Press: This article was originally published in the "Supplement" of the tonight newspaper on November 6, 2015.
Picture | Zhou Mengyuan
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > conscripted into the army to perform in Tianjin Who wants to turn out to be an adult</h1>
In July 1945, the Military Commission of the Government of the Republic of China declared that the War of Resistance Against Japan had entered a phase of turning defensive into offensive. At the end of the month, the United States, China, and the United Kingdom jointly issued the Potsdam Proclamation, urging Japan to surrender unconditionally. At this time, in Tianjin, under Japanese occupation, there were still resident militia groups encouraging the Japanese expatriates' determination to "win", and there were pseudo-government and pseudo-organs that were comforting the Japanese army and holding "good neighborly and blind dates" activities, while the general Japanese expatriates were sent to participate in various support activities.
At the same time, a cargo ship called Yantai Maru set off from Japan to China. In addition to a warehouse of cargo, there were several mysterious passengers on the ship, who followed the route drawn up by Dalian Steamboat Co., Ltd. for the cargo ship, from Niigata to the port of South Korea's Jungki, and then rushed non-stop toward North China and Toward Tianjin Moths. These passengers are artists of Nichizo Industries Co., Ltd., in that era of eliminating "hostile words", their company's original name "Columbia Records" was not allowed to be used, but as The first record company in Japan, the artists there undoubtedly have great influence, and this time they were also invited to the Beijing-Tianjin region of North China in the form of a condolence group to "sing and serve the country".
Below: Hamiko Watanabe in 1938.
Led by a female singer, Hamako Watanabe (1910-1999), is known as the "Showa Queen". Maybe our countrymen are not familiar with it, but when it comes to the songs sung by her and brought to Japan, we will hear about them to some extent: "Suzhou Nocturne", "The Bell of Sand Rhyme", "The Love of Bailan", "He Rijun Comes Again", "Night Fragrance", "Rose Everywhere"... The first three are authentic Japanese original songs, and the last three borrow the tune of a well-known Chinese song. These Chinese songs were also sung in Japanese and became popular in Japan through the mouth of Hamako Watanabe, and were widely known in Japan. Watanabe Washiko was a Japanese singer of that era, but she did not know that the city of Tianjin was about to be restored, and she was destined to touch it here.
In fact, this is not watanabe's first time in China. As early as the spring of 1938, the "Imperial Army Condolence Art Troupe" jointly organized by the Tokyo Nippon News, the Osaka Mainichi Shimbun and Columbia Records had visited East China, because in December of the previous year, the Japanese army had captured Nanjing, the capital of the Nationalist government, which aroused the "enthusiasm of the Japanese people to join the army", and even the literary and art circles were buzzing. Hamako Watanabe, who was repeatedly accused and banned for singing lyrical songs with no political significance in her early years, was also included this time. Since then, it has become a common practice in Japanese literary circles to comfort the Japanese military, and Watanabe Hamako has also become a singer known as the "labor army" in China, and her works are mostly covered with Chinese songs filled with Japanese words.
Below: The "Imperial Army Condolence Art Troupe" that came to China in 1938 to "offer condolences".
According to the Regulations of the Cabinet Intelligence Bureau of Japan, which controlled the publication of literature and art during the war, the artists involved in the condolences were "requisitioned", which was equivalent to joining the army, and the "Imperial Army Condolence Art Troupe" was integrated under the orders of the Reporting Department of the Army Province, so Watanabe Hamako also wore a gold star on her chest. Hamako Watanabe, who has been to China many times, has also attended some Sino-Japanese concerts and met Chinese artists such as Zhang Junqiu, Yao Li, and Bai Hong. The performance of the condolence group was greatly appreciated by the pseudo-cultural associations that occupied Beijing at that time, so they invited them to come back, so there was this time in 1945.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > the setbacks in the return trip to China Experience the scene of defeat</h1>
Following the above, after Watanabe Hamako and his party arrived in Xiongji, they took a train through Xinjing, arrived in Beijing, hurriedly "comforted" qinhuangdao, Changli, Luanxian, Tangshan and other places within ten days, and then arrived in Tianjin on August 8. In Tianjin, Watanabe "comforted" the Tianjin Hospital, the Headquarters of the Japanese Garrison in Tun and other places, and met with Major General Shigeji Takatani, the manager of the Japanese cargo factory, on the 10th. It was this Japanese cargo factory that, within a few days, became a shelter for Japanese expatriates from all over the world. On the 11th, Watanabe and his party arrived at Bac Ninh Park, where a concert was held in "a magnificent building", and the next day was the "last stage" Awaji National School (now the intersection of Anshan Road and Gansu Road). In the late Concession era, the auditorium of the Awaji National School was often used as a venue for large events and important speeches, and Watanabe Hamako also felt that "the microphone here is the best to use." The musicians played the accordion, played the saxophone, sang folk and pop songs for two and a half hours, and "the audience was very happy". At that time, Japanese artists went to the battlefield and other places to "comfort", more than the military truck provided by the military, this time Watanabe Hamako in Tianjin, when she and three musicians, an agent after the car, the driver was slow to drive, asked to learn that it was to wait for other members, when Watanabe said that people have been together, the driver is surprised how there can be such a small condolence group.
