Sakura - Kara Fuji and Japan

Kara Fuji travelled slowly through a small rural village in Akita Prefecture, Honshu. Then, over a little bridge, she spied Sakura. Beside a cluster of ancient wooden shrines, a grotto of statuette Bodhisattvas, with little red skull caps, looking like cherry-top cherubs, was a narrow avenue of soft-pink, frothy, petals-dropping-in-the-breeze gorgeousness. Either side of the walkway to the main shrine stood cherry trees, their pink canopies touching. The trees were short and trimmed, their gnarly bark thick and flaking.  Kara passed through the covered wooden gateway, up the beckoning petal-strewn path. She looked up. She couldn’t distinguish branches, so abundant were the blossoms. No leaves had burst out yet. It was a scene of rapturous beauty; clusters of pale pink blossoms, five petals each clustered around a deep pink heart of yellow-tipped stamens – a crown within a cup of daintiness. Kara, knees weak, sank down and knelt on the damp path and wept. She had arrived! She was spiritually home! She wept out loud. She howled her pain. Nobody, nothing to bother her, there in the haven of delicate pink Sakura petals, shrines, tinkling water, musty smelling mossy soil. Releasing the sixty-year-old dam wall of secrecy, wondering, seeking; keeping on the move, always busy, biding her time.

Kara Fuji was born on a New Year’s Eve during the London Blitz. Her mother, a blond, petite, pretty woman had the baby by caesarean section. The cut made, Kara arrived in the world five minutes before the clock struck midnight. Her father, having a good time at a party nearby, was, according to tales Kara heard years later, frog-marched, drunk and disorderly, to the hospital. He wailed “It’s goin’a look like Hirohito” repeatedly through the blacked-out, wintery streets of that damp, cold December night. He was paranoid. He had good reason. He was a Japanese subject and classified an Enemy Alien. He was a fortunate man, since he was born in France but at an unfortunate time in history. This accident of fate occurred because his mother, Anna, who was a married, childless, forty-something English woman met Itsuchi, a handsome, wealthy, high-born Japanese postgraduate student, in Oxford in 1910. Anna was fifteen years older than Itsuchi. Their first love child, a girl, was born in Paris; the second, Kara Fuji’s father, arrived in Marseilles two years later. Hence, the convenient French birth certificate which saved his bacon in war-torn London. 

Regardless of his Enemy Alien status he was welcomed into the Free French Army as an aide to General Charles de Gaulle with the exiled French government in London. He practiced his perfect French-language skills with alacrity and aplomb. Sadly, the story is marred by the extreme paranoia the poor man suffered. Luckily for him his daughter, Kara, his only child, was fair-haired; her eyes, a lovely green with gold flecks, did not hint at being oriental. Nor was Kara Fuji always known by that name. She chose it after she discovered her Japanese heritage, by accident, whilst being a snoopy-nosey-parker delving into her parents’ wardrobe when she was sixteen. She found, hidden in the darkest recess of a drawer, several little boxes with small trophies inscribed "C.A.M.Fuji", medals and folded documents. There were crosses of Lorraine attached to stripey-coloured-silk ribbons, Harvard University medals for fencing, a miniature golden football, and a tiny golden violin, also from Harvard. Kara was nonplussed, intrigued but none the wiser for her discoveries.

Months later, feeling grown up and elegant, dressed in a black cocktail frock, with her now-brunette wavy hair piled up in a loose chignon, Kara made a play at opening a dinner-table conversation during a lull. They were at Tee’s place, twelve around the table. 

“I say” she said in her almost-posh, well-educated accent “Who’s this chap, Fuji? I found these….”

A stabbing kick stopped her short. Guests drew sharp breaths. Her mother, opposite, glowered, cold-steel-blue eyes fixed on Kara. Mother’s pointy-toe shoe had attacked her shin under the table. She and her mother were never friends. A dreadful silence ensued until Tee rescued Kara.

“Darlink” Tee said gently from the head of the table, smiling. “Darlink, I vill tell you later.” Collectively the guests breathed out, tensions eased, glowering eyes turned away, Kara’s father excused himself, going outside for a smoke. Conversation restarted, drinking and eating continued.

