Reading Okinawa

Matayoshi Eiki’s Naminoue no Maria

JAPANESE TEXT:

Matayoshi, Eiki. Naminoue no Maria. Tokyo: Kadokawa Shoten, 1998.


Click here to get Japanese-English flashcards for Naminoue no Maria. Strongly recommended for anyone who wants to read the story in Japanese.


1. Introduction
 
Naminoue no Maria, published by Kadokawa Press in 1998, tells the story of Michi, a young Okinawan woman who is raped by several US servicemen and who raises her daughter, Maria, alone. Working in a bar, Michi struggles to survive with the help of Takeshi, a young man who works there. Through this story, Matayoshi considers the impact of the Vietnam War on Okinawa, especially in A-sign bars, where US soldiers often fraternized with local women. The novel also examines the impact of rape, including the taboo topic of child rape and other human rights abuses of that time.
 
 
2. Character List

Michi  ミチ
 
Michi is one of the protagonists of the story. She works at Sekai, an A-sign bar in the red-light district of Naha. Michi dated Takeshi before getting raped by some black men in the US military. She loved Takeshi but broke up with him because of the rape. In 1957, she gave birth to Maria when she was twenty-two years old. Michi, a strong-willed and independent person, lives with Maria in Naminoue, a section of Naha.
 
Maria  マリア
 
Maria is Michi’s daughter, who was born in May 1957. She is half black American and half Okinawan, so she has curly black hair, dark skin, and cute eyes. Outgoing and friendly, Maria usually plays with the Boy and enjoys listening to his songs when he plays his sanshin, a kind of Okinawan banjo. However, Maria becomes introverted and mute after Ryan rapes her.
 
Takeshi  タケシ
 
Takeshi is another protagonist of the story. His Taiwanese mother died due to an illness, and his Okinawan father, a fisherman, died during the war. Takeshi falls in love with Michi and then gets a job as a bouncer at the same bar. He lives with the Boy, whom he treats like a brother. Takeshi has a dream of shooting off flares. He has a strong sense of justice but is also stubborn and sensitive.
 
The Boy  少年
 
The unnamed Boy was born in June 1945 and is 165 centimeters tall. He is friends with and lives with Takeshi, whom he respects. The Boy is good at playing the sanshin because he grew up surrounded by traditional folk music. The Boy is his own person and never gives up.
 
Bar Owner  ママ
 
The owner of the bar Sekai was forty-seven in 1959 and from the Japanese mainland. She moved to Okinawa because she heard she could make money from US servicemen. She constantly worries about money.
 
Lee  リー
 
Lee is a twenty-nine-year-old Korean who was forcibly brought to Okinawa in 1944 to work as a prostitute for the Japanese military. She works at Sekai with Michi. Lee is kind, but Ryan rapes her and gets her addicted to drugs. Late in the story, she commits suicide.
 
Suzuki  鈴木
 
Suzuki is fifty-two, and the oldest hostess at the bar. She is from Yaeyama Island and is divorced. Her child has grown up but does not talk to her. Because she is lonely, Suzuki wants a man more than money; however, she is pretty old, so most customers ignore her. She is often jealous of the other hostesses.
 
Grand  グランド
 
Grand is a black US soldier who works in Okinawa. He is thirty-six years old and wears a loincloth every day. Grand dates Michi but has a wife, three sons, and six daughters in the United States. He returns to the States after his affair with Michi is discovered.
 
Ryan  ライアン
 
Ryan is a white US soldier who works in Okinawa. He has diabetes and is 190 centimeters tall. Ryan always brings two or more friends with him to Sekai. He calls himself “God’s servant” and thinks he is strong and special. However, his ex-wife ran away, and he is selfish and arrogant. He tries to approach Michi, but she hates him. In revenge, he rapes Lee and later Maria. Moreover, he gives drugs to Lee. After surviving the Vietnam War, he becomes a better person.
 
Elderly Man  老人
 
Michi’s widowed father tries to make money to buy a grave for his wife, but he wastes money gambling, so he fails to save much money. He also tries to make money as a fortune teller and by selling things.
 
