This is my essay.









At the end of last month, I went to the Kameido Tenjin Shrine for seeing the wisteria flowers. When I was heading for the main building of the Shrine, I heard a big voice, coming from the corner of precincts.

"Our life is just like walking a long way with carrying heavy burdens."

I found that it was the Chinese-poem recitation. There was a small stage in the precincts, where an old man, wearing the Japanese traditional kimono, was reciting the poem. As it was very wonderful, I sat down on a seat for hearing it. One of these poems was as below.

Instructions by the late General Ieyasu

-- Our life is just like walking a long way with carrying heavy burdens.
-- So we should not be in a hurry
-- If only we would get used to live with lack of goods, we could live enough.
-- When we will think of wants, we should recall when we were poor.
-- To endure is the key of success and to get angry is your enemy.
-- If we would get win all the time and do not know how to get lose, finally we would face the most difficult situation.
-- We should blame ourselves. We should not blame others.
-- To be short is better that to do too much.


All of these words are very instructive and wonderful instructions to our lives. With forgetting time passing I concentrated into hearing several poems. The persons, who recited them, were comprised of two men and one woman. I think the woman's voice was also matching to the atmosphere of the Chinese poems. With hearing them, I thought my mind had been refreshed completely. I think this is the good tradition, which is in danger of vanishing. We adults should convey these wonderful traditions to the next generations.

I recalled an episode of 31 years ago. It was the welcoming dinner for the freshmen to my Ministry. On the way of the course dinner, a typical Japanese style, someone urged the freshmen to sing a song, Karaoke. Each freshman sang some songs by turn. The nest turn was Mr. N. He said "I can not get used singing a song. Instead of this, I will recite a Chinese poem." He started to recite a poem. His voice was strong, matched to the content of the poem. We enjoyed in hearing it. Since then we have been respecting him.

Mr. N had already retired from our Ministry and he is now one of the key persons of the Japanese Automobile Industry. I think he would recite the Chinese poems in front of people of Toyota, Nissan and Honda. I believe he can cope with them.

(June 1st 2005)




—IXl¶Eç¶çÀ‚Ì–²





Essay of My Wonderful Life

(c) Yama san 2005, All rights reserved