BEIJING: A 77-year-old man has renewed his friendship with an 81-year-old Swiss woman whom he met at the 1970 Osaka Expo thanks to Swiss staff at the same event this year, moving many people online.
Tatsuhiko Yamamoto was 22 when he visited the first World Expo held in Osaka, Japan, in 1970, and met Marlies, a female member of staff at the Swiss Pavilion.
He was taking a photograph of the then popular pavilion known as “Tree of Light” when Marlies approached him and invited him to take a picture together.
Yamamoto promised her he would print the photograph and bring it to her on another day, but she was off on the day he visited again and they had never met since then.
Yamamoto was unable to get over the encounter.
He said it was not love, but “something like admiration”. He even clearly remembered his version of the woman’s name, Maris Muller.
Over the years he got married and had three children. They have grown up and moved out, and he lives with his wife in Kyoto.
As the World Expo was held in Osaka again this year, Yamamoto took the opportunity to contact the Swiss Pavilion to look for the woman in the much treasured photo.
To his surprise, the pavilion miraculously found the woman for him.
It turned out that the man who ran the Heidi cafe at the Swiss Pavilion, Philipp Mosimann, is the son of the woman’s close friends.
Mosimann says he is an “Expo baby”, as his parents both worked at the Swiss Pavilion in 1970, where they became friends with Marlies. She was also a witness at the wedding of Mosimann’s parents.
He said Marlies, who is based in Zurich, is still alive and healthy. He invited Yamamoto to the 2025 Expo's Swiss Pavilion.
Mosimann said he was moved by Yamamoto’s friendship with Marlies. He said he found a “love for each other’s culture”.
“I think this is what Expo is about,” he said.
Yamamoto carefully pasted the photograph he took with Marlies 55 years ago, an artificial intelligence (AI) enhanced version of it and a picture he took of the 1970 Expo's Swiss Pavilion in an album as a gift for Marlies.
Mosimann then helped him deliver the album to Marlies.
Marlies sent back pictures of her taken during her 1970 visit to Japan and photos of her with Yamamoto’s gift now.
The two got in contact a month later and renewed a friendship that had been suspended for more than half a century.
They have been communicating via email with the aid of AI translation tools.
The Expo 2025 Osaka took place between April 13 and Oct 13. Its theme was Designing Future Society for Our Lives; a sub-theme was Connecting Lives.
At the closing ceremony, former Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said: “By valuing solidarity over division and tolerance over confrontation, we have succeeded in uniting minds, together creating an expo that was a source of joy for many.”
“People are united with their curiosity for different cultures, this story truly reflects the spirit of Expo,” an online observer said.
“It is a miracle that he found her and could still meet her,” said another. - South China Morning Post