 
3. Plot Summary

Sections 1-9 (7-95)
 
During an air defense drill in July 1959, Takeshi launches a flare, which annoys the US military. The next day, Takeshi meets a boy who is playing the sanshin. Takeshi invites the boy to his house, and they become friends. They see Michi and Grand together, and Takeshi tells the boy about Michi. The scene jumps to four years earlier. During a typhoon, Takeshi visits Sekai after getting injured. Michi treats him at her apartment, and they fall in love. After Takeshi recovers, he starts working with Michi as a bouncer at Sekai. They agree to go to an exclusive US military beach in July, but Michi is late and ends up being raped by two black servicemen. Later, Suzuki tells Michi to forget it but accidentally tells everyone at Sekai, including Takeshi. Michi finds out that she is pregnant. Michi’s father and Takeshi want her to have an abortion, but she gives birth and names the baby Maria. In 1958, Michi meets Grand, and they start dating.
 
Sections 10-15 (96-168)
 
Maria becomes friends with the Boy, who sometimes plays the sanshin for her. Michi looks for a black man to marry so that Maria will have a father. She considers marrying Grand. She and Takeshi no longer talk, and the Boy comes to Sekai to play the sanshin. Ryan starts visiting Sekai twice a week, but Michi ignores him. He pays much money compared to others, so the bar owner puts up with his rude behavior. One day, Grand gets drunk and falls asleep in the bar, where black men are not allowed. Some of the white customers get annoyed to see Grand. One day, Maria and Suzuki find a deserter from the US military named Joe. Suzuki decides to protect him, and Takeshi becomes friends with him and asks him to get materials for making flares. The bar owner finds out about Joe and calls the US military police, who go to Suzuki’s house and take him away. Suzuki cries, but Joe promises he will return to her one day.
 
Sections 16-20 (169-220)
 
Michi’s father often gambles, so he struggles financially. One day in 1961, Takeshi tells the Boy about his dream to launch flares. From the next day, Takeshi starts teaching the Boy how to make flares. One day, Grand’s daughter visits Sekai from the United States and tells Michi that Grand has a family. As a result, Michi and Grand break up, and Michi grows closer to Takeshi again.
 
In December 1963, Ryan visits Sekai to see Michi, his favorite hostess. Fortunately, she is not there, but he calls Lee instead and violently rapes her after giving her drugs. Ryan also knocks Takeshi unconscious. Scheduled to be sent to Vietnam, Ryan has become violent and arrogant. Not able to find Michi, Ryan keeps raping Lee and gets her addicted to drugs.
 
One day, Ryan kidnaps Maria to force Michi to see him. To protect Michi, Takeshi goes to see Ryan instead of her. Ryan gets annoyed, beats Takeshi, and rapes Maria with his friends. After they leave, Takeshi asks people to take Maria to the hospital, but he is ashamed of not protecting Michi and Maria, so he runs away. Maria becomes introverted and stops speaking. Ryan goes off to fight in the war, and Lee, struggling with withdrawal, commits suicide on Christmas Eve.
 
Sections 21-24 (223-60)
 
The Boy starts making the flares and helping at Sekai instead of Takeshi. He also encourages Maria to play the sanshin since she is speechless. In order to find Takeshi, the Boy joins the US military in September 1964. After joining, he becomes friends with Dōike, who is from the mainland. One day, the Boy sees Takeshi in a fishing village on TV, so he starts visiting fishing villages, hoping to find him. Dōike is ordered to go to Vietnam in May 1965, and the Boy is discharged from the military in September 1966. While still looking for Takeshi, the Boy returns to work at Sekai.
 
Finally, the Boy finds Takeshi in a fishing village near Naha and asks him to return to Sekai, but Takeshi coldly rejects the offer. At Sekai, the Boy is shocked to hear that Dōike has died in the war. When the Boy returns to the fishing village, he finds Takeshi shooting up drugs. The Boy scolds Takeshi but takes him home and puts him in the hospital to recover from his drug addiction.
 
