Boasting more than 40,000 followers on Twitter, Teimuraz Lezhava, charge d'affaires of the Embassy of Georgia to Japan, deftly uses his Japanese skills to pull off a unique public relations campaign for his home country.
The diplomat, 32, proudly calls himself “Hiroshiman,” having first come to Japan with his family in 1992 — immediately after Georgia declared independence from the Soviet Union — and spent the subsequent four years in the eastern part of Hiroshima Prefecture.
At the heart of his unusual connection with Japan is one local doctor in Hiroshima whom he feels forever indebted to. The doctor once told him his story of the atomic bombing in 1945 of Hiroshima and, more than 75 years on, Lezhava is hoping to attend the annual Peace Memorial Ceremony this summer.