Megumi Yokota

I'll be honest, "celebrity" feels like the wrong word here, and that's exactly why I can't look away from her. Megumi Yokota was just thirteen, walking home from badminton practice in Niigata in 1977, when she vanished into the dark and turned out to have been taken to North Korea. Thirteen. Still a kid who should've been arguing about homework, not becoming a name that a whole country learned to ache over. I think about her parents most, honestly, Shigeru and Sakie spending decades standing in front of cameras saying give our daughter back, refusing to let the silence win. That kind of love is its own quiet heroism. I don't have a punchline for this one. I just hope, stubbornly and probably foolishly, that somewhere there's still a day where she gets to laugh again.

Megumi Yokota was born on October 5, 1964, in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. She was abducted by North Korean agents in 1977 at the age of 13, while returning home from badminton practice in Niigata. She is reported to have lived in North Korea, where she worked as a Japanese language teacher. Her case became a central symbol of Japan's abductee issue, and her parents, Shigeru and Sakie Yokota, spent decades campaigning internationally for her return.

Name (English)

Megumi Yokota

Name (Japanese)

横田めぐみ

Reading

よこた めぐみ

Born

October 5, 1964 (age 61)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Libra / Dragon

Origin

Aichi Prefecture, Japan

Occupation

Japanese language teacher / Daughter (of activist parents)

Motto

Private

• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%A8%AA%E7%94%B0%E3%82%81%E3%81%90%E3%81%BF

Tags

• From Aichi Prefecture
• Japanese language teacher
• Abductee

Last updated

2026-06-02

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.