Overcoming a 15-Year Age Gap, They Developed Their Love by Exchange Diary

Helene & Yutaka

“If God exists, he will surely find me wherever I may live.” It was at a university in Paris that a French girl, Helene, met Yutaka for the first time. Since they walked the same route every morning, they became acquainted with each other and naturally started to talk. Before long, they began to wonder how the other was if they had not seen each other for a few days.

The pair met in the ‘80s when Yutaka dressed like a hippie, a fashionable style at the time. Helene thought he must be two or three years older than her, as generally Oriental people look younger than their age. Later when Yutaka said he was born in Shouwa (Japanese Era) 22, she misunderstood and thought that he was 22 years old. It was many years later when she found out that he was actually 15 years older than her.

After graduating from university, Yutaka returned to Japan. But, the pair happened to meet each other again. When Helene went to Algeria to visit her relatives, Yutaka was staying in Algeria on business as an interpreter and coincidently staying in an accommodation facility for foreigners that was run by her relatives. This meeting brought Yutaka and Helene into a closer relationship,

If they were in Paris, they would have fallen in love at once, however, they were in Algeria, which is an Islamic society where young men and women are not allowed to see each other and yet there were neither cellular phones nor e-mail communication at that time. They wrote a diary alternatively to exchange their feelings of love and this lasted for two years. However, Helene’s parents opposed her marrying Yutaka.

“My cousins and friends were betting that I didn’t have enough courage to elope,” she says. But Helene had made up her mind to marry him. Inviting her cousins, friends, and Yutaka’s friends living in Paris, they held a wedding ceremony. “I didn’t go to see my parents as I was afraid to tell them. I’m disobedient to my parents, aren’t I?” When Helene gave birth to a baby and her parents found out that she was very happy, they were allowed her decision at last.

Helene came to Japan for the first time after they married. Yutaka’s parents had accepted the couples’ marriage. Yutaka’s family and relatives work in many different occupations, including diplomat and an overseas airline crew member, so Helene didn’t have any difficulties communicating as many of them had international mentalities and could speak French. Yutaka’s family didn’t treat Helene as a foreigner, good or bad.

Helene says her main difficulty was food. “Whatever food is served, it looks mysterious to me,” she says in fluent Japanese. “I hate worms, therefore, when I saw a zenmai (wild fiddleheads) for the first time, I though they are trying to make me eat earthworms,” said. “What I have a problem with now is how to read and write Japanese. When I have to fill in a clerical document such as an insurance application, even now I say ‘Good Heavens!’”

“Japan is a paradise for women, isn’t it? Because if they want to be more beautiful, they can obtain as much information about beauty as they need, and also there can’t be another country in the world where a woman can get on a subway alone at night,” Helene says about her Japanese way of life. At present she has a sweet home and is working as a principal of a language school in Kawasaki.