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Ceremony of Return

3/28/2015

4 Comments

 
PictureBuck Weatherill gives a thumbs up. Photo: Daily Astorian
Keiko Ziak's grandfather was one of over 1 million Japanese soldiers who went missing in action in World War II. More than 60 years later, her family received a flag he'd carried into battle, taken as a wartime souvenir and ultimately returned to them by the son of a Canadian military memorabilia collector.

“It’s a miracle that happened,” Keiko Ziak told The Daily Astorian. “I passed that story on to [my husband] Rex. He researched it and we found out that so many miracles could happen.”

The Japanese-American couple founded a project 
to help veterans and their families, and other citizens, return these flags to their families in Japan. They named their effort OBON 2015, after the Japanese season when ancestors’ spirits are honored. 

Known as good luck flags, yosegaki hinomaru is literally translated as “group-written flag.” Every young Japanese sent off to war carried one imprinted with blessings and messages from their family. They carried them in their pockets. Countless numbers were taken from the corpses of the 2 million soldiers who wouldn't return home alive.

“All the people who cared about that person, all the people who thought about him, were going to war with him,” says Rex Ziak about the flags. Today, these flags represent the only trace of most of those who died in the war. Bringing the flag home represents the return of the ancestors' spirit.

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Earlier this week, in a former train depot in Astoria which once sent US troops off to the very battlefields where these flags were taken, OBON 2015 held a Returning Ceremony. Attended by members of the National Guard units that served in World War II, veterans now in their 90s and their families, the ceremony was the first official public transfer of the flags in America. Five flags were presented to Hiroshi Furusawa, Consul General of Japan to Portland.

These five flags are among the 100 or so OBON 2015 has collected. With Rex working the American channels and Keiko the Japanese, they've reunited 30 of these flags with Japanese families. To overcome the challenges of changing Japanese script and the elimination of phone books, they've recruited a panel of scholars along with departments of health and veterans affairs, and religious leaders. 

“To me, it’s very spiritual,” Keiko Ziak told The Daily Astorian. “We believe this is the right thing to do on both sides of the ocean.” For Rex: “This is making peace at a family level.”

Buck Weatherill, giving the thumbs up sign in the photo above, is one of the Oregon vets who returned the flag he took from a dead Japanese soldier. "I just thought, the war is over. We're not enemies anymore, we're friends,” he said at the ceremony. “They should get the flag back."

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Photos of victorious troops with captured souvenirs from obon2015.com
Listen to the Ziaks discuss their project and the Ceremony of Return on Oregon Public Radio. Read more about the US vets and their families who are returning the flags. Donate to support the project through the OBON 2015 web site.
4 Comments
Sally Shannon
3/29/2015 05:25:55 am

thank you, Holly, for continuing to enrich and heal my life. A bit of the grief for my brother who served in Viet Nam eased. Sally

Reply
Holly
3/29/2015 12:34:58 pm

Ah, dear Sally. What an honor to have this story provide a balm for your grief over all that your brother endured. Thank you, as always, for the connection.
Holly

Reply
Rose Gagne
3/29/2015 06:19:02 am

What a beautiful story Holly. 5 years ago, we buried my father in Fort Snelling military cemetery in Minneapolis. He served in WWII on the European front. My mother passed this past January, and as a spouse of a military vet, she was buried 'on top' of my fathers remains. My brother served in Viet Nam and did not return home, soul wandering for many years and only now rests in the Philippines. Oh the healing and reconciliation that is happening and continues to unfold. Thank you for your thread of weaving this for all Sacred Humans.

Reply
Holly
3/29/2015 12:33:27 pm

Rose, I'm deeply touched by your comment and the stories of how every one of your family was profoundly impacted by combat. A deep bow to the healing and reconciliation work I know you do each day.
Holly

Reply



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