Gotai Fumanzoku

Gotai Fumanzoku (Japanese - English version Nobody's Perfect)
by Hirotada Ototake
reviewed by zlel

I could not agree more with the author of this book. I have thought about these issues before, but hearing from one who is, by societal standards, severely handicapped, it both confirmed and expanded what I thought we should be doing for the physically disabled, driving home one basic point - the last thing they need is charity and cheap pity.

Gotai Fumazoku, which title is a word play on "gotai manzoku" meaning"able bodied", preduleds beautifully with how the author was born into a family of love. A mother, who didn't get to see her child for a whole month after giving birth but told that the child had to be kept away because of jaundice, had finally to be told that her child was born without limbs. An empty bed was put on stand-by, knowing that this was probably too great a shock for her. But at that moment she saw her child, there was no wild shouting nor crying. All she said was simply "he's beautiful".

Such was the superwoman he felt his mother was. This was a family that refused to believe that their son could not live up to the challenges of an ordinary education - and made sure their son received one. But it was not so much of this determination or faith that made this book stand out. It was what he thought of himself, and how his peers took to him.

One thing that left a deep impression on my mind was his comment on how his classmates in primary school helped him out in class. Every Art lesson, the students would all rush to the back of the class to collect their Art Kits. Being innocent little children, they would help Hirotada collect his kit too - but the teacher felt very strongly that Hirotada should be responsible for what he could manage himself. So everytime he went to the back of his class on the stubs that were his limbs, the whole class would wait for him. Through this whole episode, the author opened for us two "inside worlds" - first, the thoughts of his teacher, revealing the depth of the education the teacher was offering here, as opposed to our syllabus-driven drills that seem to be in place just so that exams can be taken; and second, how the author felt that his classmates were merely helping him in a manner that was such "a matter of fact" - not out of pity or gulit, but simply and naturally lending a helping hand where one was needed.

I thought these were the two deepest core themes in the book -branching into issues such as "barrier-free" societies, discussing how the responsibility of the society towards the handicapped is not to provide materially nor to give their welfare special treatment, but rather, to give them an equal chance that they may live in the same society just as everyone else does. Coming from a handicapped individual who managed to make it through normal education into university, one cannot but feel that he was one who "got everything right".

I'll leave you with just one more thought. During Hirotada's schooldays, his favourite lesson was PE. He loved Soccer, and was later in the school Basketball team. As for how this was possible...oh well, go read the book.