Below: Awaji National School and Tianjin Commercial School.
After the event, the arranger provided Watanabe Hamako with two days of free time. Over the past two days, she briefly toured Tianjin, bought some souvenirs, attended banquets held by the Japanese army, and met with colleagues and businessmen in the care and condolence group among the expatriates, including the staff of Richu (Columbia Records) who were then located on Tongzhou Road (now Taipei Road) in the special district. Their banquet venue was the "Asia Hotel Tianjin", which was renamed the Lishunde Grand Hotel during the Japanese Occupation period.
August 15 is the day that Hamako Watanabe and her condolence group are scheduled to return. A group of people booked a train ticket at 10 a.m., but somehow the train was delayed. At this time, Matsumura, the commander of the garrison who had been drinking and talking at the army banquet, hurriedly picked them up, saying that there would be an important content from the Japanese emperor on the radio. At noon, everyone turned on the radio, and the voice of the Japanese emperor was broadcast to the ordinary people for the first time, although the difficult and obscure words and the emperor's characteristic reading pauses needed to be explained to understand, but even the few words that were understood had made these people realize that this moment was a major turning point in history and was destined to be recorded in history.
Below: Watanabe Hamako is greeted by the local garrison at a place of condolence.
After listening to the broadcast, the officers around Watanabe Hamako took off their hats, threw away their sabers, and collapsed in their chairs in despair, and some people asked them, "What did the emperor say?" The answer was: "The war is over, we have lost." The person who asked was still confused: "Lost?" Didn't we say before that we won battles everywhere in China? In the face of such a rhetorical question, the soldier could only smile bitterly and told all the people present: "You may not be able to go back." ”
The next day, the blue sky and white sun flags fluttered everywhere on the road. At this time, Watanabe and his party were escorted down to Beijing by the army. Along the way, people were worried that they would be attacked by Chinese people along the way, but they did not expect that everything would be business as usual. In Beijing, watanabe, in order to hide her Japanese identity, put on Chinese clothes and went to Beihai Park and other places to play, and saw Japanese soldiers using sabers to cut trees on the side of the road and argue with each other, falling into chaos. After that, Japanese overseas Chinese went to the shelter in Tianjin one after another to await repatriation. In this situation, Watanabe Hamako returned to Tianjin again.
< h1 class= "pgc-h-arrow-right" > still performed in the shelter eleven months after returning home</h1>
Under the arrangement of the Nichizo Tianjin Branch, Watanabe Hamoko stayed in a "first-class hotel", but the hotel side proposed to "prohibit Japanese people from staying" and drove her out, and Nichisu had to arrange for her to live upstairs in the Meiji Kochi-made Tianjin Branch and live with the in-house manager Inaba family. Meiji fruit is the manufacturer of "meiji" Meiji chocolate candy that we can now buy in supermarkets.
Next, Watanabe's autobiography is very precious, and she witnesses the entry of American troops into the city as a national of a defeated country in detention: "The welcome flag flutters in the street in the wind... There was a roar of joy outside, and we looked down from the window to see the U.S. Navy marching majestically on the main road. People waved flags, clapped their hands, rubbed shoulders, greeted them, and waved the joy of victory... We watched all this in a daze, the officer next to him clutching the window frame, tears streaming down his sad cheeks... That night (Tianjin) became a city that never sleeps, and the road was full of American jeeps and trucks. ”
Below: Meiji Advertisement (1941)
There are records that Meiji fruit making had four addresses in Tianjin: the earliest in the French Concession, and then two in the Japanese Concession, but Watanabe Hamako revealed that she was not in the Japanese Concession; and the most recent meiji fruit-making address, at the intersection of No. 7 Road and No. 6 Road in the third district of Xingya, is the arcade building on the west side of the intersection of Jiefang North Road and Harbin Road, which is also the place where the first division of the US Marine Corps entered the Tianjin city in September 1945 and was welcomed by the people of Tianjin.
