One afternoon in the mid-1980s, Hiroko Kimura was taking a rest from sightseeing on a park bench in Adelaide, southern Australia. As she was enjoying the warm sunshine, she spotted the words "Japs go home" carved into the wood. This was the height of the bubble years and Kimura was aware that some people resented Japanese companies buying up Australian land, but she hadn't known the hatred ran this deep.
"From that moment on," she says, "I made up my mind to do something to bring together Australian and Japanese people."
For anybody else, such a decision probably would have been forgotten as soon as they returned to their daily lives. But when Kimura sets her heart on achieving something, it's very hard to dissuade her. Take, for example, the time she resolved to teach herself to read and write. Then, the moment she decided to become a professional artist. Not forgetting when, at the age of 18, she taught herself how to walk . . .
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