The master, bearing witness to this chaos around him, has offered not a word. He's been focused on eating his own rice and drinking his own soup, and he's now picking his teeth with a toothpick. When it comes to his daughters' upbringing, the master appears to have committed himself wholeheartedly to non-intervention. All three could, before too long, be donning the shrimp-brown hakama of college girls, or a rat-gray hakama for that matter, and all three could, as if on cue, abscond with their beaus. The master, for his part, would be unperturbed, still eating his own rice and drinking his own soup. He's void of all ambition. On the other hand, when one looks at ambition in this day and age, it seems to consist of nothing more than snaring the innocent with lies, wielding shrewdness to get oneself ahead, intimidating others through false fronts, or entrapping the gullible with trickery. Middle schoolers, even from their first year, are quick to pick up on this conduct, deluding themselves that this is how one makes one's mark. What should by all rights be grounds for shame, they practice with great fanfare, imagining themselves gentlemen in the making. These are not what one can call productive citizens. They're better referred to as thugs. I'm a Japanese cat and am by no means unpatriotic. When I see such men posturing as citizens, my first instinct is to level them good with a hard smack. Each and every one is a blight on the national honor. Any school housing such students only debases itself, as does any country hosting such citizens. Despite being grounds for shame, such men these days seem to litter the landscape in ever-increasing numbers. Why is beyond me. The men of Japan, it seems, lack the mettle of the nation's cats. A wretched situation, indeed. Compared to these thugs, I have to say that the master is by far the better man. He's better for lacking in ambition. He's better for lacking in competence. And he's better for lacking in audacity.