| Hmmmm.....
I spent many years touring old Meiji castles, learning to speak Japanese, and learing Japanese culture and history. Sure I was just a kid, but my buddies were Japanese as were my many sensei.
One thing I know for sure is that the Japanese did not need Westerners to teach them about imperealism. I'm sure like many other things, they learnt that from the Chinese and Mongolians.
I weren't old enough to attend the Taisho Exposition, but I was in Osaka at The World Expo in 1968, on the day of greatest human density ever. Another thing I know for sure is that without WWII there would be no koi trade.
Besides the American Occupation, a few other important things came from the war. One was the invention of the plastic bag. Without those two occurrences there would be no koi trade.
In Niigata Prefecture there is a statue of Admiral Yamamoto. As important to Japanese history as he was, there is another held in highest esteem, just beneath the very Emperor himself, General Douglas MacArthur. Wihtout him there would be no modern Japan and no koi trade.
Now, I don't rightly remember a stroy about carps turning into dragons from my childhood in Japan. However, I do remember putting out koi nobori, one for each member of the family on Boy's Day (now I understand its "Children's Day" politically correct). The koi being a symbol of strength and fertility.
It would be easy enough to see the same stroy taken from China, given a Japanese spin, and the fish a koi instead of a carp, etc.
Seen a tattoo on a fella's back of a samurai riding on the back of a koi, going over the waterfall.
Gotta git,
Brett
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Brett
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