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Greetings from Guam
Ah yes, the Japanese, they are truly remarkable people...except from 1931 to 1945. I will try to be honest here for a moment. I am a history teacher and my main area of interest and study has been in WWII history. I feel no animosity towards Germans or Germany regarding WWII, but I could not say the same about Japan until about two weeks ago when I spent five days there. The Germans have come to grips with their past, they have owned up to the actions of their nation and their people in those dark years. Not so in Japan. There are no monuments to Nazi war leaders in Germany. In Japan, there is a shrine to former Prime Minister General Hideki Tojo, who approved the attack on Pearl Harbor, who did not want to surrender after the second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, but, rather, fight to the last person. And he was found guilty of war crimes and executed after the war. I know I'm biased, but I really don't think the guy deserves a shrine. Call me crazy. Because of this, and the fact that the Japanese Government to this day denies any blame for the war and various massacres - most notably, the infamous 'Rape of Nanking' - I have had a hard time forgiving Japan... like I said, until about two weeks ago. I went to the city of Komatsu for a swim meet - me and five swimmers. We all stayed with separate Japanese families - yes, in their homes. Their swimmers come to our International Meet in December each year and stay with our swimmers' families, and they reciprocate every July when we come to their meet. Well, let me just say that I have never been treated with more genuine kindness than I was in Japan. I was shocked. Not that I am a world traveler, but I have been to Canada, Spain, and France. The Canadians? Well, I'm not too sure bout them, eh? My Canadian days were closely tied to my college days, which were closely tied to lots of beer - especially when we headed north for a Road Trip to Canada. So, most of my memories of the Beer People of the North, seem a bit sketchy. Well, they didn't kill me so they can't be all that bad. The Spanish - actually the Basque people of northern Spain are okay, they are a laid back people. They picked us (swim team) up at the airport in Madrid and bussed us six hours to San Sebastin. And most of our meals consisted of bags full of loaves of bread and bags of apples, oranges, and bananas...oh yeah, with espresso chasers. Yeah, we swam well. The French, forget about it. They seemed so annoyed that we were even there in the first place. But the Japanese were awesome. The family I stayed with (mother, father and three sons) - the Sakai family - spoke little English, though much more than my Japanese. So, communicating one-on-one was pretty hard, but extremely comical for all involved. Each one of them had their translation books and I had mine. A simple conversation-type question at dinner took hours to decipher and translate, punctuated with minutes upon minutes of nothing but the sound of five books' pages all frantically being rifled through, followed by the wide-eyed nod of understanding and the simultaneous in unison, 'OOOOOH....Hi, hi, hi.' A few examples of their incredible hospitality and generosity: When I arrived at their house, they gave me the grand tour and I complimented them on a particular picture they had on their wall and told them that I liked it - that it was nice. You know, just being polite. The day I was leaving, they handed me this wrapped up gift - the picture off their wall. It was incredibly nice - way too nice for the likes of me, and besides it would clash with my neon velvet Elvis poster. So, I had to spend the next two hours trying to tell them - one word at a time - punctuated by minutes upon minutes of nothing but the sound of me mumbling and rifling through the pages of my translation book. Finally, I was able to convince them to keep it. This is after their father (whose English was the worst) and I watched Titantic together. It was a video tape in English with Japanese subtitles. We didn't say a word to each other for three hours...perfect. Now, if I could only go see a movie in a Guam theater in perfect silence - hell, even in imperfect silence - now, that would be something special. Anyway, after the movie ended, I took a couple hours to ask him how much the video cost. I asked because I was curious as to the price - American goods are very expensive there. He said (in about an hour) that it costs 40,000 yen ($40). The next day, he went out and bought me a copy of it - in English with the Japanese subtitles. (Bet not too many of you have one of those.) And the final proof (besides the fact that we were all treated wonderfully and showered with gifts), came in Nagoya Airport. As we were standing in line at the check-in counter, one of my swimmers, a 13-year-old girl, struck up a conversation with a young ( mid - twenties) Japanese woman whose English was fair. After 15 minutes of talking to her in line, my swimmer complimented her on her necklace - an 18 karat gold necklace with three pearls (fake, I hope). The woman promptly took it off and gave it to her as we walked away from the counter - and she would not take it back. That, my friends, is kindness and generosity gone mad! I feel much better about Japan and the Japanese and a little bit embarrassed and ashamed of my own attitude and feelings that I had about them. Hopefully, the younger generation of Japanese will come to grips with their country's past regarding WWII. That is their business to attend to. I am moving on. Hafa Adai
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