During the Battle of Pingjin, the Japanese disguised themselves in Beiping to sell sugar gourds, and said to customers:Don't buy it, it's too bitter
Dear Chief, I used to be a member of the Chinese Volunteer Army, and on the land of the motherland, I had the honor to meet you! "In December 1955, in Tokyo, Japan, a sentence translated by the Japanese side surprised Guo Moruo.
As the head of the Chinese scientific delegation, he was warmly received by the Japanese government and the public, and it was not surprising that he was reunited with many old friends. However, he was extremely surprised to meet a volunteer soldier in Japan.
All this can be traced back to the period of Japanese colonial rule in Tohoku.
In order to claim the throne in the Northeast, Zhang Zuolin tried his best to curry favor with the Japanese, which led to the rapid expansion of Japan in the Northeast, in addition to building railways and factories, plundering Chinese resources, and also immigrating to the Northeast on a large scale.
In particular, after the "September 18 Incident," Japan sent a militarized "pioneer group" to emigrate to Northeast China in large numbers in order to achieve a long-term invasion and occupation of China.
Megumi Sunahara, a Japanese citizen who worked as a Japanese interpreter in World War II, was born in Fukuoka Prefecture in 1933. At the age of five, he traveled with his parents to northeastern China, where Japanese colonial rule was taking place in the background.
Megumi Sunahara's father, a mineral expert at the South Manchuria Railway Company (Manchuria), was a pure scholar who was not interested in, or even somewhat averse to, militarism.
He believes that both Japanese and Chinese are born equal, so the Manchurian Railway is very friendly to Chinese employees. Although Megumi Sunahara received a Japanese bushido education after going to school, and his teacher told him to become a militaristic teenager, he was more influenced by his father and had no ill feelings towards China.
With Japan's defeat in the spring of 1945, more and more Japanese began to think about how to return to their homeland, and Megumi Sunahara's father was also actively preparing and buying a ticket to return home.
The sudden disaster made Megumi Sunahara grow up overnight and became the pillar of the family. However, before the departure, his father died suddenly at his home in Fuxin, Liaoning, and the family faced an unprecedented blow.
With a frail mother and two younger sisters at a young age, Megumi Sunahara had to step up as the only man in the family. His first task was to bring his father's remains back to Japan, but this became an almost impossible task when the land and water routes were blocked by the Allies and the situation in Tohoku was chaotic.
In order to survive, Megumi Sunahara had to sell her family's valuable belongings, but when they took the money to buy food, they were told that the puppet Manchurian currency had been deactivated and had become pieces of waste paper.
In the face of these difficulties and setbacks, Megumi Sunahara did not give up, and he fought tenaciously for the survival of his family.
Megumi Sunahara was shocked when she heard this, and decided to stay temporarily in Liutaizi Village, Goubangzi, Beizhen, Liaoning, and wait for the situation to ease before making plans to return to Japan. Megumi Sunahara's mother used her former tailoring skills to tailor clothes, while the 12-year-old Megumi Sunahara was in charge of herding pigs and chopping wood in the landlord's house to earn her own living.
Although Megumi Sunahara had never studied Chinese systematically, she could speak some simple Northeast dialects. He claimed to be a southerner, and seemed to have deceived the local people, but in fact, being smart was mistaken by being smart, and everyone had already recognized his identity.
However, the Chinese people have a kind heart, they did not directly expose the truth, did not discriminate, and did not produce hostility, they chose tolerance and understanding for this poor and innocent Japanese teenager.
Although Megumi Sunahara didn't know it, she was ecstatic that she had managed to "get through the tricks". Until an old man's admonition made her pause. The old man said: "If you want to survive locally, you have to learn Chinese, at least 2,000 Chinese characters. ”
These words made her suddenly realize, and Megumi Sunahara began to study Chinese culture in earnest. With the surrender of Japan, the northeast beacon fire is rekindled, and the return to China is far away, how can you survive without Chinese?
Megumi Sunahara understands kanji easily, and herding cattle is his livelihood. He cleverly devised a plan to steal snacks from the landlord's house and give them to his companions to herd the cattle, while he himself went to the classroom to eavesdrop.
His diligence enabled him to quickly master basic Chinese characters and vocabulary, laying a solid foundation for Chinese learning. In 1948, he had obtained legal Chinese status and joined the Northeast Democratic Alliance Army under the name of "Zhang Rongqing" and became a soldier of the Ninth Independent Regiment.
The reason why he changed his decision was because his father had instilled the concept of "a good man should not be a soldier", and now he wants to try a different life and experience what it is like to be a soldier.
