niime 百科

Encyclopedia of niime

〈continued from the first half〉

Tamaki

I wonder which direction we will go after the Coronavirus pandemic. All events with crowds or gathering are banned, right? With these events being taken away, it would be good if we could be aware of the importance of such events and make efforts to maintain the entertainment value. However, in this current world, we should not gather, right? It creates distances, and I feel they make excuses that it is okay because we could still connect with the internet.

Sakai

I have a totally different opinion about it. Basically, entertainment is enjoyed not by individuals but in groups. Gatherings enable us to enjoy spectacles, but now they are banned, right?

—— Ummmm…..

Sakai

You know what? Even daydreaming outside by myself, there are many aspects of entertainment. I believe we will refine our own enjoyment from now on. I hope everyone becomes aware of its importance.

Tamaki

You mean we shouldn’t depend on others when it comes to “gatherings.”

Sakai

That’s right.

Tamaki

I understand that.

Sakai

After all, entertainment can be extremely “dependent”, which we shouldn’t rely on. We need to seek something more “individual” …

—— So more like solitary play?

Sakai

You are right. Being away from existing entertainment, your own play that we mentioned before, or the things you can create by yourself will help you feel more sensitive to what you really think.

—— Generally speaking, entertainment is passive.

Sakai

Right. You are absolutely right.

Tamaki

They make you brainwashed.

Sakai

That’s right! They brainwash you.

—— That’s not what we need. What we need is the means of producing your own entertainment.

Sakai

You are right.

—— Each one of us needs to.

Tamaki

We should have entertainment on our own terms.

Sakai

Yeah, because we have entertainment in our daily life.

—— I see.

Sakai

Before this we believed that we needed big entertainment, but the actual matter is on how much small enjoyments we could find in oneself. That’s all. In this coronavirus environment, it may give us an excellent chance to see us going back to our roots.

—— Going back to your roots of “play”?

Sakai

Basically, I like pondering and doing nothing to relax. I didn’t need to gather in the crowd because I could be excited and enjoy time by myself.

—— In that sense, I wonder what kind of fun children today would invent.

Tamaki

What would you create during the time that we are restricted from doing anything in a month?

—— Like what would you choose to play?

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

Yeah, in the limited conditions to be in a house but children would absolutely…

Sakai

That would be absolutely great for them. They have an excellent opportunity to be away from the ordinary education.

Tamaki

They may lose the necessity of school existence.

Sakai

So, Tamaki took my nephew to Yamagata on her business trip in March, and he had many experiences there.

Tamaki

Yeah, we had fun.

—— You visited “Araebisu” that operates to protect Japanese woods and water resources.

Sakai

My nephew plays baseball, and he usually gets hooked on watching YouTube. But he went to profound nature spots like mountains to be away from people. He was so excited. His mood was totally different.

Tamaki

Yeah, his senses were stimulated.

—— What do you think about playing with given items?

Sakai

It is not attractive at all.

Tamaki

I was aware of one thing that I was told by the person I met. I agreed with what he said that it is the essential point if grownups are enjoying it or not. Actually, I was more excited than children.

Sakai

Really?

Tamaki

We shouted “Wow” or “Great!”. I thought it was crucial that adults should show our examples of excited feelings.

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

After getting off the airplane at Yamagata airport, I paused to open my arms in front of the sign “Yamagata” saying “Here we are!”. And we did it together. I did first, and he followed me to do the same. But if I asked him to stand there to take pictures, he would just stand there.

Sakai

As I think about that, there is surely some small entertainment there. To put it bluntly, did you enjoy yourself or not.

Tamaki

It was the event I had during my trip, but the point is how you can create your own entertainment for today.

Sakai

That’s right.

—— You are free of the opinions of others. It is vital that you feel you are having fun.

Tamaki

It doesn’t matter how others feel.

Sakai

You are right. I feel we finally get time to focus on the importance of individuals.

Tamaki

It looks like people all over the world can be aware right now.

