Fish of the Seto Inland Sea

Fish of the Seto Inland Sea
Ruri Pilgrim

An extraordinary portrait of one family across the years of Japan’s greatest changes; a loving, honest, moving biography of the author’s mother.Ruri Pilgrim tells the story of her family from the 1870s to the 1950s. She begins with the formality and security of the arrangements of life for a Japanese middle-class family, living in a walled compound with their servants, following exactly the tradition inherited from their parents, with marriages arranged for the children, which continued up till World War II.By then her mother was married to an engineer and living in Japanese-occupied Manchuria. That period, with her mother’s often funny, painful experiences of learning about the Chinese and Russians with whom she now lived with her growing family, and the war seen from her point of view, is fascinating. At the end of the war, the Japanese – women, children, everyone – had to escape, walking hundreds of miles to the coast.The family returned to a Tokyo where the society, the culture, the economy was entirely overturned. The Americans were everywhere, the Japanese were unemployed, and the ways of society that they had all known had vanished. And yet somehow Ruri’s indomitable mother survived.

DEDICATION (#ulink_fb0bc8bd-58b3-559a-a910-814bb3cb0104)

To my Father and Mother

Itsuji and Shizuko Kumoi

This book is about a family whose traditional home is by the Seto Inland Sea in Southern Japan.

There is a saying that the best fish in Japan comes from here because, as is quoted in the book, the rapid flow of water in many places in the sea makes the fish especially firm and good.

These qualities seem to mirror the strength and resilience shown by the three generations of women of the Shirai family.

HARUKO’S FAMILY TREE

THE SANJOS (Haruko’s in-laws)

CONTENTS

COVER (#u8cc14ecf-7e49-5b46-a897-ffc4d63d1d5b)

TITLE PAGE (#u88fc1958-6dfa-573d-b70b-a1b878bbd2ad)

DEDICATION (#ulink_2ade74ac-71d3-5eb8-ba2b-9876ebdc2c5d)

PART ONE (#ulink_83a99908-be9e-5d07-abbc-90e4f06b46ea)

1 The Landowner’s Family (#ulink_9b8bdcd0-ed5e-5e60-b5a2-0aa157b65013)

2 The Russians (#ulink_1fbb2bb5-d2ce-542f-8cd1-b1d4e8125d9c)

3 Haruko and Her Father (#ulink_46889a5a-1ae0-595a-a451-da89dc931006)

4 Shobei’s Garden (#ulink_ef8d8d4a-b7a1-5778-821c-0511edf9471b)

5 Spring (#ulink_cee8e7e6-4f46-5a81-a66c-34e6cfb5893b)

6 Haruko’s Uncles (#ulink_50fd2fa1-e488-5822-bbdb-20cb621ec80f)

7 The Flood (#ulink_d9552a13-b2d5-5803-9133-a4fae0fdfa11)

8 Takeko is Seventeen (#ulink_15a3f39c-d5d8-51e6-a7ea-2d33d91ee938)

9 The Maple Tree (#litres_trial_promo)

10 The Medicine Store (#litres_trial_promo)

11 The Chief Engineer San’s Friend (#litres_trial_promo)

PART TWO (#litres_trial_promo)

12 To Manchuria (#litres_trial_promo)

13 The Farewell Party (#litres_trial_promo)

14 The City of Acacia (#litres_trial_promo)

15 Gathering Clouds (#litres_trial_promo)

16 Bamboo Spears (#litres_trial_promo)

17 The Summer of 1945 (#litres_trial_promo)

18 The Chinese and the Russians (#litres_trial_promo)

19 A Journey to Chenyang (#litres_trial_promo)

20 Survival (#litres_trial_promo)

21 Going Home (#litres_trial_promo)

PART THREE (#litres_trial_promo)

22 The Ruined City (#litres_trial_promo)

23 The Ming Dish (#litres_trial_promo)

24 Struggle (#litres_trial_promo)

25 Kei, Her Sons and Daughter (#litres_trial_promo)

26 The Sisters (#litres_trial_promo)

27 Ayako and Her Daughters (#litres_trial_promo)

28 A God to Rescue You (#litres_trial_promo)

29 For Better Times to Come (#litres_trial_promo)

GLOSSARY (#litres_trial_promo)

AUTHOR’S NOTE (#litres_trial_promo)

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS (#litres_trial_promo)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR (#litres_trial_promo)