With the dried blood cleaned off him, and antibacterial cream swabbed onto the bite wounds, Frodo currently looks like a sad rodent punk with bare patches in some areas and spiky fur in others. He appears smaller when his fur is missing and not fluffy. Both hamsters are moody.

I haven't touched "Grandfather's War" since Clarion and am hoping to get it revised and expanded before February 1st—Chinese New Year. This is to hopefuly make the Polyphony deadline, since international mail has been slow of late, taking almost two weeks for US-Singapore or Singapore-US mail. (Same for the Lament painting, it's a depressing picture and should be finished before happy happy Chinese New Year.) On reading accounts of Singapore's occupation by the Japanese, I am struck by a few interesting things: The Japanese landed on this island within a week before Chinese New Year, 8 February 1942 to be exact. (CNY was 15 Feb that year.) It must have been a truly demoralizing and depressing time during what was supposed to have been a festive season.

Another thing: The Japanese troops' "Operation Clean-up" which historians date as 18-25 February saw the most wanton killing of civilians in the seaside areas. My mother's family had always lived by the sea, and almost all their relatives were in the same fishing village. Not to mention most of the mass-killings (men marched to the beach to be shot) happened in Changi and near the village, not even 5 miles from where I'm currently sitting, my great-grand- and grand-relatives did probably see the most violence that was done to civilians.

The killing operation was carried out because Japanese Officers were told that "50,000 Chinese" had to be killed. 25,000 had already been massacred, the head officers claimed, when the order was passed out. Singapore estimates we lost 50,000 during the operation. Popular (in Japan, of course) Japanese war writers after the deed place the number killed at 800, or "1,000 or 2,000 at most." Nevermind the remains that had been found and counted in the mass graves.

As of 1995, Japanese public opinion was still that Japan was not wrong in invading South-east Asia and that it was only a colonial act aping the imperialists in Europe. They will only concede that they lost to the US in WWII. They will only admit their trangression against China and Korea were invasions (though not wrong), while their troops in S.E. Asia were not invasions at all, and even more free from reproach. This heinous attitude probably explains why all post-war calls for compensation from Japan from Singaporean, Malaysian, Chinese, the Philippine and Korean war victims even now are always thrown out of the Japanese courts of "justice." Books in Japan absolving Japan from their war guilt are more popular than books that make any attempt at the truth. The Japanese still consider themselves victims of WWII and not aggressors, because of the numbers killed by the US atomic bombs. The numbers of people killed by the Japanese, Japan claims, cannot compare to the numbers of Japanese that died in the atomic bombings.

That was 1995. I'm not sure how things can be any better now.

And much as I want it to, I'm not sure whether one little ghost story of mine can ever do justice or raise enough awareness of the atrocities done in this part of the world during WWII that people either don't know about, or want to deny. But now you know "Grandfather's War" is a big-deal story to me, and I'll truly be struggling to get it as perfect as possible.

Currently reading:
The Price of Peace: True Accounts of the Japanese Occupation compiled by Foong Choon Hon and translated by Clara Show

Currently working on:
Lament, Grandfather's War, tattoo, web site.