In Japan
Zealand still has an army overseas. Relatives will not forget, and the Government certainly has not done so, but those who have neither blood reasons nor official reasons for remembering the men in Japan should now and again be reminded of them by other agencies than earthquakes. They are soldiers on the most tedious task an army is ever called on to carry out-the occupation of a completely conquered country. We must not assume, because they happen to be in no physical danger, that everything is well with them. Physical danger after all brings its own safeguards. It draws men close together; braces them to endure hardship; keeps them close in spirit to relatives and friends. . But tedium demoralises every army that feels itself neglected. Though discipline will hold it together for a time, the day comes when discipline itself seems a part of the neglect, and a provocation, That has not happened yet in Japan. But it could happen, and when we leave it to the Government to do all the morale-build-ing, or to chaplains and lecturers and radio officials, we are forgetting that soldiers are men and not machines, human beings, usually young, with all the restlessness and stubborn questionings of youth, and that every New Zealand soldier in Japan is there for the benefit of every New Zealander at home. It is dangerous as well as shabby to take everything and give nothing. Nor is it enough, though it is good, to remember them materially. Gifts mean a lot, but friendship and understanding mean more, and no one is too poor _ to give those. We must remember too that the New Zealander who goes to Japan, for any one of the hundred reasons that take young men on such adventures, is coming back again. If we want him to come back a better and wiser New Zealander, and not merély older and shrewder, we must make him feel throughout his period of service that we are interested in him, devoted to him, and mean it when we say that we are glad to be represented by him in that very difficult corner of the world. T is easy to forget that New
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 393, 3 January 1947, Page 5
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367In Japan New Zealand Listener, Volume 16, Issue 393, 3 January 1947, Page 5
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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