The Peace Correspondent Read Online Free Page B

1981, and international flights began in 1990, with direct connections now to Seoul, Chengdu, Guam/Saipan, Singapore and Hong Kong.
    Basho strapped on his straw sandals and walked to the north from Edo (now Tokyo). Taking an easier route, I hailed a cab to Hong Kong’s Kai Tak Airport and flew on Dragonair’s new direct flight.
    On the plane, over pre-dinner drinks, I learn something about the city from my seat mate who is returning home from a holiday in Hong Kong. “Sendai is the center of everything,” she says, notmeaning to be as immodest as she sounds.
    This former “unexplored territory” has become a modern industrial, commercial and cultural center for Tohoku, Japan’s northeastern district. It is a city of learning, with 10 universities and 10 junior colleges, high-tech industries, 30 labs and research institutions such as the 21st-Century Plaza Research Center. The Tohoku Intelligent Cosmos Plan aims to turn the region into an international high-tech center.
    After dinner, she shows me photos of her home in the Izumi Park Town, an industrial and residential area on the outskirts of Sendai. It is Japan’s version of a pleasant American suburbia, with spacious houses (rare in Japan), real yards, and a futuristic research center where outside companies rent time on computers and advanced lab equipment.
    â€œWith so many branch offices of major companies there, men are often transferred without their families. We call them ‘Sendai bachelors,’” the young lady says with a slight glint in her eye.
    Feudal lord Masamune Date, the warrior who established Sendai as his castle town in 1600, was known as the One-Eyed Dragon, because he lost his right eye as a child. We agree that Dragonair and Dragoneye make a fortuitous sounding parallel, and toast the new flight.
    However, this is not just a Japanese Silicon Valley, but a scenic area with historical sites, ancient temples, shrines and castles and famous local delicacies. Numerous hot springs and ski slopes are within easy reach of Sendai, a major outdoor recreation center.
    The first impression when the plane doors swing open is that this is a northern country, the air as sharp and clear as the famous local sake -- the best in Japan, Sendai aficionados insist.
    After the crowds of Hong Kong or Tokyo, Sendai is a spacious, uncrowded city with parks, broad streets and the scenic Hirose River winding through the center. “We call this Mori no Miyako, City of trees,” explains my friend. “Families of trees line the streets.”
    Although Sendai means one thousand years, or longevity, thecity was destroyed in an air raid in 1945, so most buildings are new. And it is growing rapidly. The suburbs we drive through from the airport were rice paddies just 10 years ago. Despite its newness, there are beguiling traces of old Japan -- cherry trees growing along the riverbank, satellite dishes sprouting on tile roofs, traditional low houses among the modern office buildings.
    The Sun Mall Ichiban-cho typifies modern, prosperous Japan, where East and West meet and mix. A life-size plastic Santa Claus -- with a slightly Asian face -- stands outside one store, American fast-food places such as Mister Donut, Baskin Robbins, Kentucky Fried Chicken and McDonald’s feed the strollers, while American brand names such as Levi’s and Lee clothe them. But a few place names in Western script and signs such as “I feel Coke” and “Let’s sport” are the only concessions to a foreign language.
    My stay coincides with the winter Pageant of Starlight, when half a million tiny bulbs glow like fireflies in the branches of the zelkovas (a kind of elm) on Aoba and Jozenji Avenues. The happy young people walking along the fantastic streets of lights give the evening a festive, college-town atmosphere.
    Next day, I visit the forested park on Aobajo Hill in the center of the town, where Date built his castle in 1602.