‘The day my mum looked after the Beatles’

1966 flight dodged a storm, JAL attendant recalls, but that was nothing compared to the tempest that awaited the Fab Four at the Budokan
by David Mcneill

In rock mythology, John Lennon was the cynical, acid-tongued Beatle, Paul McCartney was friendly and open, George Harrison was the quiet one and drummer Ringo Starr was the group’s clown, always joking around. Satoko Condon remembers it a bit differently.

“Ringo was a bit difficult,” says the Osaka native, recalling how he snapped out orders for food. “He hardly spoke and never smiled.” McCartney wrote a love letter to his girlfriend. Harrison was reliably shy. And John Lennon? “I found him the friendliest,” she says. “He was so comical.”

Forty-seven years ago, the Liverpool mop tops came to Tokyo for a historical and ill-fated visit that helped seal the fate of their live tours. Then a young stewardess with Japan Airlines known by her maiden name Kawasaki, Satoko found herself catering to the four most famous men in the world.

fter years of seeing them on television, she was surprised to find that they were just ordinary people, she says. “They were trying their best to be friendly but we knew their only privacy was when they were traveling between places, so our aim was to leave them alone.”

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