It is often said that people visit Zenkoji Temple by being pulled by a cow, but this time I was able to visit the world's hidden gem, "Nepal." This was also thanks to a "global citizen" rather than a "cow."

I have never had any interest in conventions that tend to end up being nothing more than festivals, such as those held in Ottawa, Canada, Brussels in Northern Europe, and other World Federation Conventions, but I went to the 16th World Convention, held in New Delhi, the capital of India, for a week from mid-January, because Indian President Ahmed and Prime Minister Gandhi signed the Global Citizen Register and also to obtain a resolution of support for the First World Convention of Global Citizens to be held in San Francisco at the end of July.

The above is an excerpt from an essay by Shinichi Kato titled "A Trip to Nepal - Thoughts on the Pilgrimage as a 'Global Citizen'" that appeared in the July 15, 1975 issue of "Hiroshima Cultural Communications." Kato was sympathetic to the "global citizen" concept advocated by former UN Secretary-General U Thant, and was the first person in Japan to register as a global citizen with the World Federalist World Association, after which he became enthusiastic about the global citizen movement.

However, we know very little about what specific actions he took. The main reason for this is that Kato, who was a newspaper reporter and editor but was more of a "man of action" than a writer, left behind very few writings. The essay in "Hiroshima Cultural News" is one of the few pieces of writing he left behind. I first learned of the existence of this essay through the "Peace Database" at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum.

Cooperation between the Library and the Society for Inheritance

In the "Magazines" section of the database, I found that Kato had contributed to two publications: "Life and Culture" (special extra edition No. 11, Heiwa Shuppansha) and "Hiroshima Tsushin 1972.12.01 Hiroshima Tsushin no Kai." The former was titled "All Humankind is Global Citizens," and the latter was titled "A New Prescription for Peace in the Global Age," and both contained almost the same things that Kato had written in his own book.

I visited Hiroshima City Central Library to check other issues of these two publications, and found that Kato Shinichi contributed to "Hiroshima Cultural Communications No. 3." However, the library did not have the actual copy. After a while, someone from the library's public relations materials office contacted me by email to tell me that "Hiroshima Cultural Communications No. 3 (Shunyosha Publishing, 1975)" was listed on the "Publication of the Catalog of Literature and Art-Related Literature in the Collection of the Association for the Preservation of the Hibakusha Memory Heritage" page on the website of the NPO "No More Hibakusha Memory Heritage Preservation Association."

So I emailed the Inheritance Society Archives Division, and the Society's secretariat kindly sent me a copy of Kato Shinichi's essay from Hiroshima Cultural Communications, which they said was in their archives. Thanks to the kindness of these two people, I was able to obtain "A Journey to Nepal."

Hiroshima Bunka Tsushin was a magazine first published in 1973 by Shunyosha Publishing in Hiroshima City as Hiroshima Tsushin, but it appears to have been short-lived.

Calling on Nepalese people

"Travels in Nepal" is just two pages long and includes two photographs with captions: "Temples in Kathmandu" and "Distant view of the Himalayas from Kathmandu."

According to this essay, Kato traveled from Japan to New Delhi via Hong Kong, Bangkok, and Calcutta to attend the 16th World Federation World Conference. Approximately 400 people from 24 countries around the world, including 65 from Japan, participated and discussed various topics under the main theme of "Positive Coexistence for Global Justice and Development - Aiming for a World Community."

Kato stayed in New Delhi with a group for about a week, and after that, he wanted to leave the group because he "hates sightseeing," but reluctantly stayed with the group because it was too expensive. As part of that trip, he visited Kathmandu, the capital of Nepal, and was able to see the sunrise over the Himalayan peaks, which he wrote in his essay, "maybe thanks to the Heiwa Pilgrimage."

A branch of the World Federation was also established in Kathmandu, and while the local government was busy preparing to soon welcome the Japanese Crown Prince and Princess (for the coronation ceremony of the new King), Kato and his team were warmly welcomed by the Nepalese government and private sector.

Kato also seems to have appealed for the importance of "global citizenship" in Kathmandu. However, he wrote about the reaction of the Nepalese people, "It is only natural that they were shocked when they heard about global citizenship, as this is a nation that is awakening to nationalism." Was it too early?

To San Francisco

The following passage from this essay suggests that before going to Nepal, Kato had traveled around Japan to promote his ideas as a "global citizen."

Since a Hokkaido newspaper reported that a 72-year-old global salesman had arrived from Hiroshima, he has since made the journey to Tohoku, Hokuriku, Kyushu and even the west coast of the United States, before finally making it to New Delhi, India, and finally to the first World Conference of Global Citizens in San Francisco in late July (commemorating the 30th anniversary of the founding of the United Nations), and his pilgrimage to Nepal was also "attracted by global citizenship."

The chronology is a little unclear in the text, but Kato was born in 1900, and first visited Hokkaido in 1972 to spread the word about "global citizenship." He then traveled to Tohoku, Hokuriku, and Kyushu, and even traveled to the West Coast of the United States, and, as stated at the beginning of this essay, visited Nepal from New Delhi in January 1975.

The essay "Journey to Nepal" was published in the July 1975 issue of Hiroshima Bunka Tsushin, so it is likely that he wrote this essay before that date, and also attended the first World Conference of Global Citizens held in San Francisco in July of the same year.

His energy showed no signs of diminishing, as seen in his solo car trip across the United States from 1960 to the following year, following in the footsteps of the first generation of Japanese immigrants, and in the 1970s he traveled from Japan to overseas, calling for "global citizenship."

(Titles omitted)

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© 2021 Ryusuke Kawai