By today, Ken Taylor will be back in his native Australia after a month in France and three weeks in Japan. He says he always learns something from his trips here -- 17 to date -- but at our time of meeting has no idea what that is. "The process can take a long time, or I may know when I step off the plane. Right now it's hard to tell."
We talk on a veranda overlooking Sagami Bay -- or rather he talks and I listen. He knows what he wants to talk about -- his relationship with Japan. Amazingly he is not at all put out by the fact that a house is being built next door. Maybe the lure of the sea is too strong? He spent several years from age 19 as a fireman aboard boats carrying meat from Australia and New Zealand to Europe. This sounds like an education in itself. "Once I was so rude I nearly got thrown overboard."