Twenty years ago, Constance Sathre went to Nagasaki to teach English for two years. Today, she is preparing to return to Japan to learn about how the Japanese government works.
She will make the return trip next September, along with seven other midcareer U.S. federal employees who have been selected to participate in the sixth and largest group of the annual Mike Mansfield Fellowship Program.
The group met with former Mansfield fellows and were wished well by U.S. Secretary of Commerce Norman Mineta, former Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata and others at a recent reception at the Japanese Embassy in Washington.
"Normally I would be very busy right now. But I am not," joked Japanese Ambassador Shunji Yanai as he bantered with the new batch of Mansfield fellows amid the unfolding legal wrangling of the U.S. presidential election.