Actively Introducing Japanese Culture
After visiting the Karate1 Premier League – Paris 2016, we traveled from Paris to Madrid, Spain, and visited the Japanese Embassy in Spain and met with Ambassador Kazuhiko Koshikawa on Jan 27 (Wednesday).
The Japanese Embassy actively introduces Japanese culture by hosting mochi-making events, kagami biraki, and budo demonstrations, and considers budo an important element in their activities.
Ambassador Koshikawa was well-versed in the situation for karate to be added to the Tokyo Olympics and said he was looking forward to the sport being officially added to the Games. We were surprised by the ambassador’s depth of knowledge and also felt encouraged as an involved party to have a man in this position appreciate karate.
Because the WKF headquarters are located in Madrid, President Espinós also visited the Embassy with us. There have been many karate instructors who traveled from Japan to Spain, one of them being Mr. Yamashita. He emigrated to Spain half a century ago and worked to popularize karate and also to manage the Japanese as the previous chairman of the Japanese Association in Spain.
IOC Meeting in Switzerland
The day after we visited the Embassy, we headed to Switzerland with President Mr.Antonio Espinós and attended a meeting with the officials in charge of the Tokyo Olympics at the IOC headquarters.
Our first overseas business trip of the year concluded safely and we attended many functions in Japan the following week that were deeply involved with the Olympics. We will make a report in our next newsletter.
World Karate Federation General Secretary
Toshihisa Nagura
