Yoshio on ball in study of sport for older people

When Yoshio Oro retired as a college professor in his native Japan at the age of 72 he didn’t know what to do with himself, but seven years later he is perfectly content living and studying in his adopted city of Galway.

Professor Emeritus Oro doesn’t look his 79 years and he is as curious and hungry for knowledge as he was when he was a young man.

Being a quietly spoken and modest person, many of his neighbours in Renmore may not be aware that a few weeks ago he travelled home to Japan to receive an award from Emperor Akihito for his services to higher education there.

It was a formal conferring ceremony held in the National Grand Theatre in Tokyo where he was presented with the award of Zuiho Chujusho (the Middle Order of the Sacred Treasure).

Afterwards, Yoshio and his wife Yumi, went to the Palace for an audience with the Emperor, but unfortunately he was unwell that day and his son, the Crown Prince met with guests instead.

“My wife was very happy. She was standing very close to the Crown Prince when he walked by, so she saw his face very close up. The Palace is not usually open to the public, who only see members of the Royal family from a distance.

“I was proud. It was an honour for me to get this recognition,” says Yoshio who has just spent his first Christmas ever away from home.“I had my first turkey dinner on Christmas Day with my landlord, who invited me. I was not long back from Japan and couldn’t justify going back for Christmas, but it is not a big occasion for us in Japan. New Year’s Eve is bigger, but I wasn’t home for that either,” he adds.

Professor Oro held the seat of English literature at Toyohashi University of Technology in the city of Toyohashi for 20 years, specialising in the works of the English poet, Robert Browning. His love of Western literature came after working for an American missionary, but as there were no courses in US literature at any university in Japan, he opted for English literature instead.

He hasn’t regretted it and, indeed, in his later years studied the link between English literature and technology, starting with the Industrial Revolution.

Yoshio lives alone in rented accommodation in Pinewood Grove in Renmore after first living in Salthill and Rahoon.

He came to Galway to study at NUIG, and after finishing a diploma at its Irish Centre for Social Gerontology, he is now in his fifth year of a PhD focusing on sporting activities for the elderly. That research took him to Japan and Australia, as well as talking to some sporting clubs in North Dublin.

A sprightly man like him who comes from a part of the world where older people are revered is probably the best person to study the sporting activities of older people and the link between being active and staying fit for this age group.

You get the sense that Yushio doesn’t regard himself as old at all and that as long as he is mobile and his mind remains curious and alert that he will keep himself occupied with study, essays and writing theses. He is financially independent thanks to his college pension. His whole life, both professionally and personally, appears to have been guided by God, he says, as things have always fallen into place for him.

For more, read this week's Galway City Tribune.