{"id":300205,"date":"2025-08-04T12:01:56","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T11:01:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=300205"},"modified":"2025-08-03T08:16:07","modified_gmt":"2025-08-03T07:16:07","slug":"a-japanese-childs-dream-to-end-all-wars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/08\/a-japanese-childs-dream-to-end-all-wars\/","title":{"rendered":"A Japanese Child\u2019s Dream to End All Wars"},"content":{"rendered":"

My 10-year-old third cousin-in-law, Mako Kumano, was assigned a composition subject in her 5th<\/sup> grade class:<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you were to be reborn, what would you be and what would you like to do?\u201d\u00a0 <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

With the assistance of Mako\u2019s 3rd<\/sup> cousin, Yoko Kagawa, I read most of Mako’s work with a smile, and then with poignant sadness, I read the rest of her short composition.<\/p>\n

I think it is an especially appropriate composition for the \u201cFood for Thought\u201d section of Transcend Media Service<\/em>, with its goal of \u201cSolutions-Oriented Peace Journalism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mako\u2019s consideration of the thing she would \u201clike to do most\u201d if reincarnated, brought a tear to my eyes, thinking about the preciousness of children and how we can assist and encourage them, and, also, about how too many children are suffering in our mad, contemporary, \u201cadult\u201d world.<\/p>\n

Kindly consider:<\/p>\n

\u201cIf You Were to Be Reborn: What Would You Be and What Would You Like to Do?\u201d\u00a0 \u00a0<\/strong>
\nby Mako Kumano<\/em><\/p>\n

The alarm clock was ringing at a volume a hundred times louder than usual.\u00a0 I jumped up and opened my eyes to find an alarm clock a hundred times louder than usual.\u00a0 It seemed I had been reborn as a fairy.<\/p>\n

The first thing I want to do as a fairy is to sneak into a cake shop and taste all the cakes.\u00a0 Because, I\u2019m a \u201cmaster gourmet\u201d who has a sweet tooth!<\/p>\n

The next thing I want to do is to become a police-dog fairy.\u00a0 This is a job where I catch criminals like a police dog.\u00a0 I attach a GPS to my body, sneak into the criminal\u2019s pocket, and tell the police officer where the criminal is!<\/p>\n

There are other things I want to do, too.\u00a0 I want to travel on the back of a bird, talk to natural treasures, and talk to various creatures.<\/p>\n

There are many things I want to do, but the thing I want to do most is to stop wars!\u00a0 I will sneak into the bedside of the leaders who are starting wars and persuade them to stop the wars!\u00a0 When that happens, I will use Commander Conan\u2019s \u201cbow-tie voice-changer\u201d to move the leader\u2019s heart by using the voice of the person the leader trusts and respects the most\u2026.<\/p>\n

The alarm was ringing at its usual volume.\u00a0 I jumped up and opened my eyes, and there was a normal-sized alarm clock.\u00a0 It seemed that I had been reborn as a human.\u00a0 Then, I heard my father\u2019s and mother\u2019s voices, calling me from the kitchen.<\/p>\n

_______________________________________<\/p>\n

Mako Kumano lives in Tokyo, Japan.\u00a0 She loves to write, play the violin, and is now studying ballet.\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n

Gary Corseri is a world-traveler, currently in Japan, a former professor in the US and Japan, widely published.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My 10-year-old third cousin-in-law, Mako Kumano, was assigned a composition subject in her 5th grade class:
\n\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cIf you were to be reborn, what would you be and what would you like to do?\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":136189,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[213],"tags":[2009,1012],"class_list":["post-300205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-food-for-thought","tag-anti-war","tag-food-for-thought-editorial-cartoon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=300205"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300205\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":300514,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/300205\/revisions\/300514"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=300205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=300205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=300205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}