[/floatr]Telegraph: Japanese Empress who dreams of being invisible
...The talk in the palace is of crisis, and a whiff of despair hangs in the air. This is the home of ageing Emperor Akihito and his wife, Michiko, the beautiful, accomplished commoner whose arrival in the imperial family more than 40 years ago was supposed to herald a new age of modernity. Instead, as Michiko ruefully reflected last week, on the eve of her first official visit to Britain, those dreams have been crushed by the forces of tradition and secrecy. The 72-year-old Empress is a broken butterfly. "It has been," she said during a rare, and carefully controlled, news conference, "a great challenge to get through each and every day with my sorrow and anxiety". The grim picture of Michiko's life inside the palace has taken years to leak out. Even to travel into Tokyo she must seek permission 14 days in advance. In deference to protocol she must change her kimono three times a day, keep her eyes lowered, and walk three steps behind her husband...more...
