III. Continuing Correspondence
Masuaki's feats which Walter had observed in Tokyo interested him in continuing the contact by correspondence. Airmail letters crossed the Pacific frequently, at times simultaneously in both directions. A total of 30 letters were written by Masuaki and/ or his father, Yoshinori Kiyota, before we were to see them again in Tokyo in March 1979.
Walter sent some stainless steel tablespoons and a case - hardened flat file to Masuaki which he asked him to try to bend by PK. They were returned twisted, along with some bi-metal and aluminum strips that had been twisted in experiments conducted by Prof. Shegemi Sasaki at the University of Electro-Communications. Files become very brittle when case-hardened and should normally break instead of bend under pressure, yet this file and the four additional files Masuaki sent along had all been influenced by PK. One was bent into a U-shape, and several of the lighter ones apparently had broken in shipment because they were not securely packed. But the paranormal bends were still observable.
Walter had noticed Masuaki's enthusiasm for baseball, so he sent him a baseball at Christmas and a book of photos of Midwest U.S.A. Masuaki reciprocated with color photos taken of himself and his friend Toru Ozaki on a skiing holiday, as well as a number of paranormal pictures which he had made, and a super-8 movie film taken by Toru which showed Masuaki and another youngster successfully applying PK on metal objects.
The spoons which Walter had bought at the hardware store near Kiyota's home in 1976 were magnetic [type 410 ferritic stainless steel containing about 18% chromium and .2 to.25% carbon]. Before leaving Tokyo he bought 15 more stainless steel tablespoons at the Keio - Plaza department store for further experiments in the U.S. These happened to be of the non - magnetic type [austinetic stainless 304, containing about 17% chromium, .8% nickel, and about .01% carbon]. He mailed two of these to Masuaki on January 13, 1977 to see if he could also twist or bend this type of stainless steel. These came back with similar twists in the handles - a visible answer to his question. As a "bonus" Masuaki had also sent along two teaspoons, one with a tight left-right double twist in the handle, and the other with about a centimetre distance between the reverse twists.
Masuaki's father sent Walter a special signature stamp in Japanese characters of a kind used for papers of importance for the name "Uphoff," explaining that the Japanese characters pronounced (a)(fu)(ho)(fu), meant "a man who goes his own way."
On March 24, 1977, Masuaki wrote a letter enclosing a photocopy of the certificate he received for the highest grade in Fourth Grade English Proficiency. Only 20 of his 250 classmates had received this certificate, he reported proudly, and his correspondence with us had inspired him to study harder in the subject.
These first letters began with the words: "My dear American grandfather" and "Dear new American grandfather" - an indication of respect in Japan. These letters were written on stationery decorated with stars and stripes in red and blue and signed, "Your new grandson." Later most of his letters were typewritten instead of written in his careful longhand. It is possible, although we have never asked, that the friend of his father occasionally helps transcribe letters for Masuaki. Masuaki's father who does not read or write English, has enlisted the services of a friend who translates and writes the letters to us. The improvement in Masuaki's command of English has been remarkable in the time that he has been corresponding with us.
On April 4, 1977, Mr. Kiyota wrote three letters. In the first he said. We also believe in hereditism [heredity] ... because my father (Masuaki’s grandfather) and I can do Nengraphy when no one sees us. And my wife, Setsuko (Masuaki's mother) sometimes can see a white ghost. I can perceive my relative's death by seeing a ghost or by intuition...
Frankly speaking, my father and I can make others who inflict an injury on us destroy themselves. But we didn't notice it till ten years ago. And we thought that it was just a coincidence. Since then we know our power we have struggled not to have ill will against anyone, because we are sorry for them and feel bad. But men are made incomplete [imperfect] and the struggle not to have ill will toward anyone is very hard. I suppose you can understand our feelings...
I had a drill [bit] bended in the shape of a right angle, but I forgot the place where I kept it with care. As soon as I find it out, I'll send you its photograph.
In the second letter of the same date, he included several intriguing bits of information:
I have told you that we can make others who inflict injury on us destroy themselves ... we have also discovered that it can be the power that makes our family and others happy. . .
Masuaki can do to bend spoons, to produce Nengraphy, to put small things into an orange without cutting the peel. . . He can make a thing appear or disappear. And he can reach to the school within 2 minutes instead of a 15 minute walk.
