Desert Exile

Chapter 5 chronicles the Uchida family’s move into a horse stall and the strong community prisoners established the first few weeks at Tanforan. Halfway through the chapter, Mr. Uchida arrives. The chapter closes by describing Dwight’s experience in subzero Montana weather, while imprisoned.

In Tanforan, the Uchidas arrive at Barrack 16, Apartment 40. The family passes through the camp, where “black tar-papered barracks had been hastily erected to house the 8,000 Japanese Americans of the area who had been uprooted from their homes” (69.) The Uchida’s barrack is past these and is a former horse stall with three army cots, and “linoleum that had been laid over manure-covered boards, [and] the smell of horses […] in the air” (70). Dead insects clung to the wall. Uchida wonders if “our nation’s security would have been threatened had the Army permitted us to remain in our homes a few days more” (70) until camps had proper family accommodations. Food in early days was “canned sausages […] a boiled potato and piece of butterless bread” (71). Within a few months, the mess hall offers fried chicken and ice cream. The Uchida’s “camp bundle” arrives and in their stall, they gather around a hot tea kettle for warmth. This imagery furthers the motif of Issei keeping Japanese culture alive, and begins to develop the theme of the erasure of Uchida’s identity. Yet the Japanese-American community exhibits strength. Soon, friends inside bring gifts of dried prunes. Uchida’s friends mail her gifts.

Uchida notes that their “stable consisted of twenty-five stalls facing north which were back to back with an equal number facing south” (73). It’s an assortment of small family units and an artist, Dwight Uchida’s barber and his wife, and an elderly retired couple live near the Uchidas. Neighbors spend days playing cards. Meanwhile, Mrs. Uchida domesticates the horse stall, sewing curtains. 

Chapter 5 concludes with Mr. Uchida reuniting with his family, and Uchida’s description of her father’s days in Montana. There, the men started a church, following disciplined schedules that each morning began with calisthenics. Their mail was inspected by officers. Uchida paints the portrait of her father’s courage in the face of struggle. 

Chapter 6 explores how from May through September 1942, Tanforan evolves into a makeshift city, with churches, schools, a political campaign, and prisoners engaged with groups outside. Uchida further develops the themes of Japanese courage, ingenuity, and community-building in the face ofthe camp’s meager conditions, as rumors of an impending move inland, to another facility, surface in July, threatening longevity at Tanforan.

Uchida describes how within three weeks, non-Japanese friends sent messages asking how to help. They visit “laden with such welcome snacks as cookies, candy, potato chips” (84). Uchida’s parents’ visitors included her mother’s former university teacher, who now lives in California, the chairman of the Pacific Coast Committee on American Principle and Fair Play (who is Mr. Uchida’s good friend), and the Associate Dean of Women at the University of California.

Uchida recalls separate Christian and Buddhist churches, the post office, hospital, library that first offered 41 books and later over 5,000, and the Tanforan Totalizer newspaper. Prisoners organize a softball league, weekly talent shows, musicals, and town hall discussions. They build wooden ships to sail on the lake in front of the grandstand, and women knit fancy sweaters. A constitution is drafted, and thirty-eight candidates are elected to a congress the Army eventually shuts down. Uchida’s sister Keiko organizes a nursery school. Uchida herself teaches at an elementary school. Each morning, Uchida leads the children to school. Teachers hold open houses, organize PTA groups, and a Flag Day ceremony: “In spite of the circumstances under which the program was being held, I don’t think the children had any other thought than to do honor to the flag of their country” (91). Workers in Tanforan receive paychecks, and by July, the government issues scrip books worth money; internees buy candy or shoelaces from the camp canteen. Uchida and Keiko move into their own stall. Still, sicknesses develop. Red splotches develop on Uchida’s hands, and she’s diagnosed with Vitamin B deficiency. Keiko suffers a month-long cold.

By mid-August, official word arrives: from September 15 through 30, many prisoners at Tanforan will move to camps farther inland. This time, the Uchidas have too many belongings to fit in their “camp bundle.” In preparation for their departure, Uchida’s father “disassembled everything our friends had built for us when we first arrived. He saved every scrap of wood and every nail, and converted our shelves, tables, and benches into shipping crates” (101).