In the fall
of 2008, I received an email from my German colleague, Dr. Ralph Faerber, which
read something like this: "I have attempted to write a story about Gyokuro
. . . please read it and let me know your thoughts."
That evening, after
the staff had left the company, I read the story to myself. My initial reaction
was, "Wow, this is an excellent story!" Even now, I can remember the
feeling of excitement that was to inspire the beginning of this project."
 Link
to the original story
"How
can this story including the unique cultivation of Gyokuro be made known to people
across the world?" I wondered as I phoned Dr. Faerber later that night. When
I suggested that we have the story illustrated, Dr. Faerber said that he had the
same thought. Thus began our endeavor to find a suitable illustrator for this
story. It was
my desire that the story should not only be illustrated adequately, but also that
the illustrator should share our enthusiasm for the uniqueness and beauty of the
cultivation of Gyokuro. With these thoughts in mind, I asked cartoon artist Akishige
Chatani (with whom I had previously had some interesting conversations about green
tea) to look at the story.
He felt our enthusiasm right away. His reply was:
' Yes, let's definitely do this together!'
(At the bottom of this page, you
will find some information about Mr. Chatani. He received the Jury's special award
at Tokyo Contents Market in 2009 for his work 'Sengokudama Dullahan' and is a
Manga artist of whose activities are observed with great expectation.) Although
he is an extremely busy man, we dared to ask him if he could complete this project
by the beginning of the tea harvest in 2009. However, he told us that this would
be impossible. That is when we decided to take it slowly and allow time to do
the job thoroughly. Thus, we moved the deadline to our next tea harvest of April
2010. Following
this discussion, Mr. Chatani visited the famous Gyokuro tea master Toshikazu Yamashita's
tea plantations several times to learn more about Gyokuro and sketch the preliminary
drawings related to the story. Since the fields before the first harvest in May
look very different than those in the fall, the drawings had to be revised several
times.
About
Mr. Toshikazu Yamashita's Gyokuro Also,
due to our desire to create pictures that would radiate warmth to young children,
we asked Mr. Chatani to change the mood of his drawings to fit his audience more.
In retrospect, it may seem that we were too demanding in our requests regarding
the drawings, but when the final copy was finished, we felt that we had attained
our goal to cater to young children and that everyone who looks at these drawings
will experience a genuine affection for them. In
regards to the story, Dr. Faerber's original idea to tell the story from the point
of view of the tea bush was changed by Mr. Chatani's inclusion of a small child
in his drawings. This change was made with Dr. Faerber's consent. Subsequently,
the focus of the story shifted to the character of the little girl. The reason
this change was implemented was to make the story more accessible to children.
It is our earnest desire that through this story people around the world will
come to know about Gyokuro and its rare method of cultivation.
Also, we would
like to take this opportunity to thank our tea farmers for their diligent work
in producing our delicious Gyokuro.
May
2010
Maiko Tea Headquarters
Toshiya Nakabo |
