"There was a lot of noise being made outside the embassy's office just before six in the morning. Young and old, men and women alike were complaining about something. I didn't think this was an ordinary thing."
It was July 18, 1940. The axis of Japan, Germany and Italy had been formed two months before.
The place was Kaunas, Lithuania, a major city in the Baltic triangle.
Recalling the state of affairs at that time, Chiune Sugihara had disregarded order from the Japanese government and saved the lives of over 6000 Jews by issuing visas for passage.
Sugihara was born in 1900 in Yaotsu-cho, Gifu prefecture. With excellent marks in middle school, Sugihara was to proceed to medical school, following in the footsteps of his father.
However, Chiune's interest was in doing work using his special talent in languages. On the day of his entrance examination to medical school, he ate the lunch his mother had made for him and went home. From that point forward, he became a gritty young man who believed in his standard of value.
In 1918 he entered the highly esteemed Waseda University for preparation to be an English teacher at the high school level. Later his career included being a diplomat to Manchuria and working in the minister's office in Helsinki. In August 1939 he was appointed to consul of the consulate office in Kaunas, but shortly after Nazi Germany invaded Poland.
This marked what would be the start of the Second World War, as Germany continued to roll into one country after another, eventually occupying Paris in the next year (1940).
The Jews, terrified by the Nazis, ran out of places to escape to. This is how on July 18 they came to the Japanese Consulate with a request for passage by visa.
"I cannot refuse being humane" was the message he twice encrypted and sent back to the State Department of his homeland while issuing visas.
However, the State Department, trying to keep its alliance with Germany, simply answered no. Chiune worried in thought for the next several days.
"I cannot cast away the lives of these people who have come and are counting on me. For if not, then I am playing God."
After conferring with �KZq.v�l, he made the tough decision to ignore the order from the State Department.
Around July 29 and for nearly a month, Chiune neither ate nor slept and continued to write to visas.
After Lithuania became a member of the Soviet Union on August 3rd, the consulate issued an order thrice for stopping the Jews, but Chiune continued to disregard the orders.
Eventually, he would leave the area on September 5, but until the very last moment when he finally departed from Kaunas station, he continued to write visas for the many Jews waiting.
In April 1947, Sugihara returned to his homeland to work for the State Department, though he soon left in June of the same year.
On July 31, 1986, while in Kamakura, Japan, Sugihara entered the eternal sleep. He remarked of himself, "Perhaps as a diplomat, I made some mistakes. But as a human being, I did the right thing."
Before his death, in 1985 he was awarded the "Yad Bashem" medal by the Israeli government.
Crossing boundaries and having bravery to make difficult decisions as a human being is a noble deed in any generation.