Presents Gifts to Students : First Lady, in Tokyo, Visits ‘Sister School’

First Lady Nancy Reagan arrived Monday night, eager to see her husband after learning that rockets launched by Japanese radicals had landed near the state Guest House before the President arrived for welcoming ceremonies on Sunday.

In Tokyo, the First Lady began another day of cultural events this morning with a visit to a “sister school” of an elementary school in Washington D.C.

Mrs. Reagan was on a separate, two-day tour of the Malaysian and Thai capitals when the rockets--which contained no explosives--were launched by a Japanese radical group. She learned of them from her Secret Service detail after attending a Sunday luncheon in Bangkok with Prime Minister Prem Tinsulanonda.

Telephoned Husband

Mrs. Reagan called her husband immediately.

“He said he was fine,” she said on board her Air Force jet bound for Tokyo. “I’m glad it wasn’t more serious.”

She admitted that the incident alarmed her, but added, “I’m always worried. That’s just me.”

In Tokyo today, the First Lady visited the Nagata-cho Elementary School in downtown Tokyo, a public school that has graduated two of Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone’s children.

Schools Exchange Gifts

The entire student body of 200 children from preschool to 6th grade participated in a welcoming program and an exchange of hand-painted murals and gifts with the Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in Washington, making them sister schools.

Mrs. Reagan visited the U.S. school, located in a slum neighborhood in the nation’s capital, several weeks ago to pick up the mural and letters, written by the children, to pass on to the Japanese students.

Accompanied by Tsutako Nakasone, the prime minister’s wife, Mrs. Reagan listened as a Japanese boy in blue shorts stood on the stage with a microphone and read, in English, a short speech about the exchange of letters.

He also read a portion of his own letter to a U.S. student, which said, in part: “Our school is very nice. At lunchtime we play baseball. I’ve only been four months in this school so I don’t know that much.”

Statues, T-Shirts

Mrs. Reagan also presented the school with a two-foot-tall copy of the Statue of Liberty, T-shirts with pictures of the statue on them and a certificate signed by Chrysler Corp. Chairman Lee A. Iacocca, who led a fund-raising drive to refurbish the statue.

The children, many of them dressed in blue and white kimonos, played her a song on the taiko, a large drum beaten with sticks.

Another group of students carried a small Shinto shrine on stage, loudly chanting “ Washoi, “ in a ceremony that is said to bring the spirit of the local deity down to the proceedings.

Flowers, Dancing

Still other students performed a traditional folk dance, and everyone in the auditorium joined in, waving blue cardboard hats decorated with red tissue flowers.

The First Lady joined one group of children on stage as they all held hands, and everyone sang, “You Are My Sunshine,” swaying to the beat.

“I enjoyed seeing you perform very much,” Mrs. Reagan told the children. “Thank you. I can’t wait to go back and give these letters to the children at Martin Luther King Elementary School. I hope this will bring you a long and a lasting friendship with them. I’m sure it will.”

Later in the day, Mrs. Reagan was scheduled to attend a traditional Japanese tea ceremony and then cap the day by accompanying the President to a state banquet at the Imperial Palace, hosted by Emperor Hirohito.