Megumi Sunahara came from a poor background and was one of the poorest people in the countryside. However, in the land reform in the northeast, he was classified as a "hired peasant", a "higher" level than the poor peasantry.
In land reform, the poorer the more "glorious" they are, and the higher the treatment they enjoy. As a result, Megumi Sunahara was given the best land and her family's food and clothing were guaranteed. He was deeply moved by these changes, and he saw that the Communist army fought for the poor, while the Kwantung Army and the Kuomintang ** Army only protected the rich, regardless of whether the poor lived or died.
He expressed his admiration for the revolutionary fighters and longed to be a soldier, hoping to liberate others and win the respect of others. Megumi Sunahara named herself "Zhang Rongqing" and hoped to fight bravely like Zhang Fei, the hero of the Three Kingdoms.
He joined the First Column of the Northeast Democratic Alliance Army, which was later reorganized into the 38th Army and became part of the People's Liberation Army of the Northeast Field Army (Siye) and was a member of the Scouts.
In the War of Liberation, the 38th Army fought from the northernmost tip of China to the Sino-Vietnamese border in the southwestern border of China with a heroic fighting spirit, and they fought in 13 provinces and cities, liberated more than 100 cities, and became a rare main force in the history of our army.
Megumi Sunahara, a fifteen-year-old soldier, participated in the Liaoshen and Pingjin Battles with his troops, and his performance was unanimously appreciated by everyone. Not only was he brave, but he was also resourceful, and he showed extraordinary talent in battle, winning several awards.
In the Battle of Pingjin, in order to find out the enemy's defenses, he disguised himself as a vendor selling sugar gourds and successfully infiltrated Beiping City. Although he brought too many sugar gourds and affected his travel speed, he immediately came up with a good idea to buy one get one free, which quickly reduced the weight.
However, he soon discovered a problem, and that was that his sugar gourds were selling too fast and did not have enough identity cover. In a hurry, he bought more than a dozen strings of sugar gourds from others and successfully solved this problem.
He learned well, and this time he didn't sell it easily, but when someone patronized him, he belittled himself: "Don't buy it, my sugar gourd is too bitter and not delicious." In 1950, when the Korean War broke out, and the volunteers swore to defend the country to the death, Megumi Sunahara was itching when he heard the radio, but he was unable to go into battle in person.
However, at the end of 1950, a good news came that the 38th Army was ordered to enter the Korean war. According to the regulations, Japanese soldiers were not allowed to participate in the war to avoid causing international political turmoil.
Fortunately, Megumi Sunahara's household registration information shows that he is from the Northeast and his name is also Chinese, so he naturally has Chinese nationality and can be a member of the volunteer army.
So, he successfully crossed the Yalu River with the army, came to the battlefield filled with gunpowder, and began to beat the wolf of American imperialist ambitions.
When Megumi Sunahara was full of fighting spirit and wanted to show his skills on the Korean battlefield and realize his ambitions, he found that his Japanese identity was revealed. It turned out that Megumi Sunahara's mother was seriously ill in Japan, and he was very concerned and wanted to return to China to take care of his mother.
So, he asked ** to allow him to return to Japan in order to bring his mother back to his hometown. However, this request of his was discovered by the troops, and he had to leave the Korean battlefield with regret.
Although Megumi Sunahara's ambition has not been fulfilled, his heart is full of longing for his mother and love for his hometown.
According to international regulations, Japan cannot participate in wars, and the Japanese cannot appear on the battlefield, otherwise it will cause international disputes. As a result, Megumi Sunahara was forced to leave the Korean battlefield.
However, when he returned to Japan, his mother had died, and he could only bury her in Tohoku with tears in his eyes. Since his identity was revealed, he could not return to North Korea, so he was assigned to work in the political department of the Northeast Aviation School in Mudanjiang.
This school has many top technicians from the Kwantung Army Air Force, who trained talents for the New China Air Force. At this Northeast Aviation School, more than 160 pilots were trained, and 23 of them participated in the founding ceremony of the People's Republic of China in 1949.
However, Megumi Sunahara doesn't know how to fly, so he's curious why his superiors let him work here.
Because he is bilingual in both Japanese and Chinese, he is able to play a key role in communicating with Japanese officers and soldiers as a translator. However, after arriving here, Megumi Sunahara did not succeed in integrating into the character and instead made herself feel very angry.
It turned out that these technical backbones of the Kwantung Army enjoyed superior treatment, lived in spacious and bright rooms, ate rice and pork, and sometimes even enjoyed seafood.
