Keiko Fuji, whose real name was Junko Utada, died on Aug 22 after she fell from the 13th floor of a condo in Shinjuku, Tokyo, in what police believe was a suicide. Fuji was a popular enka singer whose debut album “Woman in Shinjuku,” released in 1970, spent 20 straight weeks at the top of Oricon chart.
Utada took a break from her radio show following her mother’s death and did not tweet until Wednesday, when she resumed tweeting to apologize to fans for the break.
The popular singer-songwriter, currently on hiatus, went on to announce that she had been followed by a paparazzo from a weekly gossip magazine for around a week and then barraged with questions. “I used to just tell myself it was their job and let it go, but after this I really have started to fear the press,” she told her followers.
“I have finally got to the point where I am emotionally stable enough to go out with friends,” she wrote, describing her recent treatment at the hands of the tabloid press as “callous” and her own state as “down”.
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Hikki also tweeted about the incident at her mother's funeral, when her car was rushed by the media.
"Being staked out my home, being tailed, those kinds of things are nothing new.
And I think I can’t help those.
But I changed my mind toward media when my mom’s coffin was carried out.
I was sitting in the front passenger seat of the car, preparing for bad things to some extent.
But I had not even be able to imagine that the media corps stood up against the funeral car.
They prevented the coffin from being carried out, shooting me.
It’s the blasphemy against the dead.
The sounds of ‘go tsu go tsu’ caused by cameras which struck the car windows violently,
flashes, questions thrown at me…
I thought mom would not cry in such a situation. So I fought back the tears desperately.
I felt only a minute seemed like an eternity and I screamed within my mind,
“Please get out of the way, please get out of the way.”."
tweet translation done by the Admin of http://japanese-music.boards.net
source, tweet translations, Utada Hikaru twitter
I was wondering if she was going to mention the funeral harassment. I was really shocked that this would happen. For some reason, I always thought Japanese mass media had more respect for the private life of their celebrities...well dating scoops and scandals aside. I mean this was a funeral! I hope they read her twitter and feel terribly ashamed.