Japanese royals visit Canada
11-Day Tour; Common touch sets imperial couple apart
Anniversaries are important to the world's oldest continuous hereditary monarchy. That's why Japan's 125th Emperor, Akihito, and his wife, Empress Michiko, have been so busy in 2009.
They marked the 20th anniversary of the Emperor's ascension to the Chrysanthemum Throne in January, after the 1989 death of his father, emperor Hirohito, known posthumously as Emperor Showa.
In April, they celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, inviting 100 other Japanese "golden" couples to tea at the Imperial Palace.
Now, 80 years after Japan opened diplomatic relations with Ottawa, the world's only remaining Emperor and Empress are embarking on an 11-day tour of Canada. They arrive tomorrow in Ottawa.
Emperor Akihito's father was once worshiped as a living demigod, a direct descendant of Japan's first Emperor Jimmu (660 B. C.), reputedly descended from the Sun Goddess, Amaterasu. He never spoke in public until he was stripped of political power and forced to renounce his divine status after the Second World War.
While remaining a continuous link with Japan's past and a symbol of the state, Emperor Akihito has become something of an "ordinary" emperor, who has sought to narrow the distance between himself and ordinary people.
In Canada, he will attend a bevy of official banquets and receptions, but will also meet Japanese-Canadians in Ottawa, Toronto, Victoria and Vancouver, visit Ottawa's Carleton University, tour the Hospital for Sick Children and a Japanese-Canadian senior citizens' complex in Toronto, inspect Vancouver's Olympics site and visit Victoria's Institute of Ocean Sciences.
While no longer regarded as a god, the Emperor and his wife still live tightly regimented lives and suffer from stress-related illnesses. This year, Akihito had to cut back on his official duties because of an irregular pulse and stomach bleeding, which doctors attributed to "mental stress." He underwent surgery for prostate cancer in 2003.
The Empress has often complained of stress and suffered a breakdown in 1993, during which she did not speak for several months.
A decade later, Crown Princess Masako, wife of the Oxford-educated Crown Prince Naruhito, withdrew from most official duties and public appearances because of a nervous disorder. Her husband blamed it on her difficulties in adjusting to palace life and the pressure to bear a son to continue the imperial line.
Empress Michiko, daughter of a wealthy flour company president, was the first commoner to marry into the imperial family and she has played a crucial role in helping to shatter its isolation.
The couple broke with a tradition in which the emperor's children were removed from their parents at age three and raised by courtiers. Instead, they brought up their own family, sending their children to school with bento (home-packed) lunch boxes.
Unlike previous crown princes, Akihito was educated with commoners at the elite Gakushuin school.
But it is the common touch that has set the imperial couple apart. Japanese officials still gush with pride when they recall how they travelled to Nishinomiya, between Osaka and Kobe, in 1995 to comfort victims of the Great Hanshin Earthquake, which had killed 6,400 people.
Dressed casually in a sweater and windbreaker, the Emperor knelt to comfort survivors in a high school gym. The couple also held hands with some victims and urged them "not to give up hope."
Some Japanese traditionalists have cringed whenever Akihito has addressed the devastation caused by Japanese imperial troops, acting in his father's name, during the war.
While Hirohito's responsibility for wartime atrocities remains a topic of historical debate, Akihito has said he is acutely aware of the devastation caused by the war and has tried to foster better relations with countries that suffered from Japanese war atrocities.
In his first year as Emperor, he visited Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia -- all countries invaded by Japan during the war. In 1992 he became the first Japanese emperor to make an official visit to China and discussed the issue of Japanese aggression, saying he deeply deplored the "great sufferings" Japan had inflicted on the Chinese people.
In 1994, the Emperor travelled to Iwo Jima and prayed for the souls of Japanese and U. S. soldiers. A year later, he went to Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Okinawa.
In Canada, the Emperor will attend a wreath-laying ceremony at Ottawa's Peacekeeping Monument, but is not expected to discuss the war publicly or to mention Japan's treatment of Canadian prisoners of war in Hong Kong.
"He is very keenly aware of the devastation of the war and the fact that during [the Second World War] 3.1 million Japanese, soldiers and civilians, perished," said Sadaaki Numata, a former Japanese ambassador to Canada, who is a spokesman for the Imperial Household during the Emperor's visit.
For the Emperor there are four important dates, Mr. Numata said: June 23, anniversary of the end of the Battle of Okinawa, in which one third of the islands' civilian population died; Aug. 6, the bombing of Hiroshima; Aug. 9, the bombing of Nagasaki; and Aug. 15, the end of the war in the Pacific.
"Any direct reference to the war is really the responsibility of the government of Japan [which acknowledged in 1995 Japan's actions] caused tremendous suffering and pain to the peoples of Asia."
"Still, some people say that because of his equanimity the Emperor may be the greatest stabilizing force for peace," Mr. Numata added.
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