Let me introduce My Self.My Name is Kaori
Miyake.I was born in Kurashikishi. Okayamakenn .Japan. On Jun.5.1980.
I am a second year student at Kagawa Juniior College. My major
is management and Information. My hobby is reading books.
Kochi, the largest city on the pacific coast, is the capital of kochi prefecture, especially known for its marine products, forestry and greenhouse culture of vegetables. The fishing ports dotted along the pacific coast are usually busy with small boats that bring in boni to and mackerel from the warm current offshore, and sometimes with big boats that have made six- or seven-month voyages after tuna into the Indian Ocean, the Tasman Sea, even the Atlantic.
Men in this prefecture have long been known for a trait called igosso. When a men is called igosso, it means he is gallantly generous, obstinately independent, carefree and passionate in his usually unpredictable actions.Women of the same type are called hachikinn.
Kochi was also a castle town. The approach to the castle gate is liveliest on Sundays as the 3-century-old Sunday Market is held there, the 1.2Km avenue lined with hundreds of stalls stocked with every kind of local project imaginable-vegetables, fruits, flowers, trees, raw, dried or cooked fish, coral crafts, toys, knives, antiques, old clothes, china, earthenware, kittens, puppies, granny's pickles, cookies, candies, rice cakes, pancakes and sundry items.
◎5 minutes' walk from JR Kochi Station to the entrance of Sunday Market.
Kochi-jo Castle came into being in 1588 when Chosokabe Motochika, who once subjugated the whole of shikoku, built his castle here on top of the hill. In 1600 Yamanouchi Kazutoyo took over the castle, rebuilt it, and 16 generations of Lords Yamanouchi reigned until 1869 when the Province was officially returned to the Emperor Meiji.
The Otemon Main Gate built in 1603 still stands. The status seen on entering the gate is that of Itagaki Taisuke, leader of Japan's popular right movement. The other buildeings-the highest donjon, turrets and gates-also retain their original style, though they were rebuilt around the middle of the18th century.
The donjion houses a museum exhibiting a large collection of mementoes of the Yamanouchi Family and historial assets of the province, with one wing dedicated to local people who in the 1860's became a driving force in overthrowing the Shogunate and restoring imperial rule.
Tosa was at the vanguard when Japan was at this critical turning point in her history. The 15th lord of Tosa Province, Yamanouchi Yodo for his part presented the Shogun a petition for the peaceful restoration of imperial rule. As the Shogun accepted it in 1867 a bloodless transference of the reins of goverment was tentatively achieved though its aftermath, the Boshin Civil War,was far from bloodless.
At the entrance hall of the museum, there are some exhibitions concerning two of the favorite sons of Tosa Province-Sakamoto Ryoma and Nakaoka Shintaro.
One of the captions is quoted from the postscript to vol.1 of Ryoma ga yuku, a biographical novel of Sakamoto Ryoma, written by a leading nobelist of contemporary Japan, Shiba Ryotaro:
At 19 he went up to Edo(Tokyo)to sharpen his swordsmanship. But in July of that year(1853), Edo and its vicinity were thrown into chaos:Commodore Perry of the United States arrived at Tokyo Bay, demanding the Tokugawa Shogun sign a treaty. Japan had maintained a natunal isolation policy for over two hundred years. The confusion that followed was unprecedented in the history of this country. Ryoma was simply a bewildered observer at that time.
In 1858 he returned to Kochi as an acknowledged swordsman. Then he met Kawada Shoryo, an artist-scholar, who was already well-informed about foreign affairs through acquaintance with John Manjiro. Shoryo inspired Ryoma with a vision of modern Japan as a nation fortified against Western colonialism.
In 1862 he returned to Edo after disenfranchising himself of goshi status in his home province. Soon he came to know Katsu Kaishu, the Shogun's Commissioner of the Warship Department.Katsu was among the most knowledgeable of internal and external affairs at that time.Two years earlier he had been to America as the captain of the first Japanese boat to cross the Pacific, when the Shogun sent a delegation to washington to conclude a treaty of friendship and commerce the U.S.A. He was a man of foresight, too, curiously unselfish and detached from the Shogunate he served.
Ryoma offered himself as Katsu's assistant and learned under him Western navigation and stueies includeing political science, philosophy and law.
Katsu also introduced Ryoma to his colleagus and friends. Some of them were progressive scholars or thinkers; others were politically influenrial. The latter turned out to be instrumental when Ryoma began to carry out his revolutionary plans.
First he started a trading corporarion with some of the former students of the Navy Training Institute, established by Katsu in 1864 but closed the next year when it was suspected of being "a den of radecals" and Katsu was dismissed.
Now Ryoma knew ships were his passion and that the future of Japan was on the sea-in trading. To begin with, Ryoma approached the Satsuma Clan for a schooner, setting up a corporation in Nagasaki with the Satsuma Clan as a major shareholder. This was Japan's first joint stock company.
His second plan was to include the Choshu Clan as another shareholder. Satsuma and Choshu had been hostile to each other, but if united, htey could be a formidable power to overthrow the Shogunate, which was now turningto a European colonialist to subjugate Choshu first and then other rebolurtionary clans.
Ryoma, with his trading company uniting them, made Satsuma and Choshu into company thus developed into the first de facto modern navy in Japan.
His next idea was to have someone bring forward a motion to the Shogun for the Restoration of Imperial Rule. Ryoma brought his Eight-point Plan to Goto sgihuro, Chief Secretary of Lord Yamanouchi Yodo in Tosa, his home provice. Goto felt it could be cceptable not only to the Emperor but also to the Tokugawa family if not the Shogunate itself.
In fact, his Plam, slightly revised by Goto, did prove to be acceptable to present the motion in his own name. On october 15, 1866, the Shogun Yoshinobu adopted it to avoid a great deal of further bloodshed.
That very night Ryoma planned how to organize a provisional government for the new area to come. The next day he produced a list of cabinet personnal. Both were agreed upon by all concerned.
At first they were suprised not to see the name of Ryoma himself on the list. Wasn't he the leader of this revolurion? When asked why, Ryoma simply answered, "I am not interested in working in an office. I think I'll go back to sea-the seas of the world."
Yet he stayed busy guiding the Meiji Restoration and planning the new goberment. But a month later, on november 15, on his 33rd birthday, Ryoma was assassinated in Kyoto.
Before his untimely death, however, Ryoma seemed to have done everything he thought he had to. The administrarive policy he had prepared was willingly adopted by the new government.