Seeing this scene, Megumi Sunahara felt very angry. These people are obviously former invaders and enjoy a comfortable environment here, while the volunteers risk their lives on the front line, but they can only eat fried noodles in the snow, which is too unfair.
In a fit of rage, Megumi Sunahara went on a hunger strike to ** the injustice of the aviation school. After the leaders of the aviation school learned about it, they patiently explained, and finally Megumi Sunahara figured it out and resumed eating.
It was only at this moment that Megumi Sunahara understood that subconsciously, he had long regarded himself as a Chinese and forgotten that he was Japanese. He threw himself into his work with a Chinese mentality and devoted his youth to the construction of the motherland with full enthusiasm.
After retiring from the army in 1953, he worked in the Electrical Administration of the First Ministry of Machinery Industry and contributed to the development of the motherland. However, in 1955, in accordance with the agreement between China and Japan, a large number of Japanese nationals began to be repatriated.
Unlike other returnees who were anxious to reunite with their loved ones, Megumi Sunahara returned to Japan with a sense of melancholy, confusion, and reluctance. His parents are buried in China, his two younger sisters are also married to Chinese, and his chief, comrades-in-arms, and colleagues are all in China.
Back in Japan, Megumi Sunahara feels that everything is unfamiliar. After 17 years of living in China, he has long since adapted to the way of life and thinking there, but everything here seems out of place, making him feel like a world away.
Despite this, Megumi Sunahara has never forgotten his Chinese complex, and he is willing to continue to contribute to China's development.
Without any skills, he wandered around Osaka, Kyoto, and many other cities, looking for a job that suited him. But the turn of fate was when Sino-Japanese relations eased and gradually increased, and he found his own stage.
Megumi Sunahara found a job as a translator at the reception department of the Japan International ** Promotion Association, and this job is in great demand for talents who are proficient in Chinese. In December 1955, he learned that the Chinese scientific delegation would visit Japan headed by Guo Moruo, which was a rare opportunity at a time when Sino-Japanese relations were at a low ebb.
Megumi Sunahara had listened to Guo Moruo's speech at the scene and believed that everyone in China had a blood connection with him. After learning the news, he was so excited that he volunteered to take on the job of receiving the interpreter as if it were the New Year.
In the end, he received Guo Moruo and his party as a Japanese interpreter as he wished. When he saw Guo Moruo, he was so excited that he couldn't find the right words to express it, so he could only call him "chief", and quickly got closer to Guo Moruo.
Ms. Megumi Sunahara is a special person who is committed to cultural exchanges between China and Japan. After the relations between China and Japan warmed up, she frequently traveled back and forth between China and Japan, and promoted economic and cultural exchanges between China and Japan with her own practical actions.
She appeared at the 1957 Japan Fairs in Shanghai and Beijing, the 1957 China Fairs in Nagoya, the 1958 Japan Fairs in Guangzhou and Wuhan, and even later the Canton Fair.
According to statistics, in the 40 years from the 60s to the 90s, Ms. Megumi Sunahara visited China more than 350 times, with an average of less than once in less than two months. Her contributions and efforts have deepened the exchanges between China and Japan, and also made the cultural exchanges more frequent.
Megumi Sunahara, a Japanese with deep roots in China. He founded a company in Japan in 1967, which was set for July 1, the birthday of the Chinese Communist Party.
In order to express his admiration for China, he also used the "March of the People's Liberation Army" as a ringtone for the mobile phones of the company's employees. Megumi Sunahara has achieved a lot in his career, but he has never forgotten everything about China.
He longed to see his old chiefs and comrades again in his lifetime.
On July 28, 2010, on the eve of the 65th anniversary of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War and the 83rd anniversary of the founding of the Chinese People's Liberation Army, a group of Japanese soldiers of the Eighth Route Army who had contributed to the Chinese people during the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression came to China, which they regarded as their second motherland.
On this special day, they were cordially received by State Councilor and Minister of Defense, General ***, who toasted them and welcomed them. What is even more touching is that they were also invited by the Ministry of National Defense to hold a reception to celebrate the 83 rd anniversary of the founding of the army in the Great Hall of the People, and to gather together with the old chiefs and comrades-in-arms of the past to reminisce about those arduous and passionate years.
Megumi Sunahara is Japanese, but his youth is dedicated to the cause of the liberation of the Chinese people, he is one of the loveliest people in China, and his exploits will never be forgotten.
When he returned to China this time, he said with emotion: "I feel like I am back in my mother's arms. "This special gathering made them feel the friendship and respect of the Chinese people more deeply, and also strengthened their determination to make greater contributions to Sino-Japanese friendly relations."