Little Caterpillar in Training (Book)

"Little Caterpillar in Training: A Culture in Transition and It's Mixed Child in Post-war Japan" gives an inside glimpse of growing up steeped in Japanese tradition while battling the racial prejudice that made Grace Lee’s life a fight to survive. It is a saga showing how an interracial marriage can affect a child growing up as an outcast in a socially prominent Japanese family after World War II against the backdrop of a country moving rapidly from tradition, through war and defeat, and toward transformation.

Each chapter offers a snapshot of life in a privileged – if quirky – family. Living behind walls in the former Governor’s Mansion, the daily challenges faced by Grace’s mother ranged from training Grace to master the delicate and precise movements of a perfect tea ceremony to dealing with Grandfather’s geisha chaos. The book demonstrates an adventurous childhood including the day she and her friends found a dead man in the park and the night they waited forever at the Officers’ Club in Yokohama to see American pop star Chubby Checker who stormed off the stage when he encountered what he perceived as racial prejudice. Most importantly, the book is about how Grace transformed her danger and others prejudice by greeting hostility on the street with a welcoming smile, turning fear into curiosity, and sometimes into friendship.

Through a bewildering childhood, Grace struggled to find out where she could fit in to this pure-bred world, and when suicide seemed the way out, a gentle, otherworldly presence showed her how to deal with the constant barrage of prejudice, giving insights into how the universe works, the “why” of suffering and how to transcend it, and the strength to survive. Though she was “a little caterpillar in training” in a hostile environment, this “Presence” has provided never ending assurance that someday she’ll be the butterfly that shares its courage with others so they can face the challenges of fulfilling their destinies.