A River in Darkness

“Grab…Destiny by the Throat and Wring Its Neck” 

Masaji Ishikawa doesn’t believe in a set destiny from birth. He believes he had five births. And he fought for his life each time. In 2000, he published his autobiography in his native Japan under the pseudonym Shunsuke Miyazake to document his five lives – including spending 36 oppressive years in North Korea before fleeing in 1996. 

“Born Between Two Worlds”  

From the moment of he was born, Masaji Ishikawa had to live between two worlds. His mother was Japanese; his father was Korean. Named Masaji in Japanese and Do Chan-sun in Korean, he had what he calls his “first birth” in 1947 in Kawasaki. Though his family had little money, he had a happy childhood in the farming neighborhood of Mizonokuchi, Japan. His mother, Miyoko, came from a well-respected family with close community ties. Her family viewed Koreans as barbarians. Her older brothers had fought with the Japanese army in Manchuria and described Koreans as gorillas –&#...