Study tour better than expected

Times Reporter

 

Feeling a need to help preserve pieces of history is just one reason why Strathmore High School social teacher Rob Pirie travelled parts of Asia on a study tour this summer.  

“It was actually better than I expected, because I really thought, how can it be anything different than what I’ve done before. Because, I mean I went to the Holocaust symposium, I’ve visited Auschwitz… I’ve went to those sorts of things and I sort of wondered what would be the difference,” said Pirie.

“I think the difference was, it was very powerful because there’s such a lack of redress that hasn’t taken place in Asia, where I think there has been in Europe, where there has been a lot more, this is a terrible event that took place in history. The people that have committed the crimes have been addressed, the nations have apologized, that sort of thing. In Asia I certainly felt there was a real angst about it, there was a real feeling that justice has been denied, and it hasn’t happened yet.”

In the mid ‘90s a group of volunteers created the B.C. Association for Learning and Preserving the History of WWII in Asia, ALPHA. In 2004/2005 B.C. ALPHA began organizing the first Peace and Reconciliation Study Tour, which sends teachers to Asia to learn more about the holocaust that took place. This year Pirie was on the tour, which went to Shanghai, Beijing, Nanking and Harbin in China as well as Seoul, South Korea. 

The point of the study tour is to teach about the Forgotten Holocaust, which took place in Asia, and all of the powerful events surrounding it, such as the rape of Nanking. It also allows for the members on the tour to meet with professors, and a number of educators. 

Evidence of Imperial Japan’s war crimes has been authenticated, and narratives about its misdeeds are reaching a wider audience. Various governments, including our own Canadian Parliament in 2007, are asking Japan to acknowledge its past.

“We also met with survivors of course, we met with people whose families members were lost in unit 731, we met people who survived the Nanjing Massacre,” said Pirie.

“The most amazing one was a woman who was 14-years-old when the Japanese attacked Nanjing, and her story as to what happened to her and how she was sexually assaulted, or raped…those type of things. It was quite a horrendous experience.”

Another thing Pirie said made the trip very worthwhile was the people they travelled with. He said they travelled with four Americans, a history professor from Frankfurt, Germany and a Japanese Minister. Pirie found it interesting to have those different perspectives. 

The study was from July 13 to 28, and Pirie stayed an extra day to go to the demilitarized zone, which is a strip of land that runs across the Korean Peninsula and serves as a buffer between North and South Korea.

“That was very fascinating. Korea was quite fascinating because South Korea is very westernized compared to China. There was a coffee shop on every corner, a Starbucks, a Dunkin Donuts, a Krispy Kreme,” said Pirie.

“We were of course there during the worst storm in 100 years as far as rain goes. The demilitarized zone was quite an amazing place because it really is like you see it in the movies. You walk to this area where you are right at the line between the North and the South and the North soldier stares down at you with binoculars and the South soldier is all dressed with these dark sunglasses and weapons at their side. It’s really quite a surreal experience, but very, very interesting.”     

Pirie said when they were reading the papers they saw that because of the record rainfall one of the things the army was being mobilized to do was look for land mines. The South Koreans have a number of landmines planted, said Pirie, and because of the rain and the mudslides there was a fear they would move onto the highways or into areas that people would actually be walking. 

“I think the key thing is, and it was sort of summed up by the German professor who was along, he reiterated that as westerners when we’re teaching the war we should not be talking the terrible atrocity or bombing of Dresden without first talking about what took place at Auschwitz and the Holocaust,” said Pirie.

“In the same way we should not be talking about the atomic bombs of Hiroshima or Nagasaki without, of course discussing at the same time the rape of Nanking and the terrible atrocities that Japan committed. Those things have to discussed together and we shouldn’t allow the victimizers to become victims as well and that, that’s sort of an interesting part that I’m going to have to work with my students to make sure I present that balance.”

While it wasn’t a trip he looked forward to in the normal sense of the word, Pirie feels he has brought back something powerful, which he can teach, and show his students.