I lived in the Yokosuka Naval Base for several years when I was a kid between the ages of 8 and 11 (1967 - 1970)
Suffice to say that for an eight year old gaijin kid, Japan was a very strange place. Odd toilets that you had to squat over...open sewers...the smell of fish...large groups of people walking around wearing face masks, pachinko ball machines...restaurants with bizarre plastic food in the front windows...
But one of the oddest things to me was that whenever an aircraft carrier came into port, there would be these HUGE anti-nuclear weapon demonstrations outside the base.
At around 9:00 AM several hundred Japanese riot police would assemble in a field near my house, then on cue shortly thereafter, the crowds would assemble outside the fence near the main gate with banners and megaphones...I seem to remember large groups, but it might have only been 500 or even a thousand. They would get vocal and demonstrate for a while, then again, on cue, some of them would go over and begin climbing the fence. The fire trucks inside the base parked nearby would begin spraying the demonstrators on the fence with fire hoses, knocking them off, then they would begin spraying the other demonstrators through the fence.
Shortly thereafter, the demonstrators would disperse, the area would be quickly cleaned up, and when the water evaporated, there was no indication that anything had transpired.
When I think of it now, it seemed like one big, huge, ritualized kabuki dance. Everyone knew their roles on both sides, the whole thing went down like clockwork, and then it was over until the next time.
I remember my brother and I going over and talking to a bunch of the Japanese riot police, and inviting them back to our house after the demonstration was over. We went into the cabinets and opened up a bunch of cans of stuff and poured them into bowls. I recall that we had maybe ten bowls of things like chick peas, corn, whatever.
My mom came home, and politely told the Japanese guys to leave, which they did. I have no idea what my mother thought of that. I think she must have thought we were just crazy.
I lived in the Yokosuka Naval Base for several years when I was a kid between the ages of 8 and 11 (1967 - 1970)
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I was in and out of Yokosuka 57-60 and homeported there 60-62. Yes, the demonstrations were definitely ‘street theater’ and had to do with Nuclear armed and powered ships.
(Any excuse for a get together).
Funny how the Merchants, Bar Keeps etal were ‘quiet’ about the ‘demonstrations’ until it started to take a toll on their business. THEN they started to ‘fight back’.
If the Govt etal had any gonads, they would tell the ‘rioters’ in Ferguson to wrap it up AND tell the Merchants that there would be NO ‘Urban renewal’ plan...
Watch names get dropped and arrests start then. As long as the ‘Authorities’ continue to ‘protect’ the demonstrators, the people trapped there can take NO action....
Tell the press to go home and quit interviewing these clowns and it will end quickly.
BTW, I ‘looked’ at your page and your father looks vaguely familiar (the ‘official portrait) of course I am at the age where about every other person one sees they swear they have seen them before.....<: <: <: