Woke up at 5:00 and heard the 6:30 o’clock mass at St. Sofia’s. The Nagasakis were there, too, to pray for my safe return home.
Yesterday I was with them to say “sayonara,” and it was really sad to leave those who have been my family in Japan. Yasuko-san is the sublimest person I have met in Japan. Crippled for life, walking with the aid of an arm crutch, she saw me off on the streetcar. As the street-car pulled away, there she stood leaning on her crutches looking towards me, her eyes misty, waving to me goodbye. (A very devout Catholic, she takes her deformity with true Christian resignation.) I
hope to see her again. God bless her and her family (and General Nagasaki, now in Davao).
Despedida Party at Tokyo Station. At 10:00 this morning, our train left Tokyo station amidst a rousing send-off. All the pensionados (except a few) were there; they helped us with our baggage; representatives of the Kokusai Gakuyūkai and General Satō were. there too; and just a few minutes before the train left, came General Homma (ex-Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese Forces in the P.I.) to shake our hands and say, “Stand firmly and strongly.” The boys sang the “Song for the Creation of the New Philippines,” and as the last notes of the oft-sung song rang in the air, the train pulled out of Tokyo Station, the big buildings of Tokyo’s center soon disappearing in the distance. Goodbye, Tokyo!
Mr. Yasuhiro Gō boarded the train at Shinagawa to say goodbye—a swell guy to the last minute.
In the train did not do anything but think of the events which have happened so fast these last three days since the order to go home came as a bombshell.