Japanese Quaker Yearly Meeting

Shelley and I have had the pleasure of attending Quaker meetings in several countries around the world, but little did we expect to find Quakers here in Japan.

As we found out last year, there is quite an active (though small) Quaker presence in Japan that has been here for over 100 years.

The whole Quaker movement started in Japan with a various impressive man: Inazo Nitobe. During a long and varied life he wrote the well-known book "Bushido, the soul of Japan", taguht in both Japan and in the US, was part of founding several Universities in Tokyo and was part of founding the Friends school here in Tokyo. Click here to find out more about him.

As it turns out, he was instrumental in working with Philadelphia Yearly Meeting to establish an agriculture program in Tsuchiura, North of Tokyo over 100 years ago. This evolved into what is now the Tsuchiura Monthly Meeting where Japan Yearly Meeting was held in a newly up-graded meeting house with a guest house as part of the compound. 

Shelley in front of the Meeting with Misatto, our Young Friends coordinator who sat next to us and helped us with what was going on:

We spent the weekend surrounded by lovely Friends involved passionately in issues around the world and working on issues right locally as well.

We enjoyed the positive energy of Sachiko, from Tokyo who is the clerk of JYM:

Conversations were all in Japanese, but also included Korean as we had three visitors from Seoul Monthly Meeting (who spoke some Japanese but no English) and us who speak some Japanese and no Korean. This Friend is a banker retired in farming outside of Seoul:

And this Friend is active in Korean alternative film making for youth. Behind him is Paul, our English translator and in front is Megumi who translated into Korean; quite complex!

When our brains got too full and we were no longer able to follow the thread of conversations we did some visiting of the area. Our Tokyo Friend who works with the mentally challenged and volunteers with the homeless took us to the local peace museum which commemorated the young men who died as Kamikaze pilots. 

Shelley and I also wandered the alleys around our Meeting house and found some striking old buildings tucked behind the concrete towers: 

The on-going challenge of abandoned buildings:

Some beautifully redone buildings (this one belongs to a Friend):

Some lovely smiles in the different shops:

And beautiful Bonsai trees tucked in back-yards:

As we explored we also got a kick out of the various signs on stores and buildings showing their "international flair" using English and French... of a fashion. We chuckle about this with respect knowing full well that if we tried writing signs in Japanese for our home... it would be just as problematic!

How about this clothes store for women called "Chubby" ?

Or the Hair studio called "Switch"?

Or this lovely apartment by the creek:

And then, just for the "Je ne sais quoi" factor, a French store name that means..."Climb reason"?

And just to make sure that all passersby get what they need, there was the beer vending machine on the side of the road with all sizes of beer. Yes there is a drinking age limit of 20 here. Just to make sure you are legal you have to swipe your ID card proving you are of age before you can pay for your beer. Would that work in BC???

Once again we returned to the throbbing world of Tokyo at the end of the weekend to return to our regular lives, impressed by the depth and richness of Quaker heritage in Japan.