Friday, November 3, 2000

The Order of Culture was presented to six people in a ceremony in the Matsu no Ma hall of the Imperial Palace on Culture Day. Those honored received the order from His Majesty the Emperor and the patent of decoration from Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori. Honored were Tadao Ishikawa for contemporary Chinese studies, Fukuko Okubo for leathercraft, Hideki Shirakawa for materials science (he also received the 2000 Nobel Prize for chemistry), calligrapher Kason Sugioka for kana calligraphy(Japanese syllabary), Ryoji Noyori for organic chemistry, and Isuzu Yamada for stage and film acting.