Memoirous

Christmas 1944 Alice Gundry’s Recipe For the Best Potato Pancakes Ever Start with leftover mashed potatoes. Add finely chopped onion, salt and pepper. Knead in flour until no longer sticky. Form a handful of potato mixture into a patty and fry in hot bacon fat until golden on both sides. Delicious! We fed upon our dreams, bittersweet dreams of food and release. Gift giving for our second Christmas in Los Baños revolved around food, our most precious commodity. Alice and I exchanged recipes. Mother managed to save a can of jam from last year’s Red Cross Christmas package. We each got half a teaspoonful. Freddy surprised us with chicken. While Mother was preparing our one holiday meal, I took a walk over to see little Maggie Suchey. I had made a doll out of split bamboo for her. As I walked over to the family barracks, I couldn’t avoid passing by the corner room belonging to Mr. and Mrs. Leecher. Mr. Leecher ran a black market operation inside the camp. It was rumored ...

Read the rest of the story--(available in digital format, eBook from Amazon , Nook, Smashwords. Christmas at Los Baños The transfer to Los Baños took place two weeks later. Except for missing Frank, Ann, and the girls, I was glad to leave. Too many memories lingered in the halls and courtyard of STIC. I looked forward to seeing Papa and meeting Freddy Urs. I still had the money for him that his mother had given me before I left Panay. We traveled by railcar to Los Baños, which was approximately thirty miles south of Manila. Ironically, Los Baños—“the baths”—had been a resort famous for its curative waters. Laguna de Bay, a huge lake, bordered the edge of town, and nearby was the picturesque volcano Mount Makiling. The internment camp had originally been an agricultural college. It felt odd walking along the rows of fruit trees—tangerine, kalamansi , mango, papaya—toward the gates and fences of our prison camp. We arrived dusty and travel-worn, anxious and excited. I h...

In the cold month of December we could use a little paradise--here is an excerpt from my YA novel (available in digital format, eBook from Amazon, Nook, Smashwords, y'all!).   ANOTHER EXCERPT Christmas in Captivity Christmas Day arrived—my second in the Philippines, my first in captivity. It came without store-bought presents, without Papa, Julie, or mother. Mother mostly lay in bed except for when I took her by the hand and led her to the shower, the toilet, or to meals. She had hardly spoken a word since her outburst about the wedding album. As I looked into her vacant face, I often wondered what she thought about. Was she thinking of Papa? Without Papa she was missing her other half, the part of her that said she fixed good meals, thanked her for being a good wife, held her hand, and smoothed her hair at the dinner table. It was hard watching her crumble a little bit more each day. I busied myself making Christmas presents for the girls from materials availabl...

On the eve of WWII Louise Keller and her family moved to the Philippine Islands. When the war broke out her father was away picking up the missionary school teacher in Manila and ended up separated from his family. Louise and her mother are eventually rounded up by the Japanese and placed into Allied internment camps for civilians. They are in one such camp—at a former university St. Tomas in Manila where this excerpt takes place. Louise has not seen her father for two years —since the war started—and has no idea where he is. Peter a young man the family met on the boat coming over is also interned at St. Tomas and is in possession of an illegal radio. Thanksgiving in St. Tomas I’ve heard it said that when a cup is mended it is actually strongest where the glue holds it together. Mother was like that—strong, but still fragile in places. We learned to lean on each other. Peter brought us news of victories in the Solomon Islands. Little by little, island-hopping, the A...