This spring the Japanese suffered from face mask shortages.
Then, the former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hit upon an idea of distributing face masks to every nation.
His idea seemed marvellous, but ended in failure.
Why? Because:
(1) He spent too much national budget on it, which became controversial.
(2) The design of the mask was far from fashionable (seemed the same shape as the one when the Spanish flu was spreading).
(3) Some of them turned out to be defective and it took time to retrieve and redistribute them.
Before his mask went around every nation, the mask shortages had been resolved.
This obsolete mask was named Abe-no-mask (meaning Abe’s mask) and worn by nobody but Mr. Abe. Even his Cabinet members refused to wear it, still only Mr. Abe stuck to it.
At last, his obstinacy was criticized on a TV program and finally he gave up wearing his cloth mask. When he declared his resignation, he wore modern cloth mask.
He resigned not because of the failure of his “mask policy” but of his chronic bowel disease.
It seemed that his sensitiveness (and possibly stubbornness) worsened his illness.
I feel pity for him, and so do most Japanese, probably.
By the way, Japan has experienced many large earthquakes and everyone prepares baggage to take out in the emergency. I put Abe-no-mask into my baggage.
Later, I asked my acquaintances “Where have your Abe-no-mask gone?”
Whoever I asked, they said they had put it into emergency baggages.
Face masks are essential for evacuation because many people get together, and we have to prevent us from not only infection, but also dryness, dust, coldness and sometimes TV cameras.
When an earthquake occurs and we seek shelter, we will find everyone wears Abe-no-mask and that will be the time we thank to him.