... He was born at 4:25 p. m. on April 30, 1962 in the hospital near my house. About 3 hours later my wife, Setsuko, was binded [bound] by an unknown force and could not move herself. When she looked at her newborn baby sleeping beside her, she found him wrapped by something like a white mist, and could not see him. She said it continued for a while, and 1 said to her it was just an illusion. But thinking back now 1 wonder if it was something connected with Masuaki's psychic abilities. . . One summer night in the year Masuaki was born I saw in the sky a bright ball as large as a moon. It came flying from the North and stopped above my head and went flying to the South. At that time I thought it was a bright balloon. But I don't know yet what it was.
Masuaki wants to take the psychological course in a college in Japan and then to go to an American college for the study of parapsychology. . I think Masuaki could go to college because he takes a high rank in school record at present.
An explanation of Masuaki's experiences with Nengraphy came in a letter from Yoshinori Kiyota, May 4, 1977:
Masuaki sometimes takes [produces] photographs of men. He once took a photograph of a man without face and hands. But only the sleeves of his shirt were taken and one of them had a camera. The man who took this photograph is Mr. Jiro Tunoda, a famous cartoonist in Japan ... Mr. Tunoda is one of the members of the London Psychic Association and is much interested in physic phenomena. He also has some psychic abilities.
Masuaki likes the photographs of buildings better than those of men. So he has taken buildings of the Nengraphy photographs. Most of all he is fond of the Empire State building and the Goddess of Liberty in New York
When Masuaki bends a metal, he doesn't feel any warmth or heat.
In this letter Masuaki's father explained in some detail, experiments which Prof. Shegemi Sasaki had been conducting with his son. (See Chapter XI.) He then went on to answer a question we had put to him about something he had mentioned in a previous letter: Who is Zenefu?
Zenefu [whom] Masuaki can see says to him, 'When you become old you have a duty but I can't tell you about it now.' Masuaki wonders 'What is it?'
Now I will tell you about Zenefu. At first I thought Zenefu was an illusion but later I knew Zenefu was not a mere illusion. The predictions Zenefu tells Masuaki come true at the rate of 90 percent. From this fact, you will know that Zenefu is not a mere illusion. . .
It was about April 1974 when Masuaki began to contact with Zenefu. Zenefu wears such a round hat and a gown as a clergyman wears. He is shining brightly and always smiling. But when Masuaki tries to do some wrong acts, he gets angry. . .
Zenefu says, 'I am coming here by an order from the upper class [higher order?] I am not a human being nor God who is in the upper class. I cannot also see God. If a man can see God through his own eyes, he will be only able to perceive God as light. My present form is not a real one. It is only just the way to bring you around. My country is the star in the south of this earth which you can see in Australia. But I am not a creature in the star. I have not the body. And the creatures with bodies are not high - leveled ones.
... I am not a spirit or a creature. Though you may take me [to be] a thing like a spirit, I am not a spirit of a human being. So you had better take me 'a life' without a body ... I haven't a name, but if I haven't a name, you will find it difficult to call me. . So I named myself 'Zenefu'
Though I try to hear more about Zenefu from Masuaki, he doesn't want to tell me further ... Masuaki seems to have some promise with Zenefu.
Translation of concepts from one language to another is not easy, yet we are surprised at times how well we can understand what is said in the letters. There are instances when we have questions. In his June 29, 1977 letter, Mr. Kiyota continues his explanation about what Masuaki has learned from his teacher, Zenefu:
Zenefu seems to have been guiding Masuaki's steps in the path of righteousness. I think [he] is under the proper guidance of Zenefu and Zenefu is a good guide. By the way, the name like Zenefu is not originally used in Japan or in the Eastern countries. The image ... that comes to my mind is the name used in some European countries ... At the early days Zenefu said to Masuaki, 'I am surprised that some creatures on Earth make internecine struggles against one another.’ If Zenefu is the spirit of a human being, he ought to know as much.
Masuaki says, 'Zenefu speaks to me many things about the microcosm but it is too difficult for me to understand. When he asks Zenefu to talk about them easier, Zenefu says, 'There is no way to explain them easier…' I suppose an energy in the universe appears in human shape as Zenefu and Masuaki can see [him].
Kiyota continues his discussion about Zenefu in his letter of August 15th:
Zenefu says to Masuaki, 'A substance has a physical law and a simple spiritual element. Then it becomes a living thing. A living thing has an instinct and becomes [comes] to have an emotion, according to its revolution. [evolution]. On human revolution men became to have intelligence. People think intelligence is the best thing. But there are psychic abilities above it. Men, including Masuaki, with these abilities began to appear on Earth. By and by these abilities will be more powerful and the modern civilization will be replaced by the psychic one. But before the psychic civilization is born, human spiritual structure is required to develop not to affect badly each other. Because this psychic power is a tremendous one, it is quite dangerous when it is used for wrong purposes . . . Men with these abilities have duties as the seeds of forthcoming new human beings.'
