[Fishbreeder]

"The Barbarian and the Geisha" with John Wayne is a great movie. I don;t know how historically accurate it is, but it follows with what little I know of Japanese history.

My dad has several Japanese artifacts dating to pre-Admiral Perry (before 1854). One of the most interesting is an iron cross. A Christian cross, made by Jesuit priests that visited Japan in the early 1800's, it has the image of Buddha instead of Jesus, on it. The other one is a "Samurai head box" which was the box used to bring the decapitated heads of enemies to the boss.

At any rate, it was Admiral Perry's visit to Japan followed by Ambassador Harris' stay that brought the common carp to America. As part of a cultural/biological exchange, common carp fingerlings were brought to the US and rainbow trout eggs to Japan. It was of course, an ecological disaster on both sides. Common carp being the scourge of pristine American waterways and rainbow trout displacing the native Japanese trout from its habitat.

Both species now considered "indigenous" as they've become so well esconced into thier respective ecosystems.

As an avid old movie buff, I like to watch old Japanese movies on the Independent Film Network. As a child living in Japan I was able to meet famous Japanese actor Shintaro Katsu. He made many movies from the late fifties into the seventies based on the mythological character "Zatoichi". Zatoichi was a blind massuese (Zatoichi directly translates to blind man of the lowest caste) during the Edo period who traveled the country side gambling and righting wrongs. He is a mild mannered and very polite person, unassuming and self deprecating. That is until he gets stirred up, then he becomes a swordsman of the utmost skill, killing all that offend, oppress and take advantage of less fortunates.

In some of the movies the word "koi" is mentioned, almost always associated with fish to eat or fish to catch while fishing (Zatoichi is also a recreational fisherman). "Koi" seen in these old movies are usually packaged up to eat, on a plate or swimming in a pond.

For folks that would like to learn more about life in fuedal Japan, these old movies can help do just that. They are also entertaining with good story lines and contain considerable humor. They are also at times extremely violent and the newer ones get down right bloodthirsty.

Brett