re like scratchings in the barnyard, the evidence of much activity, scaly claws hard at work. But what good do they do, I do not know-those little black typewritten words-rain words, cloud droppings. They do not touch us where we are planted here in Alberta, our rots clawing the sudden prairie air. The words are not made of flesh. Trains do not carry us home. Ships do not return again. All my prayers disappear into space.”(Obasan 226)The sight of the work Aunt Emily has done compared to the amount of success she has received has collapsed all hope that Naomi had in the government and in those who would try to aide the Japanese-Canadians currently under siege.Naomi’s Obasan and Ojisan attempt to protect both Naomi and Stephen through their stubborn silence. Every year on August 9th, Naomi and Ojisan walked out near a river and sit on a hill. To Naomi it seemed like a quiet pilgrimage that she did not understand. Ojisan would not tell her the reason they always made the walk. “From both Obasan and Uncle I have learned that speech often hides like an animal in a storm.”(Obasan 4) Naomi searches for her answers and yet, her Obasan and Uncle do not help, but hide there answers fearfully. No matter how many questions she asked she was either ignored or brushed off with vague excuses like ‘You are still too young.’ While in a bathhouse with Obasan, Naomi attempts to play with a friend of hers from school; the friend tells Naomi quite brusquely stated that she cannot play because Naomi’s family has tuberculosis. While not wholly true, Naomi’s father has tuberculosis, Naomi did not even know what tuberculosis was and could not understand why the friend’s family would not even speak to her. When questioned, Obasan simply replied, “Perhaps there was nothing to say.”When she was little, Naomi told her mother much about her life, “I tell her everything. There is ...
