The Big Hello

On his bury-the-hatchet tour of Southeast Asia last year, Japan's Premier Nobusuke Kishi found the Filipinos least ready of all of Tokyo's World War II victims to forgive and forget. Only a military guard greeted him at Manila airport, and the Philippine public turned a cold shoulder. The stiffly formal meetings with Filipino officials were chilled by arguments over Japan's reparations payments ($550 million promised) to the Philippines. Last week, on the first anniversary of Kishi's icy reception in Manila, the Philippines' President Carlos Garcia went to Tokyo. Hoping that flattery would get them somewhere, the Japanese welcomed the former guerrilla leader, on whose head they had once placed a price of $50,000, like a long-lost brother.

Emperor Hirohito and other members of the royal family greeted Garcia, his wife and party of 22 on a red carpet at Tokyo airport, to the thunder of a 21-gun salute. For the next five days the Garcias, who like to live well both at home and abroad, were treated like royalty. Stung by criticism of her taste for jewelry and the corruption in her husband's regime (TIME, April 21), Mrs. Garcia wore her jewels only twice.

Titanic Proportions. A gold-crusted coach drawn by six bays hauled the Garcias in style to the Imperial Palace. At a lavish banquet, court musicians played those old Japanese airs, Haydn's 17th Symphony and selections from The Barber of Seville, and gifts were exchanged all around (including a stole and purse for Crown Prince Akihito's bride-to-be, who ' was barred by Japanese protocol from attending). Amiable Old Pol Garcia soon had the shy Emperor beaming on him.

Addressing a joint session of the Japanese Diet, something no foreigner had ever done, Garcia noted that Japan and the Philippines, "two of the countries in the Far East that have come under the beneficent influence of democracy," were caught by geography and defense strategy "in a portentous drama of titanic proportions." He was cheered mightily.

Touring the Japanese countryside, Garcia heard the cheers of dock workers, the praise of industrialists, even saw one of Japan's on-the-dot express trains brought to a halt so that his entourage could pass. "My God," remarked one Garcia aide, "the treatment we are getting! Here we are kings. In the United States [last June] we were beggars."

Legacy of Suspicion. At Osaka, Garcia delivered his message to Japanese merchants: "Among Japan's underdeveloped neighbors, the wounds of battle have not been completely healed. We know the most effective way to wipe out the legacy of suspicion and hostility is for Japan to extend them credits."

When he boarded his Viscount for home, Garcia had the promise of $48.8 million in loans from Japan to help him build the Marikina Dam, buy machinery and to expand the Philippine telephone system. He tactfully made no mention of another part of the Japanese reparations: a $2,500,000 yacht now being built in Tokyo for the exclusive use of the President of the Philippines himself.

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