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Stanley camp survivors revisit a place of pain

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Annemarie Evans

Daphne Erasmus has been reliving some painful memories.

'You were always hungry, there was never enough food,' recalls Erasmus, who was detained with her parents in the Stanley internment camp after the Japanese invasion of Hong Kong.

'For the families without gardens to grow vegetables it was particularly difficult. Even now I never let any food go to waste.'

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The daughter of Quaker missionaries, she was six when she was interned. She was among 26 former detainees or descendants who visited the grounds of St Stephen's College, site of the former camp, this week to mark the 70th anniversary of the invasion on December 8, 1941.

For Erasmus - who came with her granddaughter from New Zealand - life in the camp had one compensation. 'There was a lot of freedom to play,' she said.

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The week-long visit was organised by retired American teacher Geoffrey Emerson, who interviewed many ex-internees for his book Hong Kong Internment, 1942-1945: Life in the Japanese Civilian Camp at Stanley.

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