Farewell To Manzanar By Jeanne Wakatsuki

The Manzanar Relocation Center, located in California, was an internment camp for Japanese Americans during World War II. After the attack on Pearl Harbor, Americans began to get paranoid and the Japanese were considered potential saboteurs, therefore they got put into these detention centers with many restrictions. People were given little warning and time to gather the small number of belongings they wished to bring with them to Manzanar. Japanese families were split among the terrible barracks partitioned into one-room apartments, with little privacy, warmth, and enjoyment. Historical author Sonia Benson states that children and parents' relationships were being strained as families were separated, therefore it was difficult to discipline

This idea is expressed in Jeanne Wakatsuki’s novel Farewell to Manzanar. As adults worked, some even getting drafted into the war, the children had controlled freedom throughout camp. Everyday life consisted of the same harsh routine that youth had to encounter. Despite this, the community of Manzanar, the youth especially, took advantage of their situation to come together and accept their position. Before explaining the man-made beauties of the camp, Jeanne Wakatsuki writes in Farewell to Manzanar, “What had to be endured was the climate, the confinement, the steady crumbling away of family life…My parents and older brothers and sisters, like most of the internees, accepted their lot and did what they could to make the best of a bad situation.” (98). Wakatsuki shows how she looked at the entertainment and pleasures of incarceration when she was living there at seven years old, such as the relationships with others, their interests and talents, and the beauty of Manzanar’s nature. Because of the excessive amount of time outdoors, there was also a great sense of familiarity and children made friends easily. Erica Harth, author and a former child internee of the Manzanar camp, writes “camp was dismal, but it had acquired the dubious advantage of familiarity…at Manzanar, friends abounded. Twenty-two children--a record figure for my childhood--attended my sixth birthday party” (367). The kids were able to make friends and explore their talents easily because of the available communication within the camp. Rather than focusing on the dreadful parts of it, the youth of the imprisonment camp learned to team up to find joy within the