Helen Colijns account of her wartime experiences is a window into a largely
overlooked dimension of World War IIthe imprisonment of women and children in Southeast
Asia by the Japanese and how these prisoners of war responded to their dire circumstances.
The conditions were harsh, terrible. Food was scarce, medicine unavailable. Held in captivity
for three and a half years, more than a third of the women in Helens camp died of disease or
starvation. Yet their courage, faith, resiliency, ingenuity, and camaraderie provide us with
enduring lessons on living.

Though the prisoners had no musical instruments, they had their voices, and from memory scored
classical works for symphony and piano. The music that helped sustain them while in captivity is a
lasting and precious gift of these women to a world that has witnessed far too much war.

Nadia May has been nominated as an AudioFile Golden Voice five years running and is a winner of thirteen AudioFile Earphones Awards. She is the co-founder of TheatreFirst, a theater company in the San Francisco Bay Area where she currently lives.