I was at the time near the point at which the sets of rails joined up. The sky above the jungle at Konkuita was quite clear. There were massive growths of green leaves on the trees and although the tropical sunlight gave no shade they kept cascading down to the ground under the trees. The hour of noon drew near. Shrilling of cicadas assailed our ears. Work had stopped on the roadbed a day or so previously. The railtrack stretched out making a straight line through the jungle. The embankment was low at this point. At 11 a.m. GOC Ishida gave the command to start the contest. Soon from both sides East and West in the jungle could be heard the shouts of command in unison of the two track-laying squads who braced themselves to the task in their race to get there first. Rails loaded on flatcars were propelled by rail-tractors, moved ahead and the worksquads lined up the sleepers. Then several soldiers with loud shouts in unison dropped each rail down on the sleepers. Gaps between rails were aligned and dog-spikes driven in with mells to fix the rails to the sleepers.