The Old Man and the Amabie
Keeping Tabs Weekly, Summer 2019
Shigeru Suzuki is not a household name in Japan, but his business is: In 1950, Suzuki was the founder of Red Garden Sushi, recently the third most popular fast food chain in all of Japan, following McDonald’s and Sukiya, edging out KFC. Its 1,300 locations—from Miyazaki in the south to Wakkanai City, Hokkaido, in the north—bring in nearly two billion dollars USD every year.
“My grandfather,” says Haruto, age 9, Suzuki’s grandson, “is very hard of hearing but is very clear in his mind. He is smart. Now that he is retired, he likes to fish. And his eyesight is amazing, like the tancho [red-crowned crane]. He made sushi cheap and good. And then he saw Amabie.”
A year ago, Haruto says, he and his grandfather went fishing off the coast of Yakushima in Kagoshima Prefecture. It rained, he says, but they stayed out on the water.
“There was a rainbow,” he remembers. “It was out of the rainbow that Amabie came.”
Amabie is a Japanese myth, a strange creature said to possess a beak and big eyes in an otherwise humanish face, long hair-like fins, three long feathered tails, and shimmering scales. It is said to come from the sea to sing warnings to those who can stop disasters, most notably crop failings, disease, and famine, giving them advice on how to head off these possible calamities. It is considered unwise to ignore the advice of Amabie.
“Really,” Haruto insists, “it’s true! We saw Amabie! She came out of the water under the rainbow like a dream. She was beautiful but scary. And she came to talk to my jii-chan [grandpa]!”
The boy describes a melodic whisper coming from the being as it drifted across the water toward their small fishing boat. He says he was entranced, and he claims that every word she said was “written on [his] brain like a favorite song.” As such, he can recite the words in their entirety a year later.
“Suzuki-san, you have the power to spread this word and spare the world a secret affliction. And in your doing, you can halt a famine! Share my name and tell this truth, and there will be salvation!”
And then, Haruto says, the shining form of the legend of the sea, Amabie, disappeared once more.
“We watched her go, together, my grandfather and me,” the boy says. “And then my grandfather shouted after her, ‘What was that? What did you say?’”
The following month, a nationwide outbreak of salmonella crippled the Red Garden Sushi chain. By year’s end, the company was forced to declare bankruptcy, and patrons seeking sushi had to satisfy their hunger at other restaurants.
“My grandfather broke the same business he made,” Haruto says, “because he just doesn’t listen.”
