Geo1

Coming upon this skate through lucky happenstance while channel surfing during the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics is what started me on my 10 year journey down the Yuzu rabbit hole.

Ghislain will be at Junior Worlds in Taipei and the World Championships in Montréal and hopes that he will see some fans there. He says, “… too bad that Yuzuru won’t be there (in Montréal) because he was supposed to go … in 2020.” If you are going to either or both of these events and see Ghislain, don’t be afraid to chat and have a picture taken with him. He is very friendly and accommodating.

It’s true! You were bubbling with excitement over Yuzu when you came up to introduce yourself to me at the 2018 ACI.

When I awoke today, I had a nagging feeling that for some reason, today was special. Then I remembered. It was on Monday, September 16, 2019 that we drove from our AirB&B high-rise two-bedroom condo across from the Square One shopping mall in Mississauga to The Cricket, Skating and Curling Club in Toronto to visit Ghislain who arranged for us to meet with Yuzu after his practice. It is hard to believe that four years have gone by since then and that so much has changed during those four years. Yuzu and his mother left Toronto in March 2020 and I believe that they had every intention of returning to The Cricket for the following season but for the pandemic. I had been looking forward to seeing Yuzu, Brian, Ghislain and Tracy at the 2020 Autumn Classic International in Oakville, but it was not to be. The last competition that we attended was the 2019 Skate Canada International Grand Prix in Kelowna, British Columbia, and it was one for the ages.

Javi lost the bronze medal to Dennis Ten at the 2014 Sochi Olympics when he inadvertently Zayaked during his free skate. He did not realize that he had committed this error and was surprised/disappointed in the Kiss and Cry when he saw his score. He fell from bronze medal position after the short program to fourth place by a mere 1.18 points behind Dennis Ten. Ironically, Dennis was the ultimate loser for having won the bronze medal, but that’s another story. Edit: It has always amazed me how quickly Yuzu was able to switch gears and change his program when he made a mistake in order to regain lost points. A case in point is his Seimei free skate when he failed to complete his second quad toe loop combination. He immediately changed the following jump combo to try to make up for the points lost.

Agreed. Definitely don’t want Yuzu to be layered like an onion. I once half jokingly said that a fellow lawyer was like an onion. You can remove all of the layers expecting to find some deep meaningful core, but when you take the last layer off, there is nothing!

This was Yuzu’s initial jacket for ‘Hello I Love You’ when he performed it in June 2012 at the ‘Dreams on Ice’ show. By July 2012, he had already changed the jacket to the shorter one with frills that we are more familiar with when he performed the same number at ‘The Ice’. The black ‘trash bag’ pants are the same though.

Date Masamune was born in what is now Yamagata-ken (Yamagata prefecture). Modern day Yamagata prefecture is located in the Tohoku region of Japan and borders Akita prefecture to the north, Miyagi prefecture (where the city of Sendai is located) to the east, Fukushima prefecture to the south, and Niigata prefecture to the southwest. Masamune carved out a large section of northeastern Japan (Tohoku region) as his domain by warring with and conquering his neighbours. He was the last of the daimyo to submit to Toyotomi Hideyoshi who was the de facto ruler of Japan. Masamune lost a substantial part of his domain to Hideyoshi as punishment for being purposely tardy in coming to the aid of Hideyoshi in a crucial battle. After Hideyoshi's death, Masamune supported Tokugawa Ieyasu who succeeded Hideyoshi and completed the job of uniting all of Japan under his rule and became the Shogun very loosely depicted by James Clavell in his novel of the same name and later made into a miniseries starring Richard Chamberlain and Shimada Yoko. (Incidentally, we met Yoko when she was making a movie in Vancouver and took her out for dinner after which she came to our home and we sang karaoke together. She autographed my two-volume hardcover copy of Shogun.) Masamune was granted the Sendai domain by Ieyasu as reward for his loyalty and support. Masamune subsequently moved into the little village of Sendai with all of his family and vassals and founded the modern-day city of Sendai. Masamune's crescent-moon-bearing helmet and eye patch are famous as evidenced by Neko Masamune's appearance. We bought the Blu-ray disc of 'The Magnificent Nine' ('Tono, Risoku de Gozaru' – 'Lord, The Interest, If You Please') and it did not have English subtitles.

Yes, Yuzu played the part of Date Shigemura, the young daimyo of the Tohoku region from the mid to late 1700s. Date Masamune was Shigemura’s more famous ancestor who reigned almost 200 years before Shigemura. Masamune was a legendary warrior and leader who founded the modern-day city of Sendai. He was much feared by his enemies and was nicknamed the “One-Eyed Dragon of Oshu” because he was missing an eye which was covered with a patch. He apparently cut his own eye out because it was useless and he found it disgusting. Yuzu could probably play the part of Masamune if he put on his ‘hate-to-lose’ killer look. He would probably look good with an eye patch and one eye glaring.

I am happy to hear that you were able to see the documentary. I have noticed that a lot of websites recommend using Google Chrome or Firefox for the best viewing experience.

This is Ghislain in the Air Canada lounge at Toronto Pearson International Airport yesterday waiting for his flight to Tokyo. He will be in Uji, near Kyoto, working at the Kinoshita Academy with Mie Hamada until May 24. Although Ghislain did not meet with Yuzu during Yuzu’s recent trip to Toronto, Ghislain did attend Fantasy on Ice on May 29 last year where he received a warm applause from the audience. Ghislain said that the ice show was great, but not as great as the private meeting he had with Yuzu afterwards which was very special. Ghislain also received a number of gifts from Yuzu while he was in Japan, including Phiten necklaces for himself and his three sons. I am only speculating, but Yuzu may have viewed this as a tribute meeting with Ghislain since Ghislain is no longer with the TCC. Hopefully, that will not be the last meeting between Yuzu and Ghislain.

With Yuzu’s recent visit to the TCC and a formal closure to the most important chapter of his life, to completely understand the significance of the present, one must look at the beginning, when Yuzu first came to Brian. For new Fanyus, if you have not had the chance to watch the 2012 NHK documentary, ‘Spirits of the Athletes’, I would highly recommend that you do. You cannot fully appreciate who Yuzu has become without knowing who he was. I have watched this documentary countless times and never tire of it. This English dubbed version is in the Planet’s video archives.

Brian will see Yuzu at the TCC. Brian would normally have been at the TCC when Yuzu arrived, but he has been out of town for the last couple of days.

Yuzu’s departure from Toronto is unconfirmed, but Ghislain has heard that he is leaving for Japan this Friday. Ghislain does not think that he and Yuzu will be able to meet this time, although he has texted Yuzu. Yuzu is apparently leaving at the end of the week and Ghislain is busy getting ready to leave for Japan on April 29. He will be in Japan until May 24. When I said that Yuzu was probably in Toronto to retrieve his original Pooh Bear, Ghislain replied, “I’m sure that Pooh will be happy to go back to Japan.”

I’m glad to see that the two same age unicorns from Tohoku, Yuzuru Hanyu and Shohei Ohtani, are the top two favourite male athletes by a country mile. Between the two of them they have about 98% of the votes.