"WORKING QUADS" HomePage
The brief history of my independent living.
Mr. Hiromichi Mukaibo of "WORKING QUADS" writer
"WORKING QUADS" No.3 writer
"WORKING QUADS" No.8 writer
"WORKING QUADS" No.9 writer
"WORKING QUADS" No.10 writer
Mr. Hiromich Mukaibo, "Working Quads" writer, lives in Kitakyushu-shi

Hiromichi Mukaibo :
'Towards Insependence,' "Working Quads" No. 3 , p.3, 1990.6, RAW

Hiromich Mukaibo : The Green Life Institute, The post card correspondent, Fukuoka-ken Kitakyushu-shi In order to earn income 150,000 yen everymonth "Working Quads" No. 8, pp.49-51, 1992.12, RAW

Hiromichi Mukaibo : The Days of Trying to be Independent, "Working Quads" No. 9, pp.29-37, 1993.12, RAW

Challenge abroad - The Record of a disabled who challenged the wider world after overcaming his annoiance
"Working Quads" No. 10, pp.56-67, 1995.3, RAW


1990.5 in Fukuoka-shi

1997, in Lucena, Philippines

1997, in Nepal

My Attendant System(1997/4/12)

The post card correspondent (1997/4/13)

Lucena, Philippines (1997/4/13)

"The Reiviving Life" in 1992 (1997/4/15)

"The Reviving Existence" in 1994 (1997/4/15)

"The Reviving Buddhism" in 1990 (1997/4/22)

'The continuation of The Reviving Buddhism' in 1996 (1997/4/22)

Mr. Stephan M. Salzberg (1997/5/8)


DEAR SIRS


HOW ARE YOU?

Would you receive my message?

FROM; MR.HIROMICHI MUKAIBO.
GREEN LIFE INSTITUTION IN JAPAN.
80801,
ADDRESS; 3106 ARIGE, KITAKYUSHU
CITY, 808-01 JAPAN.
NIFTY-ID: BXEO6432. INET ADDRESS: Lucenashi TEL & FAX:093-741-2413.

  • 1996.10, Hamamatsu,

  • The brief history of my independent living.



    1 A frog in a well

    When I caused the car accident in 1958 at the age of 20, I kept the
    high fever of more than 39 degrees for 5 months. I was confined in a general
    hospital for 3 years. Even after I discharged from it, I was only bed ridden
    for many years. Because of my poor health, I had no communication with other
    handicaped people. I was shut out from the outer world. So I was just like a
    frog in a well, knowing nothing of the great ocean, as the Japanese proverb
    says. Informations are very necessary especially for the seriously disabled.


    2 The mental conversion

    One nidht, my father came to my bed and said, "As long as you stay
    in my house, you may eat as much as your stomach is full. But I'm very sorry
    to say that I can't hire even one attendant for you, because I found all the
    expenses I paid for your care up to now is devastating dimensions. But don't
    be depressed, because you have the normal ability of ears, eyes and brains.
    You can do anything you want, if you do your best!" Then he went back to his
    room. I cried, for I was deeply moved by his encouragement. Then, I began to
    try to convert my idea to the self reliance.


    3 First experience of foreign trip

    My first tour abroad was to the Philippines with my family in 1969.
    My family members had a tacit gratitude for my miraculous life, as I was 31
    years old. We flew from Haneda Airport to Manila, where we stayed 4 nights,
    and toured Baguio 3 days.

    I made up the schedule to go around by myself and left the procedure
    of booking to a travel agency. Driving to Fukuoka Airport for our departure
    was disturbed by the heavy snow but it was already hot summer in Manila. The
    members, my parents and 3 brothers, were very exited during their new year's
    vacation. As I had a deep impression of the Philippines that the people were
    so kind and the climate was so warm I made up my mind to go back there again
    some day. My first foreign trip let me know the huge dimension of the outer
    world.


    4 The psychological development

    I began to study the Buddhist teachig 6 years after the accident. My
    long time mental struggle led my spirit to the peaceful bliss in it. Then I
    was especially attracted by its theory of equality of lives. I attended all
    of the preaches in the nearby temple. After 3 years study I burst into tears
    with Buddha's limitless endowment, when I realized even a drop-out was more
    embraced by His Compassion than the healthy people. I knew even a drop-out
    can live with dignity.

