Last week we had a phone call.

It was really interesting and lovely and we're going to tell you all about it

Twitter, it was with Japan.

Hello sweet Leeds this is Japan calling

Ey up Japan it’s our Leeds, how do

So.

Japan paid us an online visit! They caught our online exhibition celebrating Florence Nightingale @LothertonHall.

You can pretend you’re also Japan, seeing it for the first time, if you click this link: https://bit.ly/34bAyQP 

Now.

Tsuda Umeko (born Tsuda Ume) pioneered education for women in Japan during the Meiji period, from 1868–1912.

Umeko was a big fan of Florence Nightingale (fair) who has a lovely connection to @LothertonHall, explored in the exhibition.

Umeko was really keen to meet Florence, who was like, 'absolutely yes how wonderful come and be my best friend!'

@Harry_Styles would be sweet if you could take a leaf out of Florence’s book actually

Barbara Rose records in Umeko’s biography that ‘Ume was especially gratified when Florence Nightingale - as popular in Japan as she was in England - granted her request for an interview.'

Ume said: ‘I would rather have seen her than royalty itself’.

(biiiiig fan)

Florence gifted Umeko some flowers when she visited Brtain, and Umeko had them pressed.

Now they’re in the archive of Tsuda University. They reached out to us last week to share this lovely titbit!

You can see Umeko's beautiful writing beneath each flower:

like, gah

(These archive images are courtesy of Tsuda College!)

This portrait of Umeko is in the Florence Nightingale exhibition, and is why Japan were like 'omg let's call those guys and tell them the stuff'.

It's by Goseda Horyu II, and she's holding a plum, which is a reference to her name.

Side note: our Japanese friends told us that Umeko will be the second ever woman to appear on a Japanese banknote (5000 yen!) when it’s produced in 2024.

Anyway we're now best friends with Japan so