Zenefu says. . .'Your power . . . stays at the limit of projecting Nengraphical images or bending spoons. It is because your society still can't receive psychic phenomena extensively.'
But this problem will work itself out. . .
On a number of occasions, Masuaki, according to his father, has seen spirits, identified as deceased relatives whom Masuaki had not known. He also mentioned that Masuaki knew Yukio Ishii about whom we had written in our earlier book, New Psychic Frontiers:
. . . we don't know where he is now. He was very delicate at heart ... he was always worried about his psychic abilities ... Once there were about 3,000 boys and girls with psychic abilities in Japan, but they abandoned their abilities from the social pressure of contempt and derision. Fortunately Masuaki is strong - minded.
On October 13, 1977 he wrote:
Masuaki says, "Some people dare to call me a liar openly to my face instead of saying 'I can't believe it,' or 'I can't understand it well.' I feel this is equal to calling me a thief, but they cast an imputation on my character by calling me a liar. And these people wouldn't try to work with me by scientific experiments. There's no rights for psychics in this country. But I do love this country.
Masuaki has discovered at a tender age what others who have worked in the psychic field for years, either as investigators or psychics, have had to put up with - regardless of country.
As was to be expected, the media soon discovered Masuaki's unique talents and, just as with Matthew Manning in England, sought interviews for whatever sensational value they might have. Mr. Kiyota reported that The National Enquirer was one of the first on the scene, October 26. 1977:
The other day we were called on by two reporters and one cameraman. They were foreign correspondents in Japan: Mr. David Tharp of The Australian Times and Miss Mary Mine of Los Angeles Times. They said to us, 'We have been told by telephone from National Enquirer to meet Masuaki and to see whether he can do mystical things or not.'
The experiment ended up in success. Five Nengraphical pictures were taken: The Goddess of Liberty (2), the Washington Monument (1), Manhattan (1) and the London Tower (1). Eight spoons were twisted; turned round from once to thrice or being broken after twist.
Professor Miyauchi's experiment was succeeded too. They were truly astonished. They said 'We don't know how to write these that we have seen [with] our own eyes. Can people in our own country believe in the article that we’ll write?' . . When the Washington monument was projected by Masuaki’s Nengraphy, no Japanese including Masuaki couldn't understand [knew] What it was. Then one of the foreign reporters said it was the Washington monument so we found it out at last.
He elaborated on this report when he wrote again on December 12, 1977:
... The interview of the National Enquirer was carried on for 3 days. Mr. Tharp and Miss Mine said they must make these psychic phenomena widely known to the world. But the witnesses selected from the National Enquirer seemed to think in the bottom of their hearts that Masuaki must use a trick, though they saw the phenomena in [with] their own eyes. They seemed to be against the interviewers writing articles. One of them was a prist [priest]. He seemed to have an opposite opinion because of the religious reason that no one except Christ can do wonders. Other witnesses had administrative positions in Japanese branches of American companies. Though they were good businessmen, they were quite strangers to parapsychological field. They were skeptical about our experiment, though they actually saw it with their own eyes.
One of the reasons was, I think, they were afraid of being thought queer, or not to be proper to administrative positions. I think that the National Enquirer had bad choices of witnesses. It is just to send for an engineer instead of a doctor to a patient. I believe when we do an experiment, a witness [should] be a scholar or a researcher who is keenly interested in the parapsychological field. . .
On the experiments with the reporters, several Nengraphical pictures were projected. One of them was the Goddess of Liberty...
This image, double-inverted, of the Statue of Liberty is very similar to the one obtained March 23, 1979 when Yutaka Fukuda, Toru Ozaki and Mary Jo Uphoff took a polaroid camera, for which we had bought film, into the street and after waiting for 5 minutes pulled out the next picture (No. 5) and got such an image. Walter and two other witnesses stayed upstairs in the Kiyota home and held hands while Masuaki concentrated on influencing the film.
They were very astonished to see it. But I wonder how they will write about this. Probably, this may not come out as there are those who are opposed to write this. Reporters brought [took] all Masuaki's Nengraphical pictures and twisted spoons. If they don't write articles, I wish they will bring them all back to me because I want to keep them all as Masuaki’s experimental record. . .
Comments about the National Enquirer episode continued in Kiyota's letter January 9, 1978:
I told you before that the interviewing from the National Enquirer has gone on for three days. But I forgot to tell you that the reporters had planned to continue the experiment with Masuaki more than three days, and that I declined to accept their offer, saying Masuaki was too tired to go on [with] the experiment.