Sections 25-28 (261-83)
 
The Boy gets another job so he can pay Takeshi’s medical fees. One day, Ryan appears at Sekai again after returning from Vietnam. His two friends have died. To get revenge, Michi puts laxatives in Ryan’s drink. Later, Michi and Maria meet Ryan. Maria is already nine, but Ryan reminds her of the past, and she starts crying silently, though she seems to have forgiven him. After this, Ryan becomes less arrogant, Michi stops putting laxatives in his drink, and Maria starts speaking again.
 
One day, Joe visits Sekai and says he will take Suzuki to the States. In February 1967, the Boy finishes making six flares, and Takeshi is discharged from the hospital. They plan to launch the flares together, but the Boy is shot and dies as they prepare to launch them. Maria launches the flare, but it strikes Sekai, starting a fire. The bar owner and Ryan run out, and the giant globe falls as the shop burns down. Takeshi launches the rest of the flares in memory of the Boy. He tells Maria that he and the Boy made the flares to destroy the world’s darkness. As he says this, Michi snuggles up to him.
 
Commentary:
 
The conflict between the Okinawans and the Americans makes the story interesting. Michi’s rape leads to conflict with Takeshi, and when Maria is raped by Ryan, the Boy and Michi struggle to help her recover. In other words, the rapes cause an intense internal struggle for Maria and Takeshi, both of whom are devastated. After a long struggle, both of them manage to recover. One shortcoming of the story is the utterly unpredictable ending. Because there is no foreshadowing, the Boy’s death will to shock readers.
 
 
4. Setting

The story takes place in Naminoue, a section of Naha, between 1955 and 1967. Naminoue is located near the ocean, so many people visit the beaches. A historical shrine called Naminouegū has led locals to call the area “Nanmin.” The section borders Tsuji, a seedy city area with numerous love hotels and sex-related clubs. Tsuji has a long history of prostitution. A US military base was located nearby until 1987 when the land was returned to Okinawa and developed into a residential area called Shintoshin. The novel’s events occur between 1955 and 1967, while Okinawa was still under the control of the United States. Consequently, the novel mentions US dollars, the Vietnam War, and A-sign bars.
 
 
5. Point of View
 
The narration is third-person omniscient, but the point of view focuses primarily on Takeshi. However, the point of view occasionally switches to other Okinawan characters. For example, when Michi gets raped by US soldiers and after she gives birth to Maria, the narration switches to Michi’s point of view. Moreover, after Takeshi disappears, the narration switches to the Boy’s point of view. The narration seems reliable, but because the point of view is limited to Okinawan characters, the story gives a negative impression of US soldiers, whose point of view is never presented.
 
 
6. Symbolism and Imagery

The flares
 

The flares are the most important symbol in the novel. In the opening scene, Takeshi launches the flares during an air defense drill, angering some US soldiers. Takeshi’s action is a protest against the US military, so the flares symbolize the anger of Okinawans. As if to remind readers of this anger, Matayoshi frequently mentions Takeshi’s plans to launch flares. For Takeshi, however, the flares are less a protest than an attempt to bring light and brightness to their painful world. At the end of the story, Takeshi and Maria launch the flares in order to bring the light of hope to the darkness. In this way, the flares also represent the Okinawan people’s hope to bring light and hope to overcome the darkness and pain resulting from the US occupation.
 
Character’s Names
 
Many characters’ names give readers hints about their roles in the story. Maria, for example, clearly refers to Jesus’s mother, Maria, who was sinless. In the novel, Maria is pure and innocent but suffers from the evil of others. Similarly, Michi’s name, which means “path” or “the way” in Japanese, suggests that Michi tries to lead and guide her daughter.
 


7. Historical Background
    
According to Kino Blog, there have been 127 rapes and 26 murders committed by US servicemen in Okinawa between 1972 and 2012. Many of these cases have angered Okinawans and have led to many protests against the US military bases. Some of these cases have become particularly infamous.
 
