This Sunday, Princess Mako went to the Imperial Palace for the annual ritual as every year.
However, this was the last time she went there as a princess of the royal family. She will marry her commoner boyfriend later this month and will leave her title as a princess.
Princess Mako, a 29-year-old fiancé of Kei Komuro, arrived at the palace in a car with Princess Kako, her younger sister. The princesses sat side-by-side in the back seat and opened the window to greet the people gathered on the road.Komuro (30), who traveled to New York to study at Fordham University’s law school in August 2018, is expected to meet Princess Mako for the first time in three years when the couple will meet the princess’s parents at Akasaka Estate, Tokyo.
The couple will register the marriage, and the princess, a niece to Emperor Naruhito, will move out of their estate that day. They will start a new life together in the United States.
A financial dispute with Komuro’s mom and her ex-fiancé led to the marriage being held for some time. The rite that the princess attended was with other imperial relatives at Kashikodokoro. This shrine is specially built in the palace to remember the Sun Goddess Amaterasu.
The princess will pay a private visit on Tuesday to the Imperial Palace Sanctuaries. These include Kashikodokoro and enshrine her family’s ancestors. On Friday, she will meet with the Emperor and Empress to discuss her plans to marry Komuro.
They would have married each other back in late 2018. However, the Imperial Household Agency announced in Feb. 2018 that ritual ceremonies would be postponed due to media reports about Komuro’s financial troubles and her ex-fiance. The official reason for delaying was that the couple wanted to mature and understand more of the public’s livelihood.
The agency announced earlier this month that the marriage would take place on October 26 and would host a press conference later in the day with Komuro.The official announcement of the schedule revealed that the princess had complex post-traumatic stress disorder. This was due to the psychological abuse she and her family received about her marriage.
Source: Kyodonews
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