Okinawa Wins in Court

Do eggs really want to be made into omelettes?

No one knows, since eggs can't talk. However, it's reasonable to assume that people, given a free choice, would rather live to a happy old age than blow up themselves, their families, and their friends en masse with government-issue hand grenades.

Here is an excerpt from today's online Japan Times: "Court sides with Oe over mass suicides --The Osaka District Court rejects a damages suit filed against Nobel Prize-winning novelist Kenzaburo Oe and his publisher by two plaintiffs who had claimed Oe wrongly stated in his book that Japanese soldiers ordered civilians in Okinawa to commit mass suicide and murder-suicide in 1945."

History is usually written by the winners, but in this case, there are survivors with the gumption to stare official history in the face and declare, "You did this, now you have to own it."

Many of these courageous survivors are women in their 90's who lived the past half century alone, without the children they gave birth to, the husbands they planned to love forever, and the friends and family who would have been their companions in the journey to old age.

Let's have some truth in advertising. Let's call a spade a spade.

War is hell, and it's time to make omelettes out of the chicken leaders who try to convince us it's not.

Just for Fun: Old Fashioned Winters

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As of March 20, winter is officially over. This year it snowed only twice in Tokyo, insignificant amounts both times. Didn’t winter used to be colder?

Here are some words that stand for ways to keep warm in the deep, freezing winters of yesteryear. See if you can guess what they are.

1. Pechika
(a) a kind of down vest (b) a stove

2. Utampo
(a) hot soup served in an earthenware pot (b) a kind of hot water bottle

3. Kotatsu
(a) double thick mittens (4) a quilt covered table with an electric heater attached

4. Chan-chan-ko
(a) a hot pot dish favored by sumo wrestlers (b) a coat worn indoors

5. Kairo
(a) a muffler wrapped around the head and neck (b) charcoal burning hand warmer

(See comments for answers, please.)

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Can you sing? Takeda Shingen could.

Everyone should be able to sing at least one song. That's what my favorite teacher always says. He has entertaining friends in mind, but in the age of Takeda Shingen, your song was your autobiography.

Shingen's song is still sung today. It is called "Takeda Bu-shi", and both the tune and the words are memorable.

Yesterday I was in Yamanashi and climbed to the top of the ruins of one of Shingen's castles in the capital city, Kofu. Where I saw the bustle of building after building sprawling almost to the horizon, Shingen would have seen prospering fields and forests. The one thing we both would have seen was the ring of mountains circling the land, with Mount Fuji standing head and shoulders above them all.

The mountains of Yamanashi figure prominently in Shingen's song. They inspired him to be a leader who stands steadfast and sure between his people and every threat to their well being, as steady and reliable as a mountain.

Back to Okinawa

Sanshin Day--March 4, 2008. This is the day to celebrate sanshin music. The main venue in Naha is at the Kumoji Palette Plaza, where the world's largest sanshin is on display this one day only. It is so heavy, it takes three strong men to set it up. It is so long, it takes two people to play it.