    So I decided to leave my parental home to try my independent living,
    though my parents were still in good spirits to take care of me. I dared to
    move to a solitary house on a beach at my 32 year old age in 1970.

    I challenged desperately to the various kind of works to support the
    independent living. One of the successful trials was the parking lot at the
    back of my house. To succeed in my work of clipping tickets at the entrance,
    I tried to excercise the open minded conversation with the visitors for my
    psychological development.


    5 How to finance my independent living?

    I worried about the continuity of my life because a doctor diagnosed
    me as a short life. I needed the excellent attendant to get my life longer.
    I had to earn more money than the normal persons. Then I tried to invent the
    goods and apply the patents, but I failed in them all.

    The main source of my income was the tutorial work. I recruited some
    of high school students to teach their school subjects before their entrance
    examination into colleges.

    They came to my bed side to study in groups every night. They might
    be embarrassed very much when I gave lessons to them on the bed. The problem
    of the tutorial job was my seriousness of influenza just in case when I was
    contaminated by the students. Because of the paralized nerve system on the
    chest, I was very weak on the lung so as to be scared to face them. So I was
    careful not to take charge of many students.


    6 Move to the south

    My isolated beach house was confortable in summers, but by and by I
    used to transfer to Nagasaki-bana Promontory in Kagoshima only for winters.
    Totally paralized persons can not adjust their body temperature to the very
    hot or very cold climate. They already lost the physical functions for that.
    Some one told me that the most south part of Kyushu was warm enough to avoid
    the coldness in winter seasons.

    Getting acqainted and keeping good friendship with many people there,
    I was given more chances to teach. Soon, I came to appreciate my life value
    to live even as a 'drop-out' in the society and I felt no shame to go around
    nearby villages in a wheelchair.


    7 Capitalist country, Japan

    According to the national law, however, I noticed the incorporated
    organization has big advantages because Japan is a capitalist country. So I
    established a joint stock corporation to manage my parking lots on the beach.
    I found my income increasing gradually. Now that the job was not hard for my
    disabled situation, I extended the parking buisiness in other places in the
    city proper. The project was so helpful for me to have my personal expenses
    payed by my conpany. It means I can easily prepare the equipment and devices
    for my independent living.


    Advancing and retreating alternatively

    In the management of parking lots and the tutorial job, People were
    kind to me, but not always generous. I had to exert myself to reward their
    kindness. If I was too abusive, my works would not go well. We suppose that
    an independent living will not be attained easily in a wheelchair, so it was
    strange 23 years ago for me to try it even on the bed. My earning was small
    always but big enough to renovate the house sometimes. At the age of 33 in
    1971, I concluded that the watcher in the parking lot was one of the most
    suitable jobs for disabled persons in a wheelchair, because it doesn't need
    hard works in a sitting position. Sometimes I was moved by the bliss given
    by the Great Life.


    8 The dishes for the independence

    In 1977, 7 years after my runaway from home, I was over mid thirties
    but the journey to the independent living was only half of the way. Always
    I was attacked by the lack of money but I squeezed it by eating wild grasses
    and genmai rice to minimize my daily expenses. Chewing hard rice for hundred
    times gave me the grateful hope for the future. By attending preaches in the
    Buddhist temple I recovered a good balance of mind. The mental and physical
    nourishment contributed to the rapid progress for the further development of
    my life.


    9 Challenging to a big buisiness

    Then I planned to construct a building on the leased land in front
    of the railroad station where I had been running a parking lot. Just after
    11 times designs through trials and errors, I could finally manage to make
    up the ideal blueprints which had the space for the rental office up to the
    3rd floor and the apaltments from the 4th to 7th floor. All apaltment rooms
    had a dining kitchen and a living room facing to the south. In designing the
    building I was bold enough to trust and employ a Korean classmate in my high
    school days in spite of our disclimination against the neibouring country.


