Eva “Fumi” Koyama (小山ふみ子)

Eva was the second child of Teru and Kei, and of the three children, she was certainly the most reserved and quiet. Just 12 years old at the time of internment, she struggled with adolescence the same as any 12-year-old girl would, but her challenges were compounded by the unfairness of internment. Although Eva herself never wrote about her body weight, her younger sister and mother did quite a bit, and it appears obvious that Eva struggled with issues of body image. Friends of Kei outside the family sometimes spoke of Eva’s beauty over the years, but these struggles with body image seem to have persisted.

I don’t believe for a minute that her mother Teru or her father ever meant Eva harm, but they did write as having said things that would strike a modern reader as very unkind, calling their daughter Eva “butterball” and “fat” as if to encourage her to lose weight. Eva is recorded in these letters as having been responsive to these jests, and according to her younger sister, she did indeed lose weight. However, I sometimes wonder about the long-term impact of internment coupled with the body-image anxieties of adolescence.

Of the three children and her mother, Eva seems to have written the least, although not for lack of trying. She expresses frustration at not knowing what to write, and in the end, her letters to Kei are more like short notes—a brief snapshot that describes what she is thinking at the moment. Eva may have written more letters that have since been lost, but given how her mother describes Eva’s struggle to write, I feel that it is likely she genuinely wrote less than her two other siblings.

Eva Koyama as a small child, playing with her doll.  Mid-1930s.

Eva Koyama as a young professional ready to enter the world of nursing, mid 1950s?