Later, after dessert, liqueurs, coffee, Tee took Kara aside in the fireside nook. They lit cigarettes, put their heads close together. Tee spilled the beans.

“It is” said Tee “an irrational but real fear” that Kara’s dad suffered, “and darlink” - her rich mid-European accent comforted Kara - “you must be obedient and respect your fazzer.” 

Kara promised that she would. Tee had been in Kara’s life as long as she could remember. She was infinitely more motherly than her mother. The truth was finally out.

When she was eventually given her birth certificate, her dad, who looked more latino than oriental, swore her to absolute secrecy.

"Remember, everything depends on secrecy. My job, our health, our security; never breathe a word, hear me?"

"Yes, Daddy, I hear you, it's OK."

His French alias was the name she was known by. The Japanese name had to be swept from her mind. The more she tried to forget it, the more it obsessed her. When people asked if she were French, she’d give them a cock’n’bull story. It was never the same story twice.

In her outer life Kara Fuji adjusted gradually; inside she felt angry and sad for her father. She thought it terrible to deny one’s family, cut oneself off and pretend. She couldn’t imagine how he kept his story straight. Many years later, after her father died, when she was middle-aged, she was given a large black-and-white photo portrait of Grandfather Itsuchi-san, the gentle, beguilingly handsome sire of her illegitimate father and aunt. That saucy couple were eventually married, twice. Once in 1928 at the British Embassy, Tokyo when Kara’s dad was fourteen. Second, in London at Marylebone Registry Office – covering all bases. After their losses in the Wall Street Crash, and with rumblings of World War II sounding in Europe, Anna and Itsuchi Fuji left the West to live in Japan. They never left Japan after 1937.

The discovery of her heritage at sixteen began her obsession. She pursued it in a most clandestine manner. She watched intense black and white movies such as Ugetsu (1953) by Akira Kurosawa. She booked seats whenever a noh or kabuki theatre production was in London. She bought LP records of shakuhachi flute music to listen to surreptitiously in her room. The fascination continued with the bewitching photograph of her grandfather. She hung it on walls in her various homes. His soft eyes followed her as she moved through her life. He sustained her. His mystique, his heritage, captured her soul. He made sense of her aesthetics, her feeling of otherness in the Eurocentric world she inhabited. He was the progenitor guardian of the heritage that coursed through her veins. She promised to seek Itsuchi-san when circumstances allowed.

Her life was hectic, she was the mother of three, she had conflict in her marriage, accidents, a brush or two with death. She was a tough old cooky; a survivor. Not until her father’s death, when she was close to clocking a half century, did she have concrete evidence of the tales she was told – never by either parent, only by their close friends who knew the story. Before she died Kara’s mother handed her a dossier of documents. Permission, finally. Mr Google, a genealogist, and a researcher provided detail. Shipping passenger lists offered the clue. A Japanese friend made translations. In possession of the available facts, Kara Fuji planned a trip to Japan. She knew where to start. Akita was the registered birthplace of Itsuchi-san.

In her seventy-fifth year, Kara Fuji began a three-month expedition seeking her heritage. This was a do-or-die moment, a shot-in-the-dark, an expensive gamble, a huge new adventure. She’d made plenty of eccentric and intrepid journeys; had a brace of near misses between life and death. This, though, was a matter of proving she belonged to a past, a tribe, a culture so she could stop yearning the unknown. She had children, even greatgrandchildren but no siblings, no extended family. The "family" of her parents’ friends were dead. She understood her father’s dread and her own strange aloneness.

It was May Day 2018 when Kara Fuji touched down at Narita Airport, Tokyo. She had booked a tiny camper van – an ex-delivery conversion – into which was squeezed a bed. It was lucky that Kara Fuji was a slim, agile septuagenarian. A drawer slotted under the bed with cooking essentials, a two-burner stove and gas bottle, under the bed at the back, fitted into a tray; some scant linen was provided. A hefty insurance deposit – Kara being over sixty and potentially a liability – paid in cash and receipted. The full hire fee paid up front, the usual international license, “Please sign here.” Road Rules? Similar to Tasmania. Terrain and road conditions? Ditto.

“Do you think you’ll be OK?” asked Walt the Dutch-Camper-Van-Man looking at her snowy white hair and wrinkles.

