Today was an eventful day - first a class fieldtrip to Yushukan, the Memorial Museum at Yasukuni Shrine; followed by dinner with Nobu at Asakusa; and finally a random (very cold) amble around Ginza with Rachel.
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Yasukuni Shrine 靖国神社
(Entrance into the Yasukuni Grounds - a 5 min walk from Kudanshita Station.)Yasukuni Shrine 靖国神社 is probably one of the most well-known places in Tokyo, what with the controversies that have surrounded it almost yearly since the end of WW2. Hatoyama has yet to make his move, but Koizumi had visited it annually during his seat at the government, and what rising outcries that raised. In the past, Prime Ministers have been sued for combining state and religion, so to avoid that, Koizumi did shy off the usual Shinto ritual at the shrine - bowing once only, instead of the usual Shinto tradition of 2 bows, 2 claps and 1 more bow (Guardian, 14 Aug 2001). But he did sign the guestbook in his official capacity, so as to pacify his supporters and make the visit sufficiently official.
(The top part of the Shrine. The architecture is amazing - early ones were apparently made with high-quality timber and no nails which allowed the structures to move with the tectonic movements, thus it withstood the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923.)So what is at the Yasukuni Shrine? 2.46million people enshrined to become "noble spirits" (英霊 = eirei), including the class A war criminals like Prime Minister Toujou Hideki, though they were quietly enshrined only several years after their execution. Well according to my Professor, this whole memorialisation and enshrinement requires a huge sum of money, which is thus funded by the government. Hence, the government becomes the authority that decides who get to be enshrined here or not. All the 2.46million selected had to have died in the battlefield, mostly during the 1931 Manchurian Incident/Invasion up till the end of WW2 in 1945. Civilians are NOT included. Apparently all those chosen to be enshrined are also thus entitled to monetary compensation of sorts, as given out by veteran associations. But the interesting thing is, apparently almost half of the families of these individuals did not want to agree to their relative being enshrined. Certainly puts a spin to the usual conceptions of this issue hmm.
(Right at the Shrine where people pay their respects. The enshrinement is within the Shrine itself though, and entry is not permitted.)=========================
Yuushuukan 遊就館The Yuushuukan is located within the Yasukuni grounds, in a modern-looking building adjacent to the Shrine. Professor said that the name itself means "making peace", yet it is ironically the largest war memorial/museum in the country - and not free of charge. International Law apparently states that all war memorials or Holocaust-related memorials/museums should be free of charge, like the Auschwitz in Poland and the Yad Vashem (Holocaust History Museum) in Jerusalem. Well but Japan never signed this agreement, so.
(The entrance of the modern-looking Yuushuukan.)Naturally, most of the information tabs and plaques are in Japanese. But there is English translation, albeit very selectively. The wording is also very careful, almost shrugging off any blame or Japanese aggression in neutrality, whilst honouring the spirit of the very same noble spirits enshrined at the Yasukuni Shrine. In the English brochure, it states that the name "Yushu" means to "associate with and to learn from high-principled people". These "high-principled people" are the very same perpetrators and actors in the many brutalities and atrocities of the Japanese occupation and invasions. Hmm. Perhaps this museum may not be so much of an issue, if it was dedicated to all victims and victimisers of the WW2. Yet the sole dedication of such memorial space and cultural memory to militaristic actions and people, and the glorifying of their "true-heartedness" (English brochure), leaves much to be wondered.
(The afore-mentioned English Brochure.)The translations are also very selective, with words like "daring", "brave" describing the Japanese soldiers, going up against "harsh" conditions and "being forced to attack others in order to defend herself". One example would have been the display for "Pre-incidents to the Marco Polo Incident" - where 3 pictures and accompanying Japanese texts were shown, but of which only 1 was translated into English; it was the one which had a number of Japanese soldiers attacked and killed. This easily implies straightaway that the Marco Polo Incident started with the other side's fault, no? Too bad there's no pictorial evidence, since photography was strictly disallowed in the museum.
Even the English brochure is couched in similiarly vague and glorified terms, describing the Yuushuukan as " a museum to inherit sincerity and records of enshrined divinities of Yasukuni Shrine" and it is the hope that the visitors "by touching directly the sincerity of enshrined divinities who dedicated their precious lives for their loving motherland, ... you may find something precious".
The saddest thing? Apparently this museum is the supplementary education for thousands of school children every year, together with the highly popular war-time stories/mangas by Kobayashi which glorify the samurai bushido and highlight the aggression of the mean Westerners who in turn forced Japan to strengthen and defend herself.
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I went through this fieldtrip today mostly through my professor's eyes - and I do acknowledge that she probably has presented it to the most biased other extent. Nonetheless, by getting a piece of each side of the spectrum, I've come to realised really how complicated and gray this matter really is. Learning never stops. But evidently, it does get remodeled and painted over in the pretty colours of vagueness, neutrality and vacuous spaces.