    10 Running a commercial building

    When I applied a loan for the plan to Public Financial Corporation
    for Housing in Fukuoka, it was fortunately accepted. About 70 % of the con-
    struction capital (\160,000,000.) was financed by it. In February in 1979,
    the 7 stories high building was completed after the construction period of
    more or less 1 year. I had the building painted green to attract tenants.

    I am very thankful to the managing job of the building because I can
    hire attendants to maintain my independent living without asking any help to
    my brothers and relatives. It took me a lot of time to find at last a trust-
    ful employee who could manage the pecuniary task and the maintenance of the
    building instead of me. The human relation seems to be one of the most hard
    subjects to study for the disabled persons.


    11 Suffering from a nervous breakdown

    After all, I guess that disabled people with the higher portion of a
    spinal cord injury can earn more money for their life expenses when they are
    employers than employees. But my business was about to bankrupt 1 year after
    the inaugulation because of few tenants. I could cope with it by the new dis
    -counted rate of rental fee. Soon after that mental supression, the nervous
    breakdown attacked me suddenly.

    My self-confidence in the Buddhist insight was crushed by it. Then,
    I was motivated to open my office room on the 4th floor in order to discuss
    on the teachings together with the fellows once a month. Thus, after having
    a narrow escape from the financial and psychological crisis, it took me 10
    years to get well completely from the mental sickness.


    12 No one cares for me

    One day in my 44 years old age, the old stay-in attendant asked me 2
    months vacation to help her daughter's baby delivery. It is extremely hard
    for a disabled person to find a hospital or institution in an emergency. I
    was too much depressed to suppose my independent living stranded. I knew the
    reality that if a caretaker has to go away, a disbled may be the first to be
    forsaken. I had to look desperately for the place for my emergency care.

    One of my friends running a night club often visited the Philippines
    to recruit dancers and singers. He advised me that if I would have gone to
    Manila, I had found thousands of jobless nurses. So many coutries, so many
    customs. I was thankful to the new chance to survive.


    13 The 2nd tour to the Philippines

    With my eyes closed I flew directly from Fukuoka to Manila as one of
    tourists. On arriving at a big hotel in July in 1982 I requested a bell boy
    to dial to a relief squads of the hotel repeatedly to hire an attendant for
    me. Fortunately at last the personnel there dispatched a friend of his as my
    private nurse. Then she gave me a good advice to stay in a hospital with the
    cheaper expenses. I moved to a hospital after 2 nights stay in the hotel. I
    spent 2 months under the emergency care abroad for the first time, and came
    back to Japan with no troubles. It might be true that heaven helps those who
    help themselves.


    14 Planning "Disabled Home"

    A disabled person (Fukuoka Prefecture, Spinal cord injury, Motorbike
    accident, Born in 1954) called me by telephone and requested me to accompany
    him to the Philippines. He wished to find his life partner. Since November
    in 1983 we spent 4 months in the provincial areas in the north and south of
    Luzon Island.

    Among those checked areas in my research, Lucena city was one of the
    best places regarding as the natural environment and a citizen's hospitality.
    Soon I challenged to a housing project for disabled people in concert with a
    rich family there, but finally I retreated from it for the reason of so many
    traps they set. It may be true that the richness is so far from the honesty.


    15 What is the advantage of the Philippines?

    As for the most disabled persons, we have no problems if we can main
    -tain our independent living in Japan with the expenses of less than $800.00
    which 1st class disabled can receive monthly as a national pension. Disabled
    people are now facing the serious reality that unless we can rely on our old
    parents or public institutions, we can not live. We must keep on our living
    even at the dead end of the earth.

    I tried to research the Philippines, Thailand, Korea, China, Taiwan
    and other countries about the possibility of constructing a diabled people's
    base. I could find many advantages in the Philippines where we can enjoy the
    merits of near distance to reach, cheap commodity prices, the warm whether,
    the availability of broken English and kind hospitality of the people there.

    Especially in Lucena city, genuine water and air are attractive. As
    it is on the bay, sea foods are abundant. The attendants know well how to be
    satisfied with a little income, so they work dilligently and honestly.


