I was very lax in considering the matter of status, it simply not being my instinct to concern myself with such things.

They all listened solemnly as I recounted my view on how influence status can creep up on someone who works busily, not pursuing these ends in themselves, but for the satisfaction of performing his tasks to the best of his ability.

If it wasn’t to do with me, then I wonder what it could have been to make them pull out like that. It seemed to me that there was something unnaturally deliberate in the way my daughter uttered these words.

The world seems to have gone mad. Every day there seems to be a report of someone else killing himself in apology. Tell me, Mr. Miyake, don’t you find it all a great waste? After all, if your country is at war, you do all...