“Sure” she replied “No worries. This place is just like Tassie” waving her arms around indicating mountains and z-bends on narrow roads. 

“Ah, OK. We’ll give you the extra over-sixty-insurance-money back if everything’s alright in two months’ time”. He said something about it being very unusual for a solo woman over sixty to drive anywhere in Japan.

“Two rules never to forget” Walt continued “First, pedestrians and cyclists have absolute right of way under all circumstances – you’ll end up in jail if you hurt anybody. Second, stop dead at a level crossing. Cameras everywhere. Even if someone has just crossed before you, DON’T follow on. Absolute stop, listen and go if clear – bullet trains are quick and quiet and not all level crossings have barriers and lights.”

THAT was good advice. “Thanks Walt – got that!”

Paid, signed, sorted and packed Kara Fuji turned the key, said her goodbyes and drove off. She headed northwest for Akita. Her big fold-out map of Japan spread on the passenger seat; she had scoped a route away from motorways. Modern Japan she found visitor friendly.  Major signage in Japanese script had “Romaji” translations beneath. Travelling was a breeze. Low speed limits, avoid bicycles and stop at level crossings. There were no roundabouts to navigate. All intersections either stop signs or traffic lights. Kara was soon out of the suburbs, cruising along by rivers, over bridges and through glistening rice paddies being planted with bundles of bright green shoots. She glimpsed snow covered mountains through gaps in the forested hills. She marvelled at the green brilliance and delicate sway of giant bamboo. The chilly air, filled with the musty scent of mossy wet soil, warmed during sunny bright days. As she drove further north, through twisting narrow roads, there were snow drifts blackening with soot. Excitement filled her, deeply peaceful thoughts, Zen-like, quieted her brain. Kara overnighted in 7/11 car parks, all legal and encouraged. The stores provided hot coffee, snacks, immaculate toilets with warm seats and free hot showers.

Then, the magical sight of Sakura that brought Kara Fuji to her knees. The bursting of the dam of secrecy. The sense that a soulful, eternal regeneration was stirring within. Her metamorphosis had begun. She smiled at the world and her self. “Better late, than never” she breathed the cliché as her sobs abated. 

The road to Akita cut across remote country; between forested mountains (so many vivid greens), by gushing waterfalls, beneath arching, swaying, giant bamboo, through long artificial tunnels built against the sides of mountains for falling rock to bounce off, rolling away into valleys below. Stopping at shrines, Kara Fuji climbed mossy stone steps; in villages she explored thatched, crumbling farmhouses and barns. She slept up side roads out of view. It took seven days to reach seaside Akita on a cold Sunday evening. In the morning she would go to City Hall, stating her case for information about Itsuchi Fuji, born 1885, Akita.

It did not go as she hoped. “Privacy. Sorry” is a phrase that City Hall officials know and repeat, with a small solemn bow, to answer questions. She knew she was understood but peoples’ shyness to practice their English was frustrating. She had tried to learn Japanese – alas, a trick too far at her age. All who saw her documents and photographs made noises of approval tinged with a hint of awe. 

“Ah, so! From Austraryia, cam-pingo. Ah, So!”

Kara took her leave, bowing, thanking the good officials and climbed into her little van. It was raining, she felt tearful, she turned the ignition key. 

Her daughter’s wise words came to mind, “Mum! Remember – no expectations, then you won’t be disappointed. Enjoy the trip.”

“Stop! Fuji-san! Stop”. A young official, under an umbrella, raced towards the van,

“Try Yuzawa”.

“Pardon?”

“Yu-za-wa – two hours south, try…”

Kara, delighted, “Ah, thank you so much, I will, Yu-za-wa!”

“Hai, hai”. Bowing he ducked under his umbrella running back to City Hall. Kara headed South.

In Yuzawa, she found City Hall. Sakura in blossom abounded. She reached the reception area, waiting, absorbing the displays of indigo dyed fabric.

Busy place this Yuzawa, Kara thought. Her number was called. She stated her business and was, again, confronted with repeated “Privacy. Sorry.”

“Please, check the telephone book, records, please”. Her urgency and air of desperation attracted the attention of a handsome gentleman walking past who asked the problem in English. 

“Ah,” he said “I’ll be back. I lived in London for years; I heard your upset voice. Won’t be long”. 

