Hope for the Japanese in the 21st Century

KOJIMA Hitomi

My mother once told me a story she heard on a lecture. Each country organized a party to observe the Inca Empire. Each party included some professors and some assistant professors.

The Japanese team even held a local meeting to select good Sherpas. In this way, the Japanese team reached the point earlier than any other country's party and began its excavation. And they brought from Japan the latest machines to observe weather, geography, and so on. Then they headed for the ruins of Inca Empire and climbed a steep mountain.

Then they reached the eighth station of the mountain earlier than they expected, thanks to the good Sherpas and the latest machines. Then they put up some tents.

The members of the party of Japan thought that if they climbed only a little further, they would be able to arrive at the destination first of all the teams. But next morning the Sherpas kept sitting on the ground without moving. The Members of the Japanese team asked the Sherpas,"Do you think your wages too small? So you do not work, do you?"but they only shook their heads and kept still and silent. The next day they did not move, either.

And on the third morning they began to move. They began to walk and head for the top of the mountain. One of the members asked the head of the Sherpas why they had kept motionless. Then he said"Our bodies reached the eighth station of this mountain all right but our Souls did not. So we had to wait for our Souls to catch up". When I heard this story, I only thought that we Japanese could not think in this way. But it is great thing beyond us the Japanese. I thought there were a lot of mysteries hidden behind ordinary things.

There can be no cooperation where people think of themselves, since they cannot trust each other.

It did not matter which party discovered first, but what wonderful things were discovered.

We are always told"to get up early, to eat quickly, to prepare quickly, to go to school quickly, to come home as soon as possible, to study quickly, to hurry up and do your homework, to go to juku school quickly, to go to bed early, to hurry up, hurry up...... We are always pressed to be quick in anything from morning till night. But I always think that the process is more important. We need time for our souls to catch up with us.

I thought that the Sherpas wanted to say,"The process is important and they should be allowed to take a roundabout way. Human being can live supported by natural powers. There are a lot of things to appear in front of you if you take a roundabout. Our hearts are mysterious and can not be measured with any machines."

This story gave me a slight relief at the end. Why did not the Japanese team head for the top of the mountain using their machines, refusing the help of Sherpas who kept still there? Maybe I think that they also knew clearly that the Sherpas knew nature better than their machines.