Sandakan Japanese Cemetery ( ja, サンダカン日本墓地; ms, Tanah Perkuburan Jepun Sandakan) is an old graveyard in

Sandakan Sandakan (, Jawi: , ) formerly known at various times as Elopura, is the capital of the Sandakan District in Sabah, Malaysia. It is the second largest city in Sabah after Kota Kinabalu. It is located on the Sandakan Peninsula and east coast of ...

Sabah Sabah () is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia located in northern Borneo, in the region of East Malaysia. Sabah borders the Malaysian state of Sarawak to the southwest and the North Kalimantan province of Indone ...

, Malaysia. Located on a hill about 2 kilometres from the town's central business district, it is a cemetery where the remains are buried of many Japanese female prostitutes called ''

Karayuki-san Karayuki-san (唐行きさん) was the name given to Japanese girls and women in the late 19th and early 20th centuries who were trafficked from poverty-stricken agricultural prefectures in Japan to destinations in East Asia, Southeast Asia, Siber ...

'' from poverty-stricken agricultural

prefectures A prefecture (from the Latin ''Praefectura'') is an administrative jurisdiction traditionally governed by an appointed prefect. This can be a regional or local government subdivision in various countries, or a subdivision in certain international ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

who were sold into slavery at a very young age years before

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

which also include recent

comfort women Comfort women or comfort girls were women and girls forced into sexual slavery by the Imperial Japanese Army in occupied countries and territories before and during World War II. The term "comfort women" is a translation of the Japanese '' ia ...

during the war. It is part of the

Sandakan Heritage Trail Sandakan Heritage Trail ( ms, Jejak Warisan Sandakan) is a trail connecting several historical sites in Sandakan, a town in the east Malaysian state of Sabah. It is marked with white concrete tiles placed on the ground showing a red footprint t ...

History

The cemetery was founded in 1890 by

Madam Madam (), or madame ( or ), is a polite and formal form of address for Woman, women in the English language, often contracted to ma'am (pronounced in American English and this way but also in British English). The term derives from the French ...

Kinoshita Kuni (born 7 July 1854) from Futae Village, Amakusa County,

Kumamoto Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located on the island of Kyūshū. Kumamoto Prefecture has a population of 1,748,134 () and has a geographic area of . Kumamoto Prefecture borders Fukuoka Prefecture to the north, Ōita Prefecture to ...

, a successful Japanese female manager of Sandakan's lucrative '' for Japanese prostitutes who died in the business with most of the graves belonged to women. Madam Okuni is a very influential and kind woman who fluent in

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

with many ''

Yamato nadeshiko ''Yamato nadeshiko'' ( or ) is a Japanese term meaning the "personification of an idealized Japanese woman", or "the epitome of pure, feminine beauty"; poised, decorous, kind, gentle, graceful, humble, patient, virtuous, respectful, bene ...

'' (Japanese girls) sought her guidance and protection with the treatment as a human beings of the girls in her

brothel A brothel, bordello, ranch, or whorehouse is a place where people engage in sexual activity with prostitutes. However, for legal or cultural reasons, establishments often describe themselves as massage parlors, bars, strip clubs, body rub par ...

were much better than in the other Japanese brothels in Sandakan where she is called as the "Okuni" of

South Seas Today the term South Seas, or South Sea, is used in several contexts. Most commonly it refers to the portion of the Pacific Ocean south of the equator. In 1513, when Spanish conquistador Vasco Núñez de Balboa coined the term ''Mar del Sur'', ...

. Herself was raised from a poor family before becoming the mistress of an

Englishman The English people are an ethnic group and nation native to England, who speak the English language, a West Germanic language, and share a common history and culture. The English identity is of Anglo-Saxon origin, when they were known in ...

Yokohama is the second-largest city in Japan by population and the most populous municipality of Japan. It is the capital city and the most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a 2020 population of 3.8 million. It lies on Tokyo Bay, south of To ...

at a young age. When her husband returned to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

, she moved to Sandakan and opening a general store including a brothel. In 1891, there were already 20 brothels and 71 Japanese prostitutes in Sandakan. The cemetery built by Okuni is for to pray for the souls of Japanese who died in Sandakan where herself had a place reserved in the cemetery when she is still alive; showing that she intended to lived permanently in Sandakan and did not want to return to Japan with all of the grave stones in the cemetery were directly ordered from her homeland country. The cemetery subsequently become famous among Japanese visitors, including those from

Jesselton , image_skyline = , image_caption = From top, left to right, bottom:Kota Kinabalu skyline, Wawasan intersection, Tun Mustapha Tower, Kota Kinabalu Coastal Highway, the Kota Kinabalu City Mosque, the Wism ...

and

Tawau Tawau (, Jawi: , ), formerly known as Tawao, is the capital of the Tawau District in Sabah, Malaysia. It is the third-largest city in Sabah, after Kota Kinabalu and Sandakan. It is located on the Semporna Peninsula in the southeast coast of t ...

as they will stop on the cemetery to pray for the deceased before proceeding their journey. A book published in 1972 by Japanese writer Tomoko Yamazaki made a mention that the cemetery used to have hundreds Japanese graves which include a monument erected in 1989 for fallen Japanese soldiers during the

as an addition to the cemetery.

Features

A majority of the cemetery are belong to ''

'', mainly daughters of poor

Japanese people The are an East Asian ethnic group native to the Japanese archipelago."人類学上は，旧石器時代あるいは縄文時代以来，現在の北海道〜沖縄諸島（南西諸島）に住んだ集団を祖先にもつ人々。" () Jap ...

with no

social status Social status is the level of social value a person is considered to possess. More specifically, it refers to the relative level of respect, honour, assumed competence, and deference accorded to people, groups, and organizations in a society. Stat ...

or value as female where they been exported overseas as

maid A maid, or housemaid or maidservant, is a female domestic worker. In the Victorian era domestic service was the second largest category of employment in England and Wales, after agricultural work. In developed Western nations, full-time maids ...

s to work before being forced into

prostitution Prostitution is the business or practice of engaging in Sex work, sexual activity in exchange for payment. The definition of "sexual activity" varies, and is often defined as an activity requiring physical contact (e.g., sexual intercourse, n ...

activities. Those who buried in the cemetery are with their feet pointing towards the direction of

as a posture or gesture that condemns their ancestral home that abandoned them or exhorted them to support their country war efforts which is considered as an ultimate insult. File:Sandakan Sabah OldJapaneseCemetery-01.jpg, Headstone in the cemetery. File:Sandakan Sabah OldJapaneseCemetery-09.jpg, A headstone with

Japanese characters The modern Japanese writing system uses a combination of logographic kanji, which are adopted Chinese characters, and syllabic kana. Kana itself consists of a pair of syllabaries: hiragana, used primarily for native or naturalised Japanese wor ...

. File:Sandakan Sabah OldJapaneseCemetery-06.jpg, Another headstone. File:Sandakan Sabah OldJapaneseCemetery-07.jpg, A cemetery.

References

External links

* {{Malaysian historical architectures and sites Cemeteries in Malaysia Monuments and memorials in Sabah World War II memorials Sandakan in World War II

History

Features

See also

References

Further reading

External links