In Memory of David Jack and Sachiko Matsunaga

A Sad Day: David Jack's Passing

11 October, 2021

Another Sad Day: Sachiko’s Passing

February 2023

The end of September was a very sad time for anyone who has been touched by Fieldwork Japan. David Jack passed away after suffering a stroke. David, along with his wife Sachiko Matsunaga, founded and funded Fieldwork Japan, the pottery project I’ve been involved with the last almost 30 years. What follows is a rather long tribute to Dave which you may or may not find interesting. It goes without saying that my life would have been very different had I not met Dave. I’m sure it would have still been interesting, but fortune had me cross paths with this remarkable person. What follows are musings of my relationship with David. Read on if it interests you.

More conventional obits on David can be read at the Japan Times or at the Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan.

I first met David and Sachiko on January 16, 1995. While that date typically doesn’t ring any bells with most of the world, people in Kansai at the time immediately recognize it as the day before the Kobe Earthquake. They were living in Sasayama, a rural town about an hour drive from Kobe. They had a piece of land they hoped to develop into a kind of rural research/educational facility. They didn’t have a definitive plan, but were looking for someone with an idea, an inspiration they liked and they would support them to run with it. I’m a potter who had just finished 2 years of work in Bizen, working with a traditional potter there, and was trying to figure out my next step in life. After spending the day with Dave and Sachiko I returned to Kobe thinking I might have just found it. At 5:46 the next morning I, along with most of Kansai, was rudely awakened by the tremors that destroyed Kobe. Thru that winter and spring I kept in touch with David and we broke ground on the kiln that April. 

Since that date in 1995, with the financial support of Dave and Sachiko, we have had built or built ourselves 2 studios, a large kitchen/dining area, a tatami dorm, a tea house and two kilns. David had only one stipulation for his support which was that he wanted it to be a learning facility controlled by the foreign community that would bring foreigners and Japanese together for a common purpose. Over the years we’ve had hundreds of people pass thru from short visits to months-long stays. 

David and Sachiko had also developed rural study centers in both Hong Kong and Scotland. David had a simple idea or ideal: buy distressed rural properties, fix them up and open them for people to pursue their passion. Encourage international exchanges. Make the world a little bit better. David made the world a much better place. 

Probably their most important project was the Kansai Bangladesh Project which supported an orphanage in the hill country for minority girls, and also supported the digging of wells for villages around that country. David and Sachiko loved Bangladesh and made many trips there.

Certainly what David is best known for was the Kansai Time Out, a monthly magazine which he founded in the mid 1970s. To say it was a lifeline to the foreign community is an understatement. Besides listing all the cultural events: concerts, festivals, exhibitions, it also had a classified section with essential job listings, sayonara sales, rental apartments, and even a lonely hearts section. It was also filled with articles about culture, politics, sports. It was an absolute Must Read. The number of young writers and editors who cut their teeth at the magazine and went onto bigger and better things are forever indebted to him. I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say that Dave was maybe the most influential foreigner in Kansai in the latter part of the last century.

And in the end, David went out like the mensch that he was: he had the stroke in a hospital. He was accompanying Sachiko who was there for tests when he was stricken. He died the next day. In Japan, when people die, the hospital wants them out quickly. Typically you call a funeral parlor or a temple. Sachiko called her friends. I was lucky enough to be in town and could help. We loaded him into a friend’s van and took him back to their home. It’s Japanese Buddhist custom to have the body at home and on display. Someone ran around to 7/11 and bought them out of ice to pack around Dave till we could get dry ice the next morning. That morning I helped build his coffin with a Japanese friend. It turned out rather well. 

Many people stopped by to pay their respects. We sat around his coffin, loaded up with flowers, food and drink. We stayed there till late into the night, and while it sounds like silly spiritual stuff, we all could detect a slight grin on his face that definitely wasn’t there when he left the hospital. 

The next morning we loaded him back into the van he left the hospital in, and on procession to the crematorium we drove around to Ogami, then by some of his favorite watering holes in Sasayama for a final farewell. We all wrote messages on the coffin and took turns hammering the lid shut. I had the honor of putting the last nail in his coffin.

On a personal level David was one of the most inspiring people I have ever met. He had a brilliant, beautiful mind, filled with facts, but never a know-it-all, though at times it seemed he did. He was humble, understated, but endlessly curious, with a wickedly funny sense of humor. No matter what part of the world you are from David would know some interesting facts, often about past sports triumphs or a local political scandal. He was such a strong role model. He was never motivated by money, his passion was having a good time with good people and to leave the world a little better than he found it. 

Well, he certainly did that. I’d like to say I miss him terribly. I miss David walking over from his house (a 150-year-old thatched farm house, nicely restored, about 15 minutes from the studio). He’d walk over to the studio and start weeding the garden. He and Sachiko planted all sorts of flowers and trees on the land here. He wanted something flowering at all seasons, and now something always does. Anyway, he’d have on a old blazer and gum boots. After about a half hour’s work he’d sit down and pull a chu-hi (canned Japanese cocktail) out of his pocket, and we’d have a chat about baseball or politics. 

David was a hard guy to thank, and I had so much to thank him for. He seriously didn’t care, he never needed praise. He was a Brit with a stiff upper lip. I never told him how much he meant to me, how much I really loved him, and loved him not for what he did for me, but who he was, how much fun he was, and how much he inspired me. 

Sachiko Matsunaga

1939 -2023

A bit over a year after David’s Death, in mid January of 2023, Sachiko passed away. It also was quick. On Sunday the 8th, we had had dinner together with my mom, who was visiting and had shared a very special relationship with Sachiko. The following Thursday she felt ill, called an ambulance and was taken to the hospital. She died early the morning of the 13th of complications with pneumonia.

Sachiko was a tough person who didn’t suffer fools. But those she did love she dedicated her life to. None of David’s dreams would have come true without Sachiko’s help and dedication. She too will be missed.

They are entombed in a small cemetery in Imadani above their 150-yr-old thatched house. It’s a beautiful monument to two beautiful people. Worth a visit if you are in the area.

Rest in Peace.