Imee

**What follows is an account of a brief, intense romance between an American soldier and a Filipina during the Second World War. It is a true account, as recalled by the author, who was kind enough to send his story to me for publication in ASAWA.

If I had more writing talent I might be able to express how my memory of Imee has been a sad part of my life for all these years...

I met her when I first came to the Philippines as an 18 year old infantry replacement in World War II. A rifleman, I was temporarily assigned to a camp on Luzon awaiting my orders, and it was here that I first saw her. She was a laundry girl. You see, it was common practice during the war for Filipinas from the surrounding areas to visit Army camps in order to sell fruit or collect laundry. Of course at that time all the girls were accompanied by a sister, brother or friend - no respectable Filipina would visit the camps without a chaperone. But she was a beautiful, sixteen year old barrio Filipina with long, shiny black hair, hair so long that she could sit on it. It shouldn't be hard for anyone to imagine how a soldier like me, far from home and in middle of a war zone, could fall for such an angel, or why I came to cherish her visits to the camp.

Eventually I decided to make my interest known to her. I can't recall exactly what my first words to Imee were, but I imagine they were something like, "If I give you my clothes to wash how do I know I will get them back?" Something romantic like that. And she would give me one of those cute Filipina smiles, the kind that are half pout, half seduction, before slinking away with a bundle of clothes in her arms.

Of course, she always did come back, and eventually she allowed me to walk home with her to meet her family and friends. Imee lived just south of Manila in Alabang, and her home was a nipa hut with a bamboo strip floor, beneath which chickens were always running around and clucking noisily. Rice fields surrounded the hut, and sometimes Imee would wander the hot fields with a big sun hat on her head, the kind that looks like a flattened cone. Our romance evolved as slowly as our circumstances permitted. I can still remember the first time we found ourselves alone - we were both too shy to even hold hands. Given the slow pace of romance in the Philippines, the odds were against us becoming seriously involved, but on two occasions I was sent back behind the lines for medical treatment, and during those brief respites from the war I was able spend additional time with her. It wasn't a lot of time...but it was enough.

By great coincidence my only cousin was in the infantry division that I was sent to. When he was killed shortly after I joined the division it frightened not only my family at home, but also Imee, who admitted that she had dreamt that a "friend" of mine would be killed. Now that this had come to pass, she feared for my life, also. We fell in love, and in the months that followed we were together whenever I could escape from my unit. This wasn't easy, since my division was involved in heavy combat against the Japanese in northern Luzon at the time.

The wartime circumstances, the danger I was in, our youth gave such intensity to our meetings as can hardly be communicated. When the war ended I was ordered to board a ship for Japan, an order that caused me considerable anguish because Imee had become very sick with an ulcer on her leg. Such an illness was life-threatening at the time, and yet I was a soldier, and missing my boat would put me in military prison. I did the best I could to cope with the situation, and had a friend promise me that he would make sure that Imee received medical attention by some of the American physicians on the island. Reluctantly, I gave Imee my U.S. address and sailed off to Japan, not knowing that I would never see her again.

From Japan I wrote many letters, even though I knew there was no reliable mail service in the Philippines, and that the chances of Imee getting the letters were marginal. The fact is that I don't know if any of the letters ever made it to her, though I can say that I never received a reply. Still, I didn't give up. When I returned to the U.S. I wrote even more and asked the Red Cross for help in locating Imee. In the end, that help consisted merely of putting a few desperate words in a Manila newspaper which, in all probability, my Filipina would never see.

Nothing worked. There was no easy way to return to the Philippines following the war. Civilian transportation to the islands was severely limited, and it was costly, making such a trip beyond my means. I never found Imee, and never heard from her again. I have spent my life haunted by her disappearance. Questions continue to linger in my mind, as they have for years. Is she dead? Did my letters ever reach her? Did she lose my address? Or, perhaps, did she simply elect to end the relationship? Was it merely a brief, brilliant romance that she knew could not be continued after the war?

So I grieved and, though life went on, I have never really resolved this. Perhaps Imee died soon after I left the Philippines. Or perhaps she lived on, married, raised a family and has lived a happy and relatively prosperous life. If so, maybe she has forgotten about me...

Maybe not. Perhaps right now, somewhere on some island very far from here, there is a Filipina who has a small scar or discoloration on one of her legs, the grim souvenir of an ulcer that almost killed her long ago. Perhaps whenever her eyes drift across that scar, she is reminded of an old romance, one with an American soldier in her war-torn homeland. Perhaps as she rubs her leg, she wonders whatever happened to that soldier, why she never received any letters from him, why he never came back for her. Is he still alive? Did he forget about her? Was she truly special, or just one of many such girls? Did her soldier marry some American girl, deciding that the romance could not survive the war itself?

Or can she somehow know that he tried, really tried to find her, but that fate simply would not allow the reunion.

I can only say this. My love with Imee is a lost love, and lost love is eternal love because the romance never really ends. It just sits there, in limbo, helpless to either grow or else to die a respectable death. It is emotional purgatory, and it has been painful for me. But life always offers a second chance, and I have since found love again. To others I can only recommend that you hold your lover's hand tightly, and thank God for each moment you are together, and that you keep your eyes on hers. Don't ever let true love slip away.

- Contributed by Mr. Bill Hawkins

All original materials on this website (www.asawa.org, www.filipinawives.com) are copyrighted by the author, Bob Lingerfelt, 1997 -2007  with materials on file at the U.S. Copyright Office.  No reproduction is authorized, in any form, without express permission of the author.