SHIZUOKA: Haunting notes stream from Manami Ito’s violin as she gracefully draws her bow back and forth, clasping it with her specially designed prosthetic arm.
The Japanese musician enthralled a nation with her brief but show-stealing performance at the opening ceremony of the Tokyo Paralympics, and playing violin isn’t even her day job.
The 36-year-old is a qualified nurse and a former Paralympian swimmer who has spent the years since she lost her right arm in a motorbike accident defying her naysayers and overcoming every obstacle before her.
“There were always people who told me: ‘No, you can’t do it. It’s impossible,'” she told AFP at her mother’s home by a lush…