—— Then, we can see your values, the meaning of tamaki niime’s “One of a kind mass productionism” which is a one to one response, one item to an individual.

Sakai

We don’t know how the world will change from now on, but I feel our time has finally come.

Tamaki

Hmmm. It is not as easy as you say. If it is only a matter of me, it would be easier…, however, we have to run the organization of the company. It is not so easy.

Sakai

Take it easy. Think optimistically.

Tamaki

Surely I’ve been enjoying working, and believing whatever will be, will be. I am not pessimistic.

—— On the upstairs a little while ago, I watched your staff answering their customers as they ordered “tamasks” on the phone. I thought the way they handled the customers individually were really nice.

Tamaki

Yeah…

—— They were not just taking orders, but also they were caring how the customers were doing.

Tamaki

Yes, we accept orders by phone, and we’re thinking to have virtual video shopping.

—— That’s a good idea.

Tamaki

Since many people quarantined at home have been lonely, we could do something other than meeting customers at the shop.

Sakai

It may be true that the people are dependent on entertainment, and gatherings are suddenly left alone, which might make them very lonely.

Tamaki

They feel isolated.

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

On that matter, we discussed that we would respond flexibly with what we could. For example, if we ask customers to shop on our web site, elderly people would complain to us that they don’t know how to use the internet.

—— For the customers who want to enjoy shopping at the real store, we could provide with YouTube videos that our staff have for ordering “tamasks”.

Tamaki

That’s right. We need to show people our mask sales at present. We need to let them know what we are doing.

—— That’s an excellent idea.

Tamaki

Because the customers can’t come to the store now, we need to send information to them.

—— While our talks continue, the central belief of tamaki niime is unintentionally exposed in these situations.

Tamaki

Absolutely, we became unified. So everyone gets excited! Risky conditions unite us. The Coronavirus made everyone feel uneasy. After all, we don’t know what is happening because we can’t see it with our eyes.

—— In other words, we could say it allows us to learn a lot.

Tamaki

Even though nobody asks, everybody has to think about it.

—— We can’t help thinking of the ways of how to survive.

Tamaki

Because we have real situations, we have to think about it. That’s why it is easier to experiment and try and error for now.

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

We can try many other ways if one way doesn’t work out.

—— You can take chances.

Tamaki

Yeah, we can. Of course, the scenarios I have in my mind are not singular. Whatever situations happen, I try to get answers on each case instinctively. I had no idea to make masks at all a year ago.

Sakai

Not at all.

Tamaki

Six months ago, however, I told my staff that we would make “something” besides shawls. I declared we would do something creative that would last the next 100 years.

—— You sound like a real prophet.

Tamaki

Yes. (laugh) And I asked them to consider it together.

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

They have kept that suggestion in mind, which must have inspired them to come up with the idea of making masks this time. (speaking to Sakai) Making masks was meant to happen. Ha!

—— Umm…

Tamaki

That’s very interesting. In that sense, I think this is what I wanted to do. It was worth preparing for that. We can unify to work full time together.

Sakai

Yeah.

Tamaki

We were swamped and had a hard time to catch up making “tamasks”, and we needed more people to work. And then Declaration of Emergency was announced, so all the department stores were closed, which was big for us because the staff who worked at the niime section of department stores came back to the factory here.

—— Oh, I see.

Tamaki

The shortage of workers was solved, and we could run forward making masks. It looks the timing helps us to make things work, pushing our backs forward.

Sakai

Yeah.

—— It depends on how you take things. Don’t you think you are rolling in the right direction?

Tamaki

I think so!

—— It is possible to go in positive directions even though in the same hard situations depending on how you take and accept the circumstances.

Tamaki

That’s why everyone has possibilities to go in the right directions. We didn’t estimate and plan for the Coronavirus, however what we have been doing is make a small choice for the things in front of us from time to time. It is interesting to see such little choices bring us real results.

Sakai

Yeah, it’s interesting.

Original Japanese text by Seiji Koshikawa.
English translation by Adam & Michiko Whipple.