She was given 30 minutes to talk to them and was told she wasn’t allowed to ask anything specific about their lives, where they lived, where they went to school or their friend’s names.
She was not given a specific reason as to why she had to keep to “limited questions”, but adds that she heard that other divorced parents were told similar things.
“My daughter was very quiet. It’d been three-and-a-half years so I think she was shy. But she said she’d been wanting to see me and that she loved me.”
Her daughter also showed her a letter, which read: Dear Mom, How are you? I am worried because I haven’t seen you for four to three years. I have become a third grader and I have lots of friends. I love you and I want to see you soon!”
Ms Sato smiles when she talks about her son, now a teenager.
“I asked him ‘Is that you?’ three or four times. Because he’d grown so much,” she said. “He’s much taller than me now.”
If there had been a joint custody system in Japan, “none of this would’ve happened”, she adds.
She says she is hopeful that the bill will eventually help eliminate parental abduction cases, but Mr Ueno is less optimistic.
He is doubtful that authorities will actually act against those who abduct their children, adding that there is still very little detail about how the joint custody system will actually be enforced.
“Frankly speaking, I think it’s ‘bare bones’- a bill without substance”, he says. “How can you enforce joint custody when there’s no infrastructure to do so?”
Back in Tokyo, Ms Sato has finally been granted regular visits with her children. She now gets to see them once a month.
She doesn’t know much about their lives she says, but she hopes to make up for lost time.
“At least I’m getting the chance to see my children”, she says, smiling through tears.
Additional reporting by Yumi Herman and Chie Kobayashi
*Names have been changed to protect their identity