In this country's custom, it is generally considered a very shameful act to receive money except on business. As Masuaki is a student and not a showman, so we thought it a shameful act to get money from the National Enquirer, and we worked together with them without pay. In such a case as this, I think they ought to show their thanks to us in some ways - the National Enquirer should tell us whether they will write an article or not.
But I resigned myself to the inevitable owing to the differences between people's thinking things, though I felt very unpleasant. At the same time I felt very sorry for Masuaki who exerted all possible efforts. We say in such a case as this, 'Hone ore zon no kutibire mouke' in Japanese which means 'I gained nothing for all my efforts. . .’
... most films and spoons that were used by Masuaki's experiments were brought by the National Enquirer. Therefore I don't know well [if] Masuaki or the National Enquirer has the right of ownership of the Nengraphical pictures and twisted spoons. . .[and] when the trouble has become larger by our protest, we may lost temper and get excited. And, as I told you before when we throw our energy with anger to others, something [some] unfortunate things may happen to them. If this [should] happen, we we'll feel sorry for them and feel very unpleasant.
The National Enquirer started out as a sensational scandal sheet and acquired a reputation for huge headlines and stories which other papers would not print. As its circulation grew, it developed a more responsible approach to journalism. We had first hand information that feature articles were checked with persons who were knowledgeable about a particular subject before the articles were printed. On a number of occasions we, ourselves, had been called for corroboration by assistant editors and reporters, so when Joe Mullins of the Enquirer staff phoned about another matter, shortly after we received the letter from Mr. Kiyota, Walter told him he did not see much point in continuing to talk with their reporters if nothing ever came of it. He was told about Kiyota's disappointment and discouragement that after spending three days with representatives of the Enquirer, all the paranormally-bent spoons and thoughtography pictures had been taken away and no one had gone to the trouble of telling the family whether anything was going to come from their efforts. Mullins seemed concerned and said he would check into it. On January 23rd, John Cooke, another reporter, called and said he hoped the article he planned to write about Masuaki would be accepted by the editor. It appeared in the March 14, 1978 issue of The National Enquirer. (See Chapter IX)
Kiyota's letter, February 3, 1978:
The other day, I had a phone call from a Japanese female reporter who had been asked [to tell me] the National Enquirer will write an article about Masuaki ... I felt much relieved
February 25, 1978:
Mr. John Cooke called on us three times...
Masuaki passed an entrance examination to the Senshu Senior High School which he wished to go to. This is a school affiliated with the Senshu University, which has a psychology course ... there are only 22 colleges or universities which have psychology courses, therefore I think Masuaki must be one of the lucky persons...
Masuaki had been advised by his teacher that he had not scholarship enough to take the entrance examination to the Senshu High School though his grades were excellent. But as Zenefu ... said to Masuaki, 'You can surely pass the test to that school'… and what Zenefu said turned out to be true.
Masuaki's 16th birthday was coming up. We found a brass belt buckle with a design we thought rather typically "American" to send to him. Masuaki wrote to thank us and told about his school:
Our school has more than 40 classrooms and other rooms ... such as a science room, a language laboratory and music room. . . Our school is a mammoth school with about 3,000 pupils and more than 40 teachers. In our school we have many clubs - an English club, a baseball club, a basketball club, a soccer club, a Judo club, a literature club ... and so on which anybody can belong to. I've been practicing Judo since I was 6 years old. But I don't belong to the Judo club because I like English better than Judo now...
My psychic abilities have surely been escalating. The other day I showed the most favorable data on Professor Sasaki's equipment. I think I can [could] do wonders if I produce PK . . without other person's pressures. To my regret, when I get pressures, my psychic abilities are weakened But this problem will be solved of itself . . Zenufu promised to help me producing PK through my life...
I was asked to come to Australia and to make my, appearance on TV . . .but I declined their offers because I must go to school. Then I said OK to go there in summer vacation.
I'm glad to say that I've come to take much more interest in studying English since I started correspondence with you.
On June 22, 1978 we got a letter from Masuaki - a short one. We had been asked to suggest psychics who might be able to perform feats of PK for a special program contemplated by Granada Television of Birmingham, England. We suggested Masuaki, if travel could be arranged during his school vacation.
Mr. Miyauchi, Mr. Tharp, Miss Morikawa (ourfriend) and I will go to London in August...