The Yumiko-chan Rape Case

In 1955, a six-year-old girl named Yumiko was raped by a US serviceman stationed on Kadena base. The perpetrator kidnapped her in his car, brought her to the Kadena base, and raped her many times. Later, he murdered her and threw her in a garbage dump. Her dead body showed that she was biting her lips and grasping some glasses in her hand when she was murdered. One week later, Isaac J. Hurt was arrested by police. The extremely young age of the victim and the horrendous nature of the crime caused much anger in Okinawa. In addition, the US-Okinawa relationship worsened due to the Yumiko-chan case.
 
The Rina Shimabukuro Rape / Murder Case

In 2016, Rina Shimabukuro, a young woman who lived in Uruma City, was raped and killed. The perpetrator, Kenneth Franklin Shinzato, threw Shimabukuro’s dead body in a forest in Onna Village. The perpetrator was married to an Okinawan woman and had a child. Shockingly, he did not express any remorse about what he did. The incident angered many Okinawans, leading to more protest rallies against US military bases. Shinzato was arrested and given life imprisonment.
    

9. Criticism
 
Gabe, Satoshi. “Okinawa o meguru bungaku no seijisei Matayoshi Eiki Naminoue no Maria
     o chūshin ni.” Japan Studies: The frontier, 2009.
 
According to Gabe Satoshi, Naminoue no Maria has two important themes: that forgiving everything leads to reconciliation and that the idea of “agreement” is used to justify rape. Gabe criticizes the novel for seemingly taking the aggressor’s side instead of the victim’s. First, Gabe talks about forgiveness and making compromises. Gabe points out that the novel is about repeated rape and shows how the victims are hurt and suffer from various symptoms. For example, Michi’s sister and Maria become speechless after they are raped. On the other hand, Lee becomes addicted to drugs and kills herself.
 
Gabe criticizes the novel for having Maria forgive Ryan—instead of emphasizing the criminal and immoral nature of his abuse. In other words, Matayoshi seems to be excusing men’s violent behavior. By having Maria, the obvious victim, forgive Ryan, Matayoshi seems to excuse criminal men who commit rape. Gabe argues that the forced reconciliation takes Maria’s voice away—as well as the voices of the other victims as well.
 
The second theme that Gabe criticizes is the “rape of agreement.” He points out that “agreement” is often used to justify the criminal activities of men who rape women. Gabe points out that even when rape victims sue, the men often argue that the sex was consensual, a claim that is very difficult to judge. In Naminoue no Maria, Michi lives strongly and independently even after US soldiers raped her. However, when Ryan rapes Maria, she goes insane and loses her voice. Gabe sees the emphasis on forgiveness as being politically related to how the US military presence in Eastern Asia has been maintained after World War Ⅱ. In the case of military bases, too, various “agreements” between the US and the Japanese government have been used to justify their presence. However, the voices of Okinawans opposed to the bases have been ignored. In this way, Gabe argues that in Okinawa, the word “agreement” has often been used to justify criminal acts and is a way of silencing the victims’ voices. He hopes we can focus more on hearing the voices of the victims.
 
 
10. Themes

Impact of Rape on Postwar Okinawa
 
Throughout history, Okinawa has had many problems with rape, especially after the Battle of Okinawa. The central theme of Naminoue no Maria is the impact of rape on the lives of men and women in Okinawa. In the novel, Michi, Maria, and Lee are raped by US servicemen. Through the story of these women, Matayoshi’s novel teaches us about the traumatic effects of rape. As a result of being raped, Michi loses her relationship with Takeshi and must raise her daughter Maria, who becomes speechless and emotionless for years after Ryan rapes her. In addition, Lee becomes addicted to drugs and commits suicide. Rape also harms the family and people who are related to the victims. For instance, Takeshi’s life completely changes due to the rapes of Michi and Maria. He breaks up with Michi after she is raped, and Maria’s rape makes him feel ashamed, leading to his drug addiction. Ironically, the novel suggests that Okinawan people were numb to rape at that time. When Michi, Maria, and Lee are raped by the US soldiers, they do not even consider reporting the incidents to the police. Similarly, Takeshi and Michi’s father seem to assume they must protect the women by themselves.
 
