Long before Abenomics or his first stint as prime minister, long before he'd risen through the ranks of the Japanese government, there was once a reserved 24-year-old young man who drove through the streets of Los Angeles in search of cultural illumination. It was 1978, and Shinzo Abe was a student at the University of Southern California, following in the footsteps of former Prime Minister Takeo Miki, who took classes at USC in the 1930s.
Shortly after graduating from Seikei University in 1977, Abe moved first to Hayward, California, a city south of San Francisco. Needing a more culturally diverse experience, he then relocated to Long Beach and home-stayed for a stretch of time with an Italian-American family. Soon after, Abe was admitted to USC.
Professor Thomas Johnson of the Naval Postgraduate School was one of Abe's professors at USC, and he can still recall certain aspects of Abe the student.