We Are Not Free

Minnow, 14. March 1942.

Since the attack on Pearl Harbor, Minnow Ito has been told by his older brother, Mas, to go straight home after school. Ever since the death of their father several years ago, Mas acts like the head of the family. Minnow doesn’t usually mind, but he resents the restrictions placed on him. Minnow likes to draw and sometimes stops to sketch the things he sees. Today, he stops to sketch the high school football team practicing, and he loses track of time. Realizing his mistake, he rushes home, noting the familiar places as he heads to his neighborhood, Japantown. There’s the grocery store, Katsumoto Co. It now has a sign out front that says, “I am an American” (5), a response to the growing tension in the city between the Caucasians, or “ketos,” and people of Asian descent. There’s a Japanese school and a bathhouse, too—but the Japanese school closed; its teachers were taken away by the FBI shortly after the attack.

As Minnow approaches his neighborhood, he notices a group of keto boys following him. He also sees a group of Asian kids and notes the buttons pinned to their lapels; similar to the sign in the Katsumoto store window declaring an American identity, the buttons declare a Chinese identity.