Comments on: Freed hostage apologizes to Japanese government

By: Irene

Irene — Thu, 19 Jun 2008 02:23:32 +0000

Well maybe his English is good, I don’t know.

By: Alec

Alec — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 16:42:02 +0000

Am I the only one wondering what a Japanese guy’s doing teaching English? Poor Nepalese kids.

By: ponta

ponta — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 16:31:33 +0000

I think that voluntary work in a foreign poverty-stricken country is “seen” as a generous and boldly good act but doing the voluntary work in a country where you know it is highly probable you might be abducted, thereby causing troubles to others is not seen as a generous and boldly good act.

By: helical

helical — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 14:56:45 +0000

He must have been aware of how the string of Japanese NGO volunteer abductions caused a storm of online bashings a few years back.
The abductees were portrayed as irresponsible and troublesome kids who pranced off to the most dangerous location in the world ignoring the wise advice of the government to stay the hell away from there, got themselves kidnapped (surprise, surprise), and now were being used as hostages to try to force the JSDF out of Iraq amidst what was already a touchy situation with the left-wingers yelling that was the application of military force overseas and equated to an invasion … or something like that. The word of the day back then was “自己責任 (self-responsibility)”, which went something like “We told them not to go but they didn’t listen. So if they get themselves killed, tough shit–they’re on their own”.
Apologizing for causing troubles draws on the age-old wisdom of kind of glossing over the whole thing and attempts to avoiding unpleasantness of pointing fingers.

By: _rem

_rem — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 13:00:42 +0000

simple japanese etiquette:
- voluntary work in a foreign country is not “seen” as a generous and boldly good act (which is a christian/western state of mind) but as selfish and irritable act because there are also plenty of needs inner Japan
- the fact of feeling as burden a strong uncomfortable feeling in Japan. The fact that he alone required so much energy and money must have been hard on him

By: Vonskippy

Vonskippy — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 07:02:56 +0000

Maybe just a touch of Stockholm Syndrome going on there eh?

By: Oops

Oops — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 06:44:25 +0000

Wow, this is one very easygoing person.