Until December 31 of that year, Watanabe Hamako and the Inaba family, who had been taking care of her, left their Meiji fruit shop and boarded a large truck of American gendarmes to the shelter. At the shelter, Watanabe was placed in a comfortable dormitory with a kitchen and bathroom, where the military families of the former cargo factory lived. In January 1946, the shelter was transferred from the US military to the Chinese side, and Watanabe Hamako, who wore Chinese costumes, sang songs such as "When the Sun Jun Comes Again" and "Night Comes Fragrant" to the Chinese soldiers stationed at the banquet, which was unexpectedly very popular. In her final months, she often performed in the shelter's makeshift theater for Japanese expatriates awaiting repatriation, as well as for Chinese soldiers, and occasionally by young Japanese soldiers who had not seen her perform, as "Chinese girls who could speak Japanese." The experience of these months in the shelter was also seen by the expatriates who were repatriated at that time. These people recall that Watanabe Hamako often performed in the shelter, and her beauty was as fascinating as that of a foreign actress. Unconsciously, Watanabe Hamako also ushered in her own repatriation day.
Below: Returning to the diaspora in Putou and today's Port of Putou.
It was the end of April 1946, and the doorman in the shelter's dormitory held a small farewell party for the group, and they all cooked Japanese food together. The next day, after being inspected, Watanabe boarded the U.S. LST-162 landing ship. Along the way, she sang happily, and on May 4, she arrived at Portotaku, Pino Island, Sasebo City, Nagasaki Prefecture. It was one of the designated Japanese repatriation landing ports. Today, the "Repatriation Memorial Peace Park" and the "Putou Repatriation Memorial Museum" have been established there to remember the past. When Watanabe returned to her burned-out home in Yokohama, eleven months after Japan surrendered.
After a generation of songs, the Tianjin Detention Brigade has come to an end. After returning to Japan, Watanabe continued her singing career. Until the retirement of the last year of the Showa era, he sang more than 1,800 songs over more than 50 years, and served as the finale of the NHK Red and White Song Festival several times. In her later years, Hamako Watanabe was bedridden by dementia and died at home on December 31, 1999, at the age of 89.
Regarding her own experience, Watanabe Hamako once commented: "I am also a war criminal. I was also one of those who supported the Japanese invasion. Because I used songs to inspire soldiers, I also went to shelters. I don't know if when she said this sentence slowly to the reporter, what came to mind was the autumn color on the streets of Tianjin that year.
Below: Hamako Watanabe in her later years.
Below: The source of this article is "Ah! Unforgettable Erhu Sounds - Autobiography of Watanabe Hamako Photo Collection".
Suzhou Nocturne
You're holding me in my chest and I'll hear you
Dream Funawing Bird Song
Spring in Suzhou, water
I'm sorry, or the willow sobs.
Of the water flowing through the flowers
I don't know what tomorrow is going to be.
The figure of two people who reflected koyoi
Don't disappear, forever.
I'm going to hang it on my hair or kiss me.
You folded the hand, peach blossoms.
In the moon of the dimness of tears
The bell rings Samsanji Temple
Translations
Snuggle up to Junhuai and listen
Fishing songs are like dreams, birds chirping
Water town Suzhou, flowers fall in the spring to return
Pity the good day, weeping willows like sobs
The petals of the fallen petals flow one by one
Where tomorrow is, ask the king if you know
This evening is precious, and the wings are stacked
Be careful not to forget, this love is long in the heart of the two
The sideburns are qingfu
Plain hands fold branches, flowers are handed to the king warm
Like crying, drunk moon hazy
Suddenly awakened, the ancient temple of the cold mountain sounded the bell at night
《How Many Days Will You Come Again》
I can't forget that I'm going to shake with you In this fog, I spent a gentler whisper and smile on that day I can't forget you again How many days I'll never forget it On that day I'll be across the shoulder of this tree-lined tree and beglowed by the two Ah, ito-kun spent the day when I spent it. The days you will be able to change again Now that all the memories that you will never forget will be divided, this tree-lined cover on your chest is a lonely day in which you wait single-mindedly thanks to your back, Myo- kun, the number of days you will come back
Unforgettable that face
In the flickering mist of lights and shadows
The two snuggled up
Smile and whisper
How happy
Ah beloved when will you be able to come back
How many days will you come back?
Unforgettable that time
Light breeze blowing boulevards
The two stood shoulder to shoulder
Joy or sorrow
Comfort each other
Unforgettable memories
And you separate the boulevards
Your face comes to mind
Embrace memories
A lonely day of obsessive waiting
(The lyrics were translated by the author of this article.) The song of Hamako Watanabe, which can be found in Shrimp Mi.com: www.xiami.com)
(Editor: Du Kun)