(JP)Port recalls when whale boats returned lopsided with catch

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IDLE HARPOONS

 

Port recalls when whale boats returned lopsided with

catch

 

First of three parts

 

By KAZUHIRO KIMURA

 

TAIJI, Wakayama Pref. (Kyodo) During the heyday of

commercial whaling in the 1960s, the town of Taiji

prospered as the cradle of whaling, supplying gunners

to seven fleets of Japanese ships that headed south to

the Antarctic to hunt the giant mammals.

Today, just 10 people in the town in the southeastern

part of Wakayama Prefecture continue the tradition,

seizing small coastal water whales that are excluded

from the International Whaling Commission's ban on

commercial whaling.

 

Japanese have long been accustomed to whale meat,

which was a major source of protein in the lean years

after World War II.

 

Deep-fried whale meat was a staple listed on school

lunch menus and was the basis of many popular dishes

that appeared on tables in homes.

 

But since Japan ceased commercial whaling in April

1988, whale meat has become a delicacy, and what

little available now is a high-grade food item found

in specialty restaurants in Tokyo and elsewhere.

 

Taiji is widely known as the birthplace of coastal

whaling, with a history dating back to 1606, when

groups of people in the town began whaling with

hand-held harpoons. Excavations have shown that

whaling occurred even before that in Japan, possibly

as early as 200 B.C.

 

Shimasaburo Hamai, 76, was a gunner on an oceangoing

whaling ship from 1954 to 1976. He still lives in

Taiji, where some 400 people -- around one in 10

residents -- were whalers in the 1960s when commercial

whaling was at its height.

 

At that time, about 10,000 people from across the

nation were making regular expeditions to the

Antarctic aboard the seven whaling fleets.

 

" Those men in Taiji who knew whales were recruited by

head hunters, " Hamai said.

 

Japan was catching more than 6,000 whales a year, and

about 200,000 tons of whale meat flooded the domestic

fish markets.

 

" Whales provided for 10 million Japanese or about 10

percent of the nation's population in postwar years, "

said Takeshi Saika, director of the Taiji Whale

Museum.

 

Japan was forced to halt its commercial whaling in

1988, however, in the face of rising public opposition

to whaling in the United States and other countries,

driven by fears the creatures were on the verge of

extinction.

 

The population of Taiji has fallen by 20 percent from

what it was in the 1960s.

 

Excluding ships that catch whales for scientific

study, there are only five ships in Japan still

whaling. They capture about 180 small whales a year --

the quota allotted to the nation as those exempt from

the IWC ban -- and a variety of dolphins.

 

Recalling the days when he was an active whale hunter,

Hamai said: " A whaling ship would run at full speed to

the deep Antarctic Ocean. The waters rose above the

surface of the sea and a giant blue whale measuring

more than 20 meters would leap out. We had only two

seconds to harpoon and catch it.

 

" If we didn't hit it right, the whale would swim away

under sea pulling our 700-ton ship along behind with

the rope tied to the harpoon. "

 

Hamai also said that the scenes of his boyhood --

small ships returning to Taiji, lopsided under the

weight of their catch, with the sun setting behind

them -- are still seared into his memory.

 

" They were really something to see, " he said.

 

 

The Japan Times: June 26, 2001

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