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Years ago Mrs. Elizabeth Gray Vining, the American Quaker who tutored Akihito during his childhood, said to Dr. Koizumi: "She who marries the crown prince must be a girl of spirit who will not be a doormat; she must not be someone who will be easily overwhelmed." Michiko Shoda, standing straight and slim beside her devoted prince, seems precisely that girl.
* At birth, the midwife had ready a piece of wet paper; if the father approved, she would stifle the unwanted infant.