He returned, softly smiling and looking with great interest into Kara Fuji’s eyes.

“Go to Ugo” he said simply. “Try there but arrive by three o’clock – it’s Friday”. 

They parted. Kara hopped into her van and Google-Mapped UGO. Only thirty kilometres and it was one p.m. She hit the speed limit on Route 398, got lost cutting across a plain of rice paddies, found her road again, arriving at City Hall at two-ten p.m. Parked, dossier in hand, she approached the glass doors. Before her, bowing low, was a small, middle-aged woman, dressed in a neat dark blue business dress and sensible shoes.

“Welcome, Fuji-san, Welcome to Ugo!”

Kara Fuji’s knees almost gave way, such was the flood of emotion that suffused her entire being like a hot surging wave.

Yuzawa phoned ahead, she realised.

Ugo welcomed Kara Fuji like a returned lost child. 

“Welcome to your town” the Director said, “Your home and family are here. We will let them know of your arrival. Perhaps Monday for an introduction?” 

The Director spoke through Angie who had received Kara two hours before. Those two hours Kara Fuji had howled like a dingo, sobbed to the point of voiceless exhaustion. Fulfilling her life’s quest; she was given her Koseki, an ancestral record of births, deaths, marriages. Even her own parents’ marriage was recorded. The amazed minions of City Hall stood aghast at the outpouring of emotion, crowded in the doorway to the Director’s anteroom. Angie booked a hotel.

“You must rest comfortable tonight, Fuji-san”.

Monday: The Director, Angie and Kara arrived at the Fuji estate for lunch. It was a black-and-white-timber traditional farmhouse, lush-green-garden, technicolour version of old, faded photos she’d pored over for years. The pond, surrounded in one photo by clusters of Fuji family generations, was still there, neat and trim, to greet her. Kara, almost frozen by the reality, braced for the meeting with her cousin. The door slid aside, a small, black-haired woman in trousers, white shirt and blue cardigan, gasped, clapping her hand to her mouth – lowering her eyes, bowing, stepping backwards and muttering, “Welcome, welcome. Mitsu, your cousin”. Kara gave flowers she bought and gifts from Tasmania. In this, her grandfather’s traditional house, she knelt at the family shrine and thanked her ancestors. 

A delicate lunch of tiny morsels on little plates was laid out on a low, lacquered table. Cushions surrounded the table. Small bowls decorated with Sakura; chopsticks wrapped in cloth napkins were set in five places. Green beans, pink salmon, white rice balls, miso soup, tiny squares of omelette, nori sheets, big perfect strawberries cut as stars, a dozen different treats looked enticing. Kara was truly an honoured guest.

Angie translated for Cousin Mitsu, “After lunch, we walk to the graveyard. The priest will meet us. You will see the gravestone of Anna-san and Itsuchi-san.”

At seventy-five – turbulent emotions jostling – she maintained her Stoic composure. One Sakura at the graveyard fluttered its last petals to the gravel. Kara placed her hand over the inscriptions and the Fuji heraldic ka-mon. Etched into the rough-cut granite headstone, the ka-mon appeared glossy black and stippled dark grey. The priest invited her to the shrine for a blessing. She spoke a prayer and gave thanks again. She felt validated, Kara Fuji, finally home. 

Returning by invitation the next day on her own, Second Cousin Mitsu drove Kara Fuji to visit her First Cousin, Hanako-san, Mitsu-san’s ninety-six-year-old mother at a care home. It was clear why Mitsu-san was shocked at first seeing Kara. Her mother and Kara looked like peas from the same pod; Hanako-san’s father was younger brother to Itsuchi-san, Kara’s grandfather. The old lady, sitting in a wheelchair, rug over knees, stroked Kara’s face with her thin, delicate fingers and smiled out of her wrinkled face, nodding her pleasure and acceptance. When they parted, Kara Fuji bowed low to her elder Cousin. Outside three Sakura trees released their last blossoms, petals fluttering to the grass beneath. 

Back in chilly Autumnal Tasmania, Kara felt serene. Urgent instinct pushed her hard to make the trip. She heard from Angie that Hanako-san died a few weeks after Kara met her. She had found the last true link to her Fuji family. She planted a memorial Sakura in her beautiful garden.