    16 Construction of 'Disabled Home'

    Returning to Japan from a tour to the Philippines, my father, almost
    blind, told me to take him to the Philippines next time. Soon I contacted my
    attendant in Lucena city by overseas call and told her to buy a lot of 250mxm
    in a subdivision to begin the construction very soon. After 3 months a small
    house of 27mxm was built but my father had already passed away. 19 days later,
    my mother died, too. In spite of my economical independence, I felt the deep
    sorrow and cried at nights.

    Year by year the scale of the facilities was developed. In 1997, the
    'Disabled Home' has 5 bed rooms and 4800mxm farm, where a small wood curving
    factory is operated to give jobs to Philipino disabled people. 117 pieces of
    second-hand wheel chairs in Japan were brought to the 'Disabled Home' for 10
    years to be donated to them.


    17 Green Life Institution in Nepal

    If my parents are alive I must consult a trip schedule to them every
    time. But now I can decide it by myself. One year after their death, I payed
    a pilgrimage tour for 45 days with my two friends to the Buddhist relics in
    Nepal and India. Then I happened to meet and speak to the Western youths. I
    was surprised to convince they wished to study Buddhist teaching as well as
    enjoy trecking in Himalayan mountains.

    Since those encounters, I conceived the dream of constructing Green
    Life Institution in Nepal to help Western young men stay and study Buddhist
    principles there. I also made a plan to begin producing wheelchairs in order
    to contribute to the social welfare in Nepal. The difficulty in the strange
    places taught me the necessity of a confidence which seems to be essential
    and indispensible to my independent living.


    18 Success owing to all others

    In 1987, 7 years after the inaugration of my commercial building, all
    went so well with my balance sheets that I could keep self-confidence that I
    could push thruogh many social welfare projects without asking the financial
    aid to other people for the life time.

    Many disabled friends began to enjoy visiting 'Disabled Home' in the
    Philippines. Some of them fell in love with a Filipina attendant and settled
    after the marriage. Green Life Institution in Nepal was constructed in 1995.
    According to my research trip to Nepal, I could not find a good location for
    the wheel chair production. So I operated the project on the 3rd floor of it.

    We are helping each other in this world and sharing the sufferings.
    Now I know the success in my independent living after a long struggle mainly
    owe to all other people. I am happy to pay back my indebtedness by contribut
    -ing to the society.


    19 Trip around the world

    I visited Chinese Buddhist ruins in her western desert for 17 days
    in 1983. The teaching of Buddha bloomed in my mind so that I might have no
    threatening or scare even in a rough country. Afterwards I made the journeys
    likewise to many countries in Europe, North and South America and Asia. When
    I joined the disabled assembly in Brasil in 1994, I had the honor to make a
    speach on the stage for 30 minutes. Then I insisted on the disadvantages of
    believing superstition and cursing. If we advance the right way of truth and
    reality, we will have no torture on the disabled situation at all. The truth
    and reality will give us a hope and bravery in the practical sense. We must
    after all come to thank for them to a great extent.

    I admired in the journey that the world was beatiful, but it was go-
    ing to be destroyed by the human greed. It has been said the whole is limit-
    less and immeasurable and a man is tiny, but as a matter of fact we are eat-
    ing the beauty of nature. As for us, we have to appeal 'the social welfare
    and the environmental protection' based on the religious insight.


    20 To a bigger dimension

    I publicated the books such as 'The Reviving Buddhism' in 1990, its
    English version in 1991,'The Reviving Life' in 1992,'The Reviving Existence'
    in 1994 and 'The continuation of The Reviving Buddhism' in 1996, in order to
    appeal the equality of all existences in the Buddhist sense to the public.
    As all my books were well sold in our local area I could afford to construct
    the extension of the building in Nepal to begin a small factory for wielding
    the wheel chairs.

    As well as the accomodation fee in the Philippines, one night stay
    in Nepal will cost $5.00. The cheap expenses will enable many young men to
    absorb the principle of the equality. Then they will be able to send various
    informations of the new era to many institutes in the world. By the way, we
    can hope that even disabled persons supply the update message to the society
    as a result of their sensitivity to the social problems such as the equality
    and disclimination.

    We have to study the theory of 'the complete equality' and adopt it
    to the construction of the new society. It will be the disabled persons who
    can contribute to it.




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