In his letter of September 27, 1978, Mr. Kiyota told us about the London visit:
Shooting on the film was done for four days. Masuaki succeeded in projecting seven thoughtographs as well as bending spoons. Thoughtographs were those of the guards of the Buckingham Palace, the Eiffel Tower, the statue of Admiral Nelson, a triangular shape of light and so on. But the results were not so good as Masuaki usually gets at home, what with the fatigue from his first visit to a foreign country and with the pressure from shooting.
... there was an unexpected unhappy trouble. Objectors were invited by Granada Television which came as quite a shock to Masuaki. The objectors said, 'Masuaki plays a trick.' Then they said to Mr. Tharp, 'You have been tricked by the Japanese.' Mr. Tharp got angry at hearing this and gave back the performance fee to Granada Television saying, 'you are very rude to this Japanese boy. Why didn't you obtain Masuaki's prior approval as to your inviting objectors before he came to London? It is very cowardly of you. We came all the way to London, not because we wanted money, but we wanted to show as many people as we could the existence of psychokinesis.'
... a letter from Prof. J. B. Hasted said, 'We are all quite certain of Masuaki's PK.'
Of the interview scene Masuaki said, 'I have never played any trick or don't know how to trick. A trick leads to corruption.'
(The next sentence is paraphrased for clarity:)
I feel kind of guilty if I keep the truth about the existence of psychokinesis a secret.
If Copernicus. . . held his tongue for fear of objection, the Ptolemaic theory would have been justified and the progress of science would have been far more delayed. . . I wonder whether the objectors . . . object scientifically? I think it can't be scientific to object [to] things because they can't believe them . . . Objectors are apt to decide only by their own limited knowledge or experiences. Four billion people have four billion knowledges and experiences.
In January 1979 correspondence resumed again when we wrote the Kiyota family that we were planning a trip to Japan sometime early in March. We learned that Masuaki would have more time to spend with us if we came after he had finished his annual school examinations March 20th. Yoshinori Kiyota wrote about an interesting incident in his January 27th letter:
My wife saw in a dream that you would visit us on March 18. After I heard this from her, I received your letter and we were surprised to know that you would come to Japan some time in March. She sometimes knows such a thing in a dream. As for your mother's death, she saw that dream last September [Walter's mother died on September 27th]. We are truly astonished at this coincidence. [So were we because we had not informed the family of Walter's mother's death until several months later.]
At present Masuaki is projecting Nengraphical photographs of landscapes of London, Paris and so on. [Masuaki had taken a week to visit Scotland and Paris en route home from London in August] saying, 'I saw such a place.' I think this ability is so convenient; if he didn't take a camera with him, later he can take a picture of a landscape he saw before.
Masuaki's response to the announcement of our visit to Japan was enthusiastic:
My dear American grandfather and grandmother ... I am very very very very very pleased to hear the news you will come to Japan.
This was a three-page single-spaced typewritten letter with detailed instructions accompanied by precise drawings of the best way to get from the airport to the air terminal in downtown Tokyo. Reservations had been made for us at the Tokyo-Green Hotel in Chiyoda, Tokyo and Elaine Morikawa had been engaged as interpreter for us. Using the red and black ribbon of the typewriter, he had composed a birthday greeting for Walter and the U.S. and Japanese flags side by side. They would wait for us on the second floor of the terminal at the escalator, he wrote:
We will wait for you there. You'll meet us. I'm going to have a twisted spoon and "WELCOME MR. AND MRS. UPHOFF" which is made of paper written by me ... I have written down everything that I want to talk about. Ill write you again. Please remember me to all of your family.
Yoshinori Kiyota wrote us a letter the same day, February 16th, with information about hotel, interpreter and connections. There was one more letter before we arrived in the TCAT (air terminal) on March 20th .The Kiyotas had never seen the film made by Alan Neuman in 1976, but had heard that it was being released to theaters in Japan late in March. Could we please find out if this were true before we came to Tokyo? To our regret we could not tell them.
A collection of spoons, files and metal strips twisted by Masuaki Kiyota. Walter Uphoff witnessed the twisting of the three spoons at the left when he was at the Kiyota home, October 1976. The next tablespoon (made in Germany) was mailed to Masuaki along with a non-magnetic stainless steel tablespoon and a flat file, all of which were returned twisted or bent along with extra spoons, files and two metal strips.
Well, I wrote some maps which were from the hotel to the nearest station (The station's name is SHIN - OCHANOMIZU.), inside Shin-Ochanomizu station from Shin-Ochanomizu to our nearest station (KITA-SENJU), inside Kita-Senju station, and from Kita-Senju station to our house.
*From the hotel to Shin-Ochanomizu station (subway Chiyoda line)
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