hiroshima the day the bomb dropped. She was on her way to deaf school, standing at the train station, asking why the train was 3 minutes late by her watch. The conductor looked at her puzzled and said….Chizuko the train left 3 minutes ago. All of a sudden the sirens went off to warn everyone to go to the underground bunker. The last couple of people to enter the bunker called out after the explosion …Come up and check this out! Chizuko’s memory is that it was one of the most beautiful sites she had ever seen. It was rainbow upon rainbow and a big mushroom cloud. The debris that had been flung into the atmosphere after the entire city was bombed created prisms which were seen as rainbows when the sun shone through. 80,000 people died that day and many more suffered from radiation poisoning.

 

Over the following weeks all young women 15 and over from all the outer lying villages were brought in to care fro the thousands of people with ‘the sickness’. Fortunately Chizuko was only 13. She and her peers were going to work on a production line in factories everyday to make torpedoes and bombs, joining the green wire to the green wire and the red wire to the red wire all day long. This went on for months and months while the war was on. They took everything that was steel out of peoples homes to make bullets and weapons. They stripped everything from their own people.

 

All Chizuko’s friends who were 15 and over grew up with many ongoing health issues including sterility, still births, cancers and deaths due to the radiation. Chizuko believes that her Grandfather’s spirit as he had passed, changed her watch time so she missed the train that day. Japanese trains run on time by the minute. This train was completely melted by the blast.

 

One time when Chizuko was planting in the rice fields with others they heard a plane coming. All of a sudden it starts shooting at them. They ran as the bullets pelted down. She was the only one that made it out of that field. That’s her trauma level. She has lots of trauma.

 

Chizuko met her husband Donald Duncan about 1945 in the Hiroshima area. He was there as a soldier from the Korean war. Australia occupied Japan after 1945. He was drinking beer made from the water in the Hiroshima River the year it got bombed. Luckily he never died of cancer. Everyone just kept living there. After they had been together for a while Donald wanted to bring her back to Australia. They returned about 1955 and they weren’t allowed to marry because they didn’t let you marry Japanese people then. Donald had to apply to the Prime Minister to get permission to marry her… Chizuko was one of the first 6 Japanese women to be naturalised in Australia. In 1960 Chiena was born and Ching was born in 1968. During those years she had 4 or 5 miscarriages probably due to the exposure to radiation. There were no Asian children in Ching’s area when he was little. He was the only one.

 

Chizuko was finally given hearing aids when she came to Australia. It was a miracle for her. Donald didn’t even know she was deaf as she could lip read English and Japanese so well. She could speak both as well. Her own husband didn’t realise she was totally deaf. She started doing Shiatsu and Acupuncture in Brisbane. Her claim to fame was massaging Grace Jones. She also learned to sew so she became a seamstress and made amazing dresses, she worked on farms and did other jobs as well. Donald worked in a hospital for 25 years. They were together 60 years before he passed.

 

Chizuko and Donald came to Lismore to be near Ching and his wife Maire so they could be close to family. They enjoyed having a big veggie garden here. As they got older they moved into Bupa in Ballina. Donald used to say he felt like he was on a cruise ship. They really look after them there. Chizuko gets to stay with Ching and his family often but she really likes it in Ballina. She has done well to survive all she’s been through. She had one lump taken from her breast 20 years ago but she’s always been healthy and lived out of the garden.

Chizuko went back to Japan with family in ’82 but hasn’t returned as only distant relatives remain and the memories are too painful to go back .”