Japan’s ‘Pacific Islands’

"Edith-san" is an obeikei, a descendant of the original Pacific Islander and Western settlers to what they called the Bonin Islands. Born "Edith Washington," she is "Edith-san" to her friends, but "Ohira Kyoko-san" when she goes to the bank or village government office. Like the islands themselves-the "Bonin Islands" on most international maps but "Ogasawara" on official Japanese documents-she and many other obeikei have both an English name for local use, and a Japanese name for official purposes.

South Sea Heritage Dancing Association performance. Photo: Craig Volker/Atsushi Miyahara

After World War II, the U.S. Navy separated what it called the Bonin Islands from Japan and ruled them for 23 years. Edith Ohira was one of the 146 0beikei whom American occupiers let return to the islands after the war. It is a time she remembers as being isolated and without much entertainment. There was little contact between the Bonin Islands and Japan under the Americans. Edith recalls that even making a telephone call to friends or relatives in Tokyo was difficult, and there was only one monthly ship to Guam.

"My husband had bought a short-wave radio on Guam so I could listen to NHK news. When I heard about the reversion, I was so overjoyed. It was going to be great to see my friends and neighbors again."

These friends and neighbors were the Japanese residents who had been evacuated in 1944 with the obeikei to Honshu for safety. Most had been born on the islands, but after the war, the Americans did not permit these ethnic Japanese to return with the obeikei. Japanese settlement started in 1878, two years after Japan proclaimed sovereignty over what it calls the Ogasawara Islands, granting Japanese citizenship to the Polynesian and Micronesian Pacific Islanders and others who had joined the original settlers between 1830 and 1878.

Edith's father was the English-speaking descendant of one of these naturalized obeikei. Edith says because of her Japanese mother, her life at home and at school was "100 percent Japanese style." Her children however, grew up after the war as Americans, attending school with Navy-dependent children, and using Japanese only at home. Local Episcopalian priest, Isaac Ogasawara recalls that for some young people, going to Guam and discovering that they were "Islanders," not Americans, was "a big shock."

The Ogasawara Islands and blue ocean. Photo: Craig Volker/Atsushi Miyahara

At reversion, the Bonin Islands were organized within the Tokyo Metropolitan District as Ogasawara Village. Obeikei were registered as Japanese citizens and again had to take Japanese names. Isaac Gonzales became Ogasawara Aisaku and Edith's husband took the name Ohira.

Obeikei were given five years in which to apply for American citizenship if they did not wish to remain under Japanese rule. Edith's son Rance recalls that this was a difficult choice for young people such as himself. Some, like him, did become American citizens and even moved to the United States. As Isaac Ogasawara explains, doing this separated a number of young people from their parents who stayed in the islands as Japanese citizens. In Rance's case, he returned six years ago from the U.S. to open a popular local pub and look after his widowed mother. With his American passport, he now lives on his native island as a foreign citizen.

Unlike many other small isolated communities in Japan, Ogasawara is growing as more "New Islanders" move in each year. For some young New Islanders, the easy-going pace of life on the islands represents an alternative to the more lock-step life they are expected to follow on the mainland. Recent arrival Yoko Suzuki says, "living here in Ogasawara, I realize that you don't need a university degree to have a happy life."

Village government official, Shigeru Sakamoto, himself originally from central Tokyo, says "settling in the Ogasawara Islands is comfortable because everyone is new here. Newcomers are accepted and made to feel welcome."

The Pacific Island roots of this northern tip of Micronesia are of interest even to New Islanders. The South Seas Dance Heritage Association performs dances brought to the islands by Micronesian settlers before World War II. "The younger generation is more open," according to a second-generation Ogasawara Islander member of the association. She adds that local versions of these dances and the accompanying songs are now taught in Ogasawara elementary schools.

With this heritage, the Ogasawara Islands continue to be both Japanese and Micronesian, and both American and Asian. As Rance Ohira says, "I have a larger world than someone who has known just the States or Japan, someone who has know their own little country."