Japan’s incoming emperor, Crown Prince Naruhito – known to be a playful, earnest and studious man – is facing a delicate task of balancing traditions of the world’s oldest monarchy and his own modern, European outlook.
The 59-year-old Naruhito, the eldest of three children, is set to become Japan’s emperor on May 1, after his father, Emperor Akihito, abdicates the Chrysanthemum Throne on April 30.
Akihito was the first emperor to do so over the last couple of centuries.
Born after World War II, following the fall of Japan, Naruhito was raised solely by parents, instead of the traditional wet nurses and tutors.
Empress Michiko even sent him to school with homemade lunches as part of parental efforts to make the royal family closer to the people. This is most evident when he visited Europe, where he showed his playful side by posing for selfies with bystanders.
He studied for two years at Oxford University in the 1980s after graduating with a history degree in Japan, and reportedly adorned his residence with a poster of American actress Brooke Shields. He described the time as some of the best years of his life.
In 1993, Naruhito wed Masako Owada, defiying palace officials, after she caught his eye at a concert.
The daughter of a diplomatic family and educated at Harvard and Oxford, Masako left behind a promising diplomatic career of her own to marry into the royal family.
In late 2003, about a decade after their wedding, she largely disappeared from public view, the start of a long struggle with what palace officials termed an “adjustment disorder.”
Naruhito and Masako have no son, and devote their time to their daughter Aiko, now 17, and has advocated for men becoming more hands-on fathers – still uncommon in conservative Japan.
