Beaten Japanese Visitors Don’t Hold It Against U.S.

America is a big country, they were told before leaving their native Japan.

They arrived and found it was true. American cars, malls, even dinner portions were all built on a larger scale. As were the youths who attacked them unexplicably last week when they walked down a street in Clairemont in broad daylight.

The two Japanese visitors, Yutaka Ozaki and Hidekazu Kobayashi, both 20, were punched and kicked during a Feb. 22 attack on a street corner five blocks from Ozaki’s host family’s home. The two came as exchange students in a monthlong program at UCSD, where they study English and learn about American culture.

Kobayashi suffered a broken nose and a chipped tooth in the beating; Ozaki was bruised. Both were puzzled.

Because no robbery took place and the victims did nothing to provoke a fight, the pummeling appears to have been motivated by race, police said. Detectives are looking for the assailants, three black teen-agers, possibly members of a street gang.

In an interview Tuesday, Ozaki and Kobayashi insisted that the incident was a random, not racial, beating. They said their ethnicity was not a factor.

Kobayashi said he, like many Japanese, has difficulty understanding racial strife, because most people in Japan are of the same race, making beatings over skin color almost non-existent.

He is aware of mounting tensions between Japan and the United States, Kobayashi said. But international conflict comes at the governmental level; how could global politics have spurred a fist-to-jaw assault by teen-agers?

“We think it was an unfortunate accident,” Kobayashi said. “There are strange people wherever you go.”

Immediately after the incident, Ozaki said through an interpreter, “They passed by us, and I saw their eyes. They turned around, and I felt I had done something wrong. I should not have looked at their eyes. They said something. We didn’t understand. I looked downward. They started beating us up.”

Ozaki and Kobayashi had money--they were on their way to a music store to shop for compact discs, Detective Bob McManus said. But their money was not taken. After being knocked to the ground, Ozaki and Kobayashi were kicked at and stepped on by two of the youths, McManus said.

“Nothing the students did provoked that kind of violence,” the detective said. “The motivation behind the attack, as far as I can tell, was that the victim’s faces have (Asian) features and they looked vulnerable. That’s a hate crime, regardless how the students feel about it.”

According to state law, if hate is found to be primary motivation of a crime such as assault, a stiffer sentence may be imposed, McManus said.

Descriptions of the attackers are murky, he said. The incident happened too quickly for a good look, the victims told police. Across the street, a woman with a stroller noticed a disturbance and saw three young men running away.

They were 5 foot, 8 or 9 inches tall; all had medium builds, police said. Their clothing was not particularly memorable. They wore black pants. Their shirts and shoes were combinations of black, red, and white.

Kobayashi and Ozaki were invited to the United States after completing course work at the Yomiuri College of Foreign Languages and International Business, a two-year college for employees of Japan’s largest daily newspaper, Yomiuri Shimbun. Both students earned their tuition as newspaper carriers for the Yomiuri. The UCSD program was arranged for 26 of the school’s top students, said Fuyuhiko Matsuya, an instructor at Yomiuri.

“The trip to the United States was their reward for working hard,” Matsuya said.

The program meets daily for morning sessions at UCSD, followed by afternoon outings several time a week. Students have free time to explore the city. Most travel by bus, or receive rides from host families, Matsuya said.

For security, Ozaki said, he now plans activities with larger groups of students. When he walks from the bus stop to his host family’s home, his pace is brisk and he scans the street, Ozaki said. His eyes never meet those of passers-by, he said.

Kobayashi’s front tooth has a new cap. And he said he is over the fear that robbed him of sleep in the nights following the beating.

“I want to remember only the things I enjoyed during my visit,” he said.

Kobayashi and Ozaki said they have had many good experiences, ones that far outweigh the bad.

“Americans offer help quickly,” Ozaki said, describing the witness who came to their aid during the attack. The students also received prompt medical care from Fire Department paramedics stationed near the site of the beating, Ozaki said.

A UCSD spokeswoman said that, in the days after the beating, the university received dozens of inquiries about Ozaki and Kobayashi’s well-being. Several people offered to pay for the student’s hospital and dental costs, said the spokeswoman, Laura Gropen.

“They saw some of the worst in people, but, since then, their experience here has been positive.”

During the rest of their month in America, they have collected anecdotes that counter Japan’s negative images of Americans.

Kobayashi said he was comforted by the staff at Scripps Memorial Hospital. Kobayashi was also impressed by the efficiency of the dentist who saw him two days after the attack, and completed work on the tooth in two hours. In Japan, the wait for major dental work can take three weeks, Kobayashi said.

“Prime Minister (Kiichi) Miyazawa says Americans don’t know how to work anymore,” Kobayashi said. “That’s absolutely not true.”

Kobayashi and Ozaki said quietly that memories of their visit to America will always loom large--as big as the country they leave behind.

“America has so many different kinds of people,” Kobayashi said. “We’ve only met three who are bad.”

After visiting Disneyland and Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo next week, they depart for Japan.