Interactions at Okinawa Hostess Clubs during the Vietnam War
 
Matayoshi’s novel describes interactions between US soldiers and Okinawan hostesses during the Vietnam War. Through these descriptions, readers can see some of the impacts of the war on Okinawa. To begin with, the novel shows how American racism was imported to Okinawa. For example, the bar owner complains about Grand being in Sekai, saying white customers will get annoyed to see a black man. Matayoshi’s descriptions of Ryan and his friends show how hostess clubs often dealt with arrogant and violent US servicemen. During the Vietnam War, US soldiers in Okinawa often got drunk or mentally unstable. On the other hand, hostess clubs and A-sign bars often made much money because soldiers facing their deaths were anxious to forget their fates and thus spent much of their paychecks in such establishments.
   
 
11. Discussion Questions
 
1. Why did Takeshi get arrested at the beginning of the story?
 
2. Why didn’t Michi have an abortion when she got pregnant?
 
3. Why did Michi name her daughter Maria?
 
4. Why did Michi consider getting married to Grand? What does this show us about how she views men?
 
5. How does Takeshi feel about Michi dating Grand? Why doesn’t he say anything?
 
6. Why does not the bar owner like Grand being at the bar? How does she agree or disagree with the prejudices of her white customers?
 
7. Why does Takeshi want to male and launch flares?
 
8. What happens to Maria after Ryan rapes her? Does she eventually recover or not? How do you know?
 
9. Where and how did the Boy find Takeshi after he disappeared?
 
10. How does Takeshi become addicted to drugs? How about Lee? What are the similarities and differences in their addiction problems?
 
11. How does Maria change after seeing Ryan with Michi?
 
12. Why does Matayoshi have the Boy die at the end of the story? What does he want to say through this incident?
 
 
12. Works Cited
 
Gabe, Satoshi. “Okinawa o Meguru Bungaku no Seijisei Matayoshi Eiki Naminoue no Maria o chushin ni” Japan Studies: the frontier, 2009.
 
Jahana, Fumitetsu. “Kangaeta saki honshitsu mieru: Hitori hitori ga shutaisei ō Akutagawasho sakka Matayoshi Eiki san.” Ryukyu Shinpo 9 Feb 2019. .
 
“Jusho sakka no gunsho.” Akutagawasho no subete. 28 May 2015.   
     <https://prizesworld.com/akutagawa/jugun/jugun114ME.htm>.
 
“Jyosei no Kubi wo SHime Hamono de Sashita Taiho no 32 sai beigunzoku ga kyojutsu Sumaho mitsukarazu” Sankei West May 20 2016. < https://www.sankei.com/west/news/160520/wst1605200021-n1.html>.
 
“Kadena Yojyo Gokan Satujin jiken” Wikipedia N.p. Web. Nov 2 2019.
 
“Matayoshi san shōsetsu Ginnemu yashiki kankoku ni 50 nendai Urasoe egaku.” Ryukyu Shinpo 21 April 2014. .
 
“Okinawa Urumashi Gokan Jiken” Wikipedia. N.p. Web. Jun 26 2020.
 
“Tsuji Nahashi” Wikipedia. N.p. Web. 31 Jan. 2020.
 
“Yumiko-chan jiken.” Yomitan Bacharu Heiwa Shiryokan. March 18 2008. < https://heiwa.yomitan.jp/3/2674.html>.
 
“Yumiko-chan jiken to Okinawa no higeki” Nenkin Sakugen haishioi mo wakamono mo Anshinshi to Kuraseru Yono naka ni minnade koe wo Agereba Yononaka kawaru. Jun 19 2016. < https://blog.goo.ne.jp/zi-san74/e/5d241bfda04ee3c0287191b8bdbefde5>.
 
 
Original Report by Rin Nishimura. Edited and revised by Kasumi Sminkey.