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The Tiger and the River
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Heavy Industries
David Morris
10/01/2007
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Photograph by Adam Campbell
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The essence of that tiger continued to shadow me as I was shown
around the shipyards and factories. I observed workers ardently focused on their
tasks, each one crafting an element meant to be part of a greater collective art
form. Turbine blades were displayed carefully and reverently, like samurai
swords, in a glass and wooden case. In the rail factory, massive bogies were
produced with an exacting finish and tolerance to ensure the bullet train
exceeds the century mark with a smoothness that persuades passengers they are
floating towards their destination. In the motorcycle works at Akashi, kaizen
efficiencies had been implemented to their optimum so that a new bike is built
in less than 90 minutes.
 Turbojets to enormous marine
pistons: KHI’s engineering and manufacturing prowess
underscored. (Click image to enlarge)
Morning, day five of my voyage—the window of my hotel room in
Kumamoto offers a scene that could be a print by Hokusai. Through a veil of
morning fog, silken strands of sunrise caress the silhouette of the medieval
fortress. I observe that Japan is both convergence and contradiction—science
fiction technology is commonplace while centuries of Zen moments flower. My
Western points of reference evaporate. I leaf through my trip journal. The
tiger’s essence is a common thread.
This essence had filled Kawasaki’s "Good Times" world. This
futuristic pavilion located within the Kobe Maritime Museum, showcases the
company’s origins, history and products. Kicking off my first full day,
information overload had blended with a schoolboy’s exuberance. I stopped before
the portrait of the founder and met the eyes of the tiger. Strolling through the
motorcycle gallery, I saw the ghosts of champions like waves of samurai cavalry
charging through the morning mist. Wayne Rainey, Eddie Lawson, Scott Russell,
Kork Ballington, Yvon Duhamel, Carl Fogarty, came and went, riding their
Superbike and Grand Prix tigers into battle. I remembered the Kawasaki
motorcycle hordes tearing across the Australian desert in 1981’s cinematic
apocalypse, The Road Warrior. I lusted after the ZZR-X concept motorcycle, whose
genetics seed the blossoms of their current offerings.
 Championship steeds on display
at the Good Times Pavilion. Photograph by Adam Campbell. (Click image to enlarge)
Crossing the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge on our way to the motorcycle
factory,
I admired the perfection of each spar on its three spans, as my hosts
explained Kawasaki’s role in constructing the longest suspension bridge
in the
world. Its two-hinged stiffening girder system allows the
structure to withstand
winds approaching 200 miles per hour,
earthquakes up to 8.5 on the Richter
scale, and the ability to resist
the unforgiving currents of Akashi Bay. "This
is how they build
everything they create," I thought.
This epiphany remains vibrant as I straddle my own ZX-14. I
feel its pulse, part panthera tigris and part shogun warhorse. When I fly down
the road, I am flying across their bridge, gliding along in their Bullet Train,
pushing the air aside like their massive freighters part the oceans. A turn of
the key and the roar of the Kawasaki engine is the tiger awakening from a
dream—that intends to awaken the tiger in us.
 Kaizen efficiency on the assembly line at
Akashi. (Click image to enlarge)
The company’s history is replete with the spirit of a tiger’s
dream. Shozo Kawasaki, born in 1837 in Kagoshima to a kimono merchant, at just
27 years of age, established a shipping business in Osaka, the country’s
industrial center, only to see it flounder. But the tiger in Kawasaki’s heart
did not fail him. When a samurai from his hometown came to his aid, the young
entrepreneur’s fortunes were revived. He opened Kawasaki Shipyard with
assistance from the Ministry of Finance on land borrowed from the government by
the Sumidagawa River.
We can imagine Kawasaki-san looking at the reflection in the
river and seeing the future become reality. As the company’s symbol, he chose
the kanji that represents the river. That symbol remains KHI’s today, and is
rendered in the sculpted hedge that greets visitors to its Kobe headquarters. As
I saw that hedge, I saw Kawasaki-san again in my mind’s eye, drawing the kanji
with a bamboo brush, the ink flowing in a confident stroke as he defined the
soul of the company he sired.
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