I have a personal story that relates to your question on the machine tool industry investment in Europe. It was 1984 and I was in "limbo" as I had returned to NYC from Doris Orme and the IOWC to apply for my husband's permanent residency, and I certainly did not want to return to her team. I was assigned to the "notorious" Team 100 formed by Won Pil Kim to deal with the IOWC escapees who had fled to New York.

I supported myself through that old standby, i.e., flogging flowers, and my favoured spot on the weekend was the block facing Central Park containing the Plaza Hotel and the Ritz. The area was filled with tourists and convention participants, and quite lucrative for rose sales. One night I was approached by a man who was attending a convention for the machine tool industry. He owned a German tool and die business. I had worked (1980-82) in the East Sun Building with Master marine fiberglass division at the time when the US Saeilo office was first set up and I was aware of the Unification Church purchase of Wanda Machine Co. in Germany. Reverend Moon's idea was to blend German technology with Korean creativity, I believe.

This man and I began to converse and I mentioned that I knew of a machine tool business run by my church which had recently bought a successful German manufacturer. When he discovered it was the Unification Church, he became quite excited and said to me " Listen to this story!"

He had advertised for an office manager for his firm. A lady came for an interview who had worked for Wanda for about 15 years. He was puzzled as to why she would want to leave a secure position in a good business, particularly since she had been working with the company for such a length of time. She was reluctant to tell him her reasons at first, but eventually she opened up and explained why she had quit Wanda.

She said that Rev. Moon had bought controlling interest in the company and soon Koreans began to enter the business to take various positions. She said that they were inexperienced in the industry, but began giving orders to the German staff and interfere with the normal running of the business. Staff became unhappy and frustrated and began leaving the company, including herself. This is why she was seeking a new job.

Wanda had been a successful and well established manufacturer, but had begun to go downhill before the Unification Church purchase, he told me. Perhaps the company reputation was slipping and it needed capital investment, which was the opportunity for Reverend Moon.

I have heard nothing further about the company except this, from the Australian Japanese National Messiah (NM): He reported to the 1999 Australian national leaders meeting ( I was present ) that when he attended workshop for Japanese NMs in Jardim Reverend Moon had scolded all of the participants for their failures and was particularly furious about the sale of the German company which he said was carried out by Takeru Kamiyama without his knowledge and approval. He was so angry that he spat on them. This NM appeared to have been quite shocked from his experience in Jardim, as Reverend Moon vented his spleen at them big time, according to his report.

This business affair in Germany is yet another depressingly familiar incident in what has become a consistent pattern, IMO, in the Unification Movement. I was in Kodiak for 6 months in 1990 during the reign of Johnson Choi (36 BC ) and those fish businesses were run in the most inefficient, downright kooky manner, from what I observed. He was replaced shortly after Steve and I left for Australia (Sept. 90) by another Korean who was a better boss, according to reports from our Kodiak friends.

Steve had asked me "Would you like to stay here?" He was in hog heaven (or shall I say fish heaven!) fishing Sockeye in the rivers, King salmon and halibut at sea, etc. I was stuck on land with our toddler and becoming increasingly aware of how miserable many of the wives appeared to be in the Kodiak Unification Church community. They were terribly oppressed by His Choiness, who I concluded was a misogynist, among other things. Sadly, he was there for 10 years, and did a lot of damage before his removal, according to members' stories. My reply to Steve was "We'll stay here over my dead body!"

BTW, I was drafted to help care for the summer invasion of hundreds of Japanese and Korean members who were invited to experience the great fishing of untamed Alaska. It was weird and round-the-clock work to care for them. There were 4 toilets in the basement of North Garden that had to service hoards of people and I was on cleanup duty. I'll never forget the morning I arrived when the toilets backed up and overflowed. There was a brown tide that had covered the floor. Lovely job, that one. But I digress....

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