I had forgotten the date.

On Sunday, I realized it was the anniversary of the March 1 “Manse” movement. It just came and went. 

As a member of the so-called Generation X born a couple of decades after the Korean War, the day does not hold too much meaning for me.

Yet, it felt slightly odd to be celebrating it in Japan, of all places.

These thoughts led me to ponder on the way I relate to the people here in Tokyo.

For instance, when they ask me if Japanese is a difficult language to pick up, I shrug and say, it’s not too bad because of the similarities between the two tongues.

One example is the word “bag.” In both Korean and Japanese, the item is pronounced almost identically. Then I usually launch into my story about how when I was younger, I thought the word for onion in Japanese was Korean because my grandmother would always use the Japanese term.

There’s more, and I tell the stories in an animated way for I am anxious to make new friends here. But at some point, I start to feel a wave of shame slowly wash over me.

The reason behind the linguistic similarities is because of the brutal Japanese colonial rule that the Korean Peninsula was subject to in the early 1900s. And so I ask myself, what am I so happy and eager about?

And what do these people really think of my anecdotes? Do they feel superior, or are they really indifferent, as many young Japanese claim to be as they had no role in the colonization?

That is one answer I may never get.

In more ways than one, my daily encounters with the people here remind me of the nature of the dialogue between Korea and Japan over past war atrocities.

Some Japanese people, even after I politely inform them I am far from fluent in their mother tongue, widen their eyes and proceed to talk more slowly.

I repeat that I don’t really speak the language, and they speak slower still, as if I might understand if they slow down.

Or they talk louder. I am not deaf. I simply don’t know Japanese.

I am not proud of this fact, but some of these folks make me swear I will never learn the language.

For instance, there is a security guard at the home of one of my son’s friends who chooses to ignore anything I say in English.

When I say I have come to visit a “tomodachi” (a friend in Japanese) in a mix of stuttering Japanese and English he promptly launches into a series of questions without opening the door.

I know I should try to figure out what he is saying, but I start getting mad, too.

I go right on speaking in English, and he in Japanese until someone else happens to walk into the building, forcing him to open the door and call a truce.

Things are not too different between the Korean and Japanese governments, it seems.

The Shinzo Abe government has made strides economically, now that Abenomics seems to have passed the test. The Japanese economy appears to be finally coming out of the woods.

Fourth-quarter GDP did not meet expectations, but still showed promise, and the benchmark Nikkei index has touched 15-year highs over the past couple of weeks.

But to the rest of Asia, the Abe administration is far from being welcome, mainly due to its far- rightist political tendencies.

It is just like me and the stubborn security guard, talking at each other, but not with each other.

It may do the Tokyo government some good to take a cue from the late Prince Takamado, the first cousin to Emperor Akihito and formerly seventh in line to the Chrysanthemum Throne.

Before meeting his untimely death in 2002, the prince had been actively engaged in Korean affairs and encouraged ties between Korean and Japanese corporations.

He helped found a private foundation whose membership is exclusively Korean and Japanese firms, and to this day, the members gather for regular meetings.

The prince is a reminder that a friendship with Korea is not one that Japan can afford to lose, and vice versa.

For me, it is a reminder that I should try to mend fences with that impossible security guard, since, after all, I represent my country here.

The writer is the Tokyo correspondent of The Korea Herald. She can be reached at jemmie@heraldcorp.com. ― Ed.