Chapter 15The last time Hiroshi stood on his professor’s porch he was dropping out of the history department and going to America to study accounting. Back then, after what seemed like hours, with his finger close to the doorbell, he finally walked off without a word of sayonara. More than twenty years had passed since then, but when Hiroshi called that morning, Eto Sensei sounded like Hiroshi had just missed last week’s seminar. Maybe there was no need for the apology Hiroshi prepared in his head on the hour-and-a-half train ride to Yokosuka.
Eto Sensei was different from most professors. In class, he prodded students to think for themselves about government transparency, the rule of law and political reform. He revealed and explained his opinions as one way of thinking, not as truth to
