Japan princess to wed, start life as commoner
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-11-15 09:37

When Japan's Princess Sayako waves goodbye to staff and sets off for her wedding to commoner Yoshiki Kuroda on Tuesday, she will also bid farewell to a cloistered life as the only daughter of Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko.

Sayako, 36, has chosen to marry a 40-year-old Tokyo urban planner, meaning she must give up her title, swap the grandeur of the Imperial Palace for an ordinary apartment, and trade official duties for housework and the supermarket run.

The reserved princess, whose hobbies include birdwatching and traditional Japanese dance, wrote of feeling "lonely" about leaving the palace following a stilted farewell ceremony with her parents at the weekend.

Her sister-in-law, Crown Princess Masako, found the opposite transition -- from commoner to princess -- so stressful that she had to take more than a year's break from official duties, only recently returning to the public eye.

But Sayako's serious, bespectacled fiance has said he is determined to help her adjust to her new life.

Though a descendant of Japan's now-abolished aristocracy, Kuroda shares a modest apartment with his widowed mother.

Combo picture shows recent file pictures of Japanese Princess Sayako (R) and her fiance Yoshiki Kuroda.[AFP/file]

It is unclear whether Kuroda's mother will live with the couple after their marriage -- such arrangements are notoriously difficult to manage in Japan, where brides traditionally were treated as servants by their husband's family.

Sayako is at least unlikely to suffer the embarrassment of becoming tabloid fodder, as the Japanese media tend to keep a respectful distance from royalty.

The wedding itself will involve little of the fanfare associated with European royal weddings, or the public frenzy that accompanied her brothers' marriages.

In line with the custom of the imperial family, which traces its history back at least 1,600 years, the ceremony will be carried out according to the rites of Japan's indigenous animist religion, Shinto.

But holding the event at a hotel, however upmarket, is a distinct break with royal tradition.

"MISS NEVER MIND"

Sayako will wear a Western-style dress for the ceremony and media reports say the thrifty princess -- known informally as Nori -- has opted to appear in one of her mother's hand-me-down kimonos at the afternoon reception.

Kuroda, who has said he abandoned a banking career for his modestly paid job at city hall because he wanted to serve the public, will wear a formal morning suit throughout.

Yoshiki Kuroda (L, in car) leaves for his wedding ceremony with Japan's Princess Sayako in Tokyo November 15, 2005. [Reuters]

French cuisine will be on the menu and the couple have decided to sit with their guests during the meal, rather than remain on a separate, raised platform as is the custom at many Japanese weddings, media reports say.

Alongside Sayako's parents, the 130 or so guests will include her elder brothers, Crown Prince Naruhito and Prince Akishino, and their wives.

Akishino and Kuroda have been close friends since their schooldays at Tokyo's exclusive Gakushuin school, and Akishino helped to spark the couple's romance by inviting them to a party.

The wedding of the daughter Akihito nicknamed "Miss Never Mind" for the words of encouragement she offered at difficult moments, will be a welcome cause for celebration in the imperial household, recently shaken by disputes and illness.

Last year, Sayako's brothers squabbled over Naruhito's public complaints about the way his wife, Masako, had been treated.

Masako, 41, disappeared from the public eye for more than a year, suffering from a mental disorder royal-watchers said was probably due partly by pressure to produce a male heir.

Earlier this month, a senior courtier criticized Akihito's cousin, Prince Tomohito, after he hit out at proposals to allow women to inherit the throne.

The Imperial Household Agency said they had no information about the couple's honeymoon plans.

But their life after the wedding will be cushioned by Sayako's $1.29 million dowry from the government.

She has taken driving lessons in an apparent attempt to fit in with Kuroda's enthusiasm for motoring, and has been brushing up her cooking skills.

Sayako has already given up her part-time job as a researcher at an ornithology center in Chiba, near Tokyo, no doubt to give herself more time to adjust to unfamiliar chores.