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February 25, 1942

Several people still smile as they remember how I held a vase of sweet peas in Brent office the night we were taken over and they crammed us into the stifling little room. When the soldiers were ripping uop the telephone wire, they upset the vase and I took it and buried my face in the cool freshness of the flowers. Later I took it upstairs and put it on the mantel over our heads. The Capital Bazaar man thought I was insulting the Japanese –that I didn’t like the air they brought, so he would not let me have my typewriter the next day nor for weeks afterward when it stayed on the table on the porch. Finally one day he saw Virginia looking at it and said to her, “Is that yours? Do you want it?” and she took it gladly and gave it to me quietly later. I have never dared to use it. He had put a vase of flowers next to it on the porch saying that would make the air better. So do we misunderstand each other,

28 days of our funds left –then what?

Missionaries heard in a note from Manila that “Uncle Sam is just around the corner.” We hope so. Ruth feels we’ll all be out in a week. We all started guessing how it would happen and nearly all feel “They’ will melt away in the night.

Lola, a refugee from Hitler, said the camps in Europe were far worse than this one. Many members would be taken out at night, and after horrible sounds of torture, they would never be seen again nor would any one know what happened to them. As for stopping the school, she says we must understand they do not want our children to learn or us to enjoy anything. They like to see us wash clothes and floors and do hard work. She says that a Japanese officer told a woman on the outside that a year and a half ago he was in Munich, so they have studied directly and learned more than the goose step there.