Editor’s Note: The following letter was sent in response to the article entitled “Postwar adoptees from Japan make connections, share stories in U.S.” that was published in the Nov. 20, 2014 issue of the Nichi Bei Weekly.

Dear Editor
I am also an ESH orphan from 1960. I hear there is going to be a reunion in Las Vegas this July 2015 but I won’t be able to go. There is a Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/675441502495319/?notif_t=group_r2j_approved.

My story is much different and although I know a little of my own history, and at times shake my head at the fact that my father gave me up but kept my older brothers, I am glad he did. I have been blessed by my adoption to a Japanese American couple who could not bear children. They and their families were both imprisoned during WWII at Poston, AZ and Heart Mountain, WY, but their own stories taught me to rise above our circumstances and live a life of grace and humility despite humiliation and racism. That is the legacy they taught me and one that I have passed on to my own children.

Cindy Bisagno, Santa Rosa, Calif.