The Woman Who Was Alone on a Deserted Island with 32 Men for 7 Years: Kazuo Higa

The story that is the subject of our content today is II. It takes place between 1944 and 1951 during World War II. In the Northern Mariana Islands, quite remote and isolated, approximately 20 square kilometers and Anatahan Island, which has several active volcanoes, is where the story takes place.

If you go there nowadays, you won’t find anyone, but until the 1990s, people lived here and what they witnessed was not left to them and The story of Kazuo Higa spread all over the world.

Events begin when a Japanese ship is hit by American missiles and 31 men are forced to take shelter on the island.

Most of the men are young and healthy, so they survive the American missiles. The men swim from their sinking ship to Anatahan Island, and it turns out that there is only one woman among the island’s inhabitants: Kazuko Higa, 28 years old.

Kazuko is the assistant of the leader of a plantation on the island. Shoichi Higa’s wife. In the chaos of the war, Shoichi decides to return to Saipan to check on his family, entrusting his wife to his boss, Kikuichiro Higa, and never returns.

After his wife does not return, Kikuichiro and Kazuko get married. Did they really get married out of love or after 31 men were stranded on the island? Did they make it look like they were married? The issue is not yet clear.

Kazuko is left alone with the men who took refuge on the island, and the events that begin here are literally like a movie scenario.

Men to protect Kazuko and marry her compete with each other. During this period, various murders and jealousy crises occur. Struggle for survival on the island, food and resource scarcity, Things even get more complicated when handmade alcoholic drinks and weapons come into play. Over time, a social order emerges on the island, but this order is soon shaken by competition and violence.

In 1945, II. With the end of World War II, a stranded island American bomber survivor Although it is not available, the ingredients inside provide new resources to the islanders. Meanwhile, the relationships, tensions and rivalry between Kazuko and the men on the island continue to increase.

The alliances formed especially to protect Kazuko lead to a power struggle and turns into violent incidents. Guns and power plays turn the island’s inhabitants against each other, resulting in many tragic deaths. One of the dead is Kikuichiro.

However How Kikuichiro died It protects its secret. Either he was killed secretly or everyone was lying to each other. No one was offering an explanation for Kikuichiro and the other deaths.

In 1950, an assassination attempt is made against Kazuko, but she manages to escape at the last moment.

Men, after all the fights and wars “Why are we fighting each other, the problem is Kazuko!” Adopting his idea changes the course of events. After one of the men warns Kazuko, she first hides in the forest and then escapes, but is rescued by the American soldier.

After Kazuko returns to Japan, she says that the men are on the island and wants them to be rescued, but the men on the island still insist on not believing whether the war is over or not. But in 1951, seven years later, the remaining 20 men, He is evacuated from the island with the help of America.

Kazuko’s story attracted great attention when she returned to Japan and many It is the subject of a book and a movie. Some survivors portray Kazuko as manipulative and someone who does her best to turn events to her advantage, while others see her as a brave woman and a survivor.

This story leads to deep thoughts about human nature and the struggle for survival on the island.

A frame from the movie Anatahan

This process that Kazuko goes through as the only woman with 32 men shows us the power dynamics within the community, leadership struggles and offers striking examples about the dark aspects of human psychology.

Every telling of the story, events from a different perspective Although the story of the Queen of Anatahan Island is a real survival drama, it also makes us think of it as a laboratory where human behavior and social structures are tested.

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