Keeping the children amused was another challenge. The Japanese strictly forbade any form of schooling or possession of pencils and paper, so, with a young nun, I had to exercise ingenuity to find ways to keep them occupied and learning something. Mostly this took the form of telling stories. The smallest children were too young to understand what was happening to them – why they were separated from their daddies, why they were in this terrible place with no food, no beds, no toys, no amah to care for them. As long as I live, I will never forgive the cruelty of making so many innocent children spend their most tender years under a reign of terror and deprivation.
Our stay at Muntok was not to be a long one. When we had been in the camp for about a month, it was decided to designate it as
