Japanese have suffered enough

Dear editor,

I want to leave a blank space for this letter out of respect for Japan. It is like one minute of silence. All my relatives in Japan have been accounted for. When the first moments of shock pass away and reality begins to sink in, we will have a situation so horrible, so unimaginable that our psyches will forever be altered.

If a volcano erupts in Kyushu and more destruction is to come, the world may lose parts of Japan which may sink into the sea, become fragmented or irradiated by the nuclear reactors in Fukushima.

I have felt incredibly cold all day and that is not like me. I am a survivor of the 1995 Kobe earthquake which looks so unimportant compared to Sendai. It may not even be the “big one” that was expected closer to Tokyo. There will be more tremors and more aftershocks. The area may become uninhabitable. I have a Japanese husband in Tokyo and I worry about his safety.

I have decided in the depth of my soul that the Japanese people have suffered enough. There is karma for individuals or so we are told. There are also group karmas which can reflect a country’s past.

I very well know how much Korea has suffered from the Japanese atrocities during World War II but as far as I am concerned, the debt has been erased. Perhaps, we are confusing justice with revenge. I will no longer fight for war reparations. Whatever happened last century died with most Japanese who were alive at that time.

I would like to humbly beg Korea to forgive, maybe not totally forget but to forgive in view of all the catastrophes that have hit Japan and that will exact an enormous price in human lives, economic losses of every kind in the weeks and months to come.

Write your own textbooks, remember your ancestors but do not dwell on old wounds when so many new ones are hitting your old enemy. We are all human beings but we become more human when we forgive. I know that you are helping Japan and it may me feel so good. For a while now, I have entertained the idea that you can be friends.

I went to a conference here in Toronto on Friday, the world was still normal then and I was happy to see Korean Consul General Hong Ji-in sitting besides Japanese Consul General Tetsuo Yamashita. Please open your hearts and hands wide to your neighbors even if they call the East Sea the Sea of Japan.

It will take time but little by little everything will change for the better. The Korean people is generous and peace loving. Listen to the song: “Imagine” by John Lennon. He was a singing poet who believed in peace.

Tonight, we are all Japanese in our hearts and minds.

Blessings to all.

Romy Kerwin

Toronto, Canada