A decisive moment, Christmas in prison
Almost everybody has encountered decisive moments in life.
I had such experience, being hardly 4 years old, while imprisoned in a Japanese concentration camp. That day we were allowed by the Japanese camp commander, for the first and only time during all three years we were imprisoned, to celebrate Christmas.
I remember the beautiful bible verses and community singing of that evening.
At the end of the evening something must have happened to my soul, when the famished women and mothers started singing Praise the Lord. No doubt that the chorus with the words Peace on Earth and Happiness to the People has never before been sung with such intensity and feeling for these special words.
Apparently because I had listened so quietly, a completely strange woman offered me a packet of chocolate –no doubt, saved by her in these days of famine and hardship for an extra “rainy” day- and I was happy to accept it, but also utterly confused.
