In the context of Japanese history, the temporal significance of “August 1945” is seen as so obvious as to need no explanation. For one, Japan’s unconditional surrender to the Allied Powers in August 1945 initiated a tremendous restructuring of government, society, and the very borders of Japan itself—from an empire that had once extended across Asia to a nation-state that, according to the Allied Powers, would now consist only of “the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine.”3 The period between 1945 to 1948 also witnessed unprecedented geopolitical change throughout the Asia region and a concomitant mass movement of bodies “back” to the national spaces they were now said to belong to.4 Within Japan, citizens were confronted with the daunting question of “what it meant to start over in a ruined world”5; outside Japan, meanwhile, news reportage highlighted again and again jubilant celebrations of freedom in Taiwan, Korea, and other former colonies.