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<div class="MsoNormal"><b>Nippon,
Nihon, Hapon - Japan<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><b> </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">It might not have been <i>Tenno Jimmu </i>who kicked the first dirt
off <i>Kyuden </i>some 2600 years ago, but Imperial
Japan has had an unbroken family line ever since. My name in <i>Zhongguo</i> is <i>Liu Ji Mu, </i>so I feel a close affinity to <i>Jimmu </i>the<i> </i>starter of Nippon's
imperial heritage.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i>Liu
jia </i>(Liu family) is my relation in China by
marriage and to demonstrate the contemporary notion that identity is a matter
of choice rather than as a kneejerk patriarchal privilege, I named myself by
her household. <i>Zhimu </i>is the closest I come to for Spanish <i>Jaime, </i>or<i> </i>English <i>James,</i> (sounds like <i>Zhang Yimou, </i>the movie director) but a family member conferred <i>Ji Mu.</i>
My calling card bears that name.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">I was on Saipan when Emperor Akihito
and Empress Michiko visited ten years ago.
Shorn of the pomp and circumstance of a state visit, it was a memorable
one. A couple of articles I wrote were
thought to be "different" (Radio Australia) compared to the standard
coverage.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">At 71 and 70, the two immaculately
attired but ordinary looking visitors paused for moments of silences on
locations where people died during the ferocious Battle of Saipan. Akihito and Michiko were pictures of decorum,
honor, and good graces that "fell from the sea" <i>sans </i>Yukio Mishima's sense of glory in death. In fact, the imperials came to honor ALL the
dead and prayed for World Peace.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">In post-WWII Pea Eye, the <i>Tenno Showa </i>(Hirohito) and the "Nips"
were "evil". Atrocities
committed in the Philippines were regularly rehearsed. A bottle buyer in Davao turned out to be a
military officer, adding to the deception theme of the attack on Pearl Harbor.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">My immediate family was not a rabid
Nippon hater. My father by profession was
an agent of compassion and reconciliation rather than hatred and discord. After he returned from five years graduate studies
in the United States, he bought me a bottle of San Mig (he was a good father in
spite of being a Methodist teetotaler) and told me the story of how a Lieutenant
of the Imperial Army warned him that his name was in the <i>Kempetai</i> list and should skip town, pronto. At the time, I was but a little lizard slithering
up my mother's womb.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">I discovered that American-led
guerrillas in the middle of town quartered my “collaborator” Uncle, a teacher
who translated for Japanese officials.
My nationalism conditioned as anti-Japanese took a deep dip down murky
waters.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">Attending ecumenical functions with Nihon
young people present made me realize they were ordinary human beings, hardly
the ogres of popular biases. Inviting
one to my home in Northern Luzon after a conference in Dumaguete's Siliman U in
the south a good twenty years after Yamashita was hanged in Manila, the depth
of racial prejudice was still fresh as stone rained on the house roof at midnight.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">Later, I visited Yokohama (its wharf
and Chinatown) and Tokyo (dined in Ginza at the first rotating restaurant and walked
down the University town of Shinjuku before I knew there was a red district in the
area) in the late 60s, went down to <i>Osaka
Banbaku </i>Expo '70<i>, </i>and trekked up
to Sapporo on Hokkaido in 2002 on the <i>Shinkansen</i>
for a week-long brooding before attending to a speaking engagement in West
Tokyo, so I got comfortable saying <i>domo
arigato gozaimashita! </i> Stops at
Narita these days make one feel one is still in L. A.!<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">When the Saipan Japanese Consulate invited
a number of participants to their two-hour program at their office in Lower
Base, I beat the path to the front of the line. I sharpened my <i>konnichiwa, o genki desu ka?<o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">The name <i>Nippon</i> or <i>Nihon, </i>the
"land of the rising sun" has been used longer than the English
"Japan", the latter derived from the Portuguese appropriation of the
Hokkien <i>Jit-pun, Zeppen </i>in Shanghai, <i>Jet pun </i>in Guangdong, adopted by the
Thais as <i>Yipun, Jepun </i>to the Malay, <i>Jepang </i>in Indonesian, and <i>Hapon </i>in Pilipino. China calls the country <i>Riben</i> in Mandarin (pronounced <i>ir
ben</i>), not too distant from the Hanggul <i>Ilbon. </i>In the archipelago, people's heart opens with
the freshness of the early morn sun, notwithstanding the intrusive Commodore M.
C. Perry and the reforming Meiji dynasty! <i>Wakarimasu ka?<o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">At Lower Base
Thursday afternoon, we were feted the Nihon touch, with green tea first
("very hot", Yasuko Kobayashi said in perfect English), then went
through a session of folding three <i>origami
</i>of "a crab, a polo shirt and a bird" with Noriko Muña. My dexterity at 70 did not come easy. Then
we were treated to an introspective experience of the movie "Nitaboh"
of itinerant blind <i>shamisen </i>musicians
at the onset of the Meiji reforms. Unobtrusively, CG Hitoshi Kikuchi
diplomatically managed from a distance. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">No attempt at
articulating "meaning and significance" was attempted in the two-hour
session. Quietly Zen, we experienced
tea, origami, and the movie, with an understated welcome for our presence and
attendance, Yasuko making sure she had first names pat at every introduction of
an arrival. I suggest the CG and staff
hold more events of this nature. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">(All Japanese
words are pure pretense. Please ignore.)
<i>Yoi ichinichi o. Sayōnara.<o:p></o:p></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><i> </i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br>
<div style="clear:both"><i>j'aime la vie</i>
<div><i><br>
</i></div>
<div><i>yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today, participate! in all, celebrate!<br>
</i>
<div><br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</font>