In July of 1918, just before the end of World War I, Etsu Suzuki went aboard the transpacific liner for Canada where he would work as editor of a Japanese newspaper Tairiku-nippo. On board he happened to encounter a young Russian man who fled from his own country in the midst of the Russian Revolution. While talking with the young man, Suzuki found that he was becoming skeptical of his own idea about revolution, a state-individual relation, and especially national identity. Later Suzuki published this experience on the sea in the Tairiku-nippo. The serial article must have had an impact on the Japanese readers in Canada, for then many of them faced exactly the problem of national identity. For acquisition of citizenship in Canada they volunteered for the front line of the battle in Europe. By witnessing the flimsiness of national identity around him, Suzuki learned the duty of a journalist for the fellow readers in a foreign country.