Remarks at the Waimea Cherry Blossom Heritage Festival

Yoshi Kamo, Consul General of Japan

February 04, 2012 

Good Morning! Aloha!

It is certainly great to see you all this morning here. Thank you very much for inviting us, my wife Etsuko and me, to this signature event of Waimea, blessed and beautiful community in the Big Island. I guess many of you take pride in many things you have in Waimea: Parker Ranch, HPA and so forth. And this heavenly weather we are enjoying well testifies that Waimea is a blessed town in the blessed island. Cherry blossom is one of these attributes to Waimea. It is certainly my great honor and privilege to take part in this Cherry Blossom Heritage Festival that has been in existence for the past almost two decades to celebrate the arrival of spring by admiring cherry blossoms at Church Row Park.

This year’s Festival has an added significance. That is to say that we are going to have a cherry tree seedlings planting event at Church Row Park shortly after this opening ceremony. This year marks the centennial anniversary for the presentation of cherry blossom trees from Japan to the United States. The idea of donating cherry trees to the United States as a symbol of friendship was first conceived by Yukio Ozaki, then Mayor of Tokyo and a founding father of the Japanese parliamentary democracy and subsequently carried out in 1912 in the form of   donating 3,000 seedlings of cherry blossom trees to the United States from Japan They were planted along Potomac River. As they grew and bloomed, it became one of the most renowned sites for cherry blossoms viewing. In order to commemorate its centennial anniversary and appreciate our friendly ties that cherry blossoms symbolize, the Japanese government has decided to launch a nation-wide cherry blossom tree planting campaign in the United States for long-lasting friendship between the United States and Japan.

Waimea is and will be a special place for Japanese and U.S.-Japan relations. I would like you, Waimea residents, to remember the following two facts. What I would like to point out first is that as I said, the 2012 nation-wide cherry tree planting drive actually starts from here. The cherry blossom tree planting that we are going to do today is the very first event which kicks off the series of subsequent cherry tree plantings taking place throughout the nation this year.

I said that we are going to have a tree planting ceremony in which we plant seedlings of cherry blossom trees. They are not just other ordinary seedlings but are very special ones, resulting from a collaboration of Hawaii and Japan. That is to say that the seedlings were made from seeds imported from Japan and nurtured and grown in the Hawaiian soil. They themselves reflect our good relations of friendship and cooperation.

You know that many people have contributed to making our cherry blossom trees planting today possible. Among them, Dr. Tetsuo Koyama is worthy of special mentioning. He is the very man who conceived the idea of importing seeds from Japan and letting them grow in the Hawaiian soil. He knows that Hawaii is not an ideal place for cherry trees to grow and bloom because Hawaii lacks severe winters. Cherry blossoms never bloom without cold winters. So he tried to bring the seeds of some Japanese varieties grown in southern Japan to Hawaii. He was able to import the seeds from Japan and now got healthy seedlings thanks to the kind and substantive support from the local community. So before long we will be able to admire genuine Japanese cherry blossoms in Waimea.

The other significant fact relates to Their Majesties. Perhaps you remember that about two and a half years ago, Their Majesties the Emperor and Empress of Japan visited Waimea. On their way back from North America, they stop by at Hawaii. To make the matter more interesting, they visited Waimea before they left Hawaii. They had a good time here, enjoying the Paniolo Show at Parker Ranch. So Waimea is the last place where Their Majesties visited in the United States. This is the place where they left their last foot prints in the United States. Isn’t this something? Although people would think Waimea is a beautiful but ordinary little town, they are wrong in an important way. It occupies a special place from the perspective of our bilateral relations. Among the Japanese, Waimea will be remembered as the last U.S. town visited by Their Majesties and as the first place where cherry blossom trees were planted in the 2012 nation-wide cherry trees planting campaign.

Thank you and you have a great day!