Samurai Yujiro Taniyama, Japan Broadcasting.net Lolipop Correspondent
Chewlet 「チューレット」was released in 1956, as an ‘edible chewing gum’. Two decades on, it was renovated and renamed Hi-Chew; short for Hi-grade Chewlet. Hence to a certain extent it can be said that this year marks the “70th Anniversary of Japan’s mighty favorite candy” Hi-Chew. The unexampled confectionary wouldn’t have been even born, in my view, were it not for the tenacity of the confectionary superstar Morinaga Taichiro, born in 1865.
By the way because his name is pronounced Molly-Naga（森永） in Nipponese, please do allow the impertinent author to refer to the protagonist also as Uncle Molly. The root of the word ‘mollify’ as a matter of fact is mollificare in Latin; mollis meaning soft, and ficare meaning make. Very confectionary, certainly.
Dear prudent reader, let us now begin.
Miseries and adversities ruthlessly pounded on Taichiro especially in his early years. Correct me if I’m wrong, but according to my beneficial yet pathological studies he de facto became an orphan at the age of six when his father died. Kiku, his mother allegedly remarried to another senseless plutocrat sort of bloke who simply rejected the very existence of Taichiro. Grandma Chica (Kiku’s mama) therefore became the guardian of the despondent six year old; although some tales that I read suggest that Taichiro was transferred from a relatives’ house to relatives’ house every staggering six months – perhaps treated as an unwanted cumbrous little kid, a stranger from outside or literally a bloody Gaijin within his own motherland. The homogeneity of the Japanese is always despicable.
Nonetheless, Uncle Molly was Grandma Chica’s boy inside out – as it was her ineffable love and compassion that always gave him consolation. “No pettifogging, no lies, be determined if you want to accomplish something” – was Chica’s credo that Taichiro never forgot until his death in 1937.
Imari city in northwestern Kyushu, where Taichiro was born was renowned for its production of Imari-yaki (Imari ware), a fine porcelain that was traditionally shipped to China as well as Europe through the Dutch settlement in nearby port of Nagasaki. When the future confectionery legend was around 11 or 12, Granny Chica called upon Taichiro’s uncle Yamazaki Bunzaemon (who ran a wholesale store of porcelain) to teach the boy ABC of pottery business. With absolute vehemence the boy learned. Unlike the unremarkable author of this remarkable column, he was always solemn. Google AI even suggests ‘He changed his name to Yamazaki Taichiro’ – which to me sounds rather incredulous to say the least.
At any rate in 1888, Uncle Molly, now an ambitious man in his early twenties hops on a ship from Yokohama and arrives in Golden Gate Bridge or San Francisco. To make a fortune by selling Japan made porcelain was his aim. Unsurprisingly however, the mission turned out to be a massive failure. He was given a contemptible look by uncivilized Yanks and Americans as a B-grade immigrant trying to sell some crap (in the formers’ standards). Devastated Taichiro, both hopeless and penniless, was one day sitting on a bench of a local grass park when a kind decrepit caucasian lady approached him with a smile and nodded, “Young Chinese man, please” (Italic part is my sincere speculation) and offered him something that incontrovertibly changed the course of his life. Magnitude 18.88 Tsunami struck Uncle Molly instantaneously. “What on earth is this unearthly yummy stuff?! Earthshaking!”, screamed the destitute youngster from Japan, continuing; “O’ blimey I must learn how to make this incredible candy thing and present it to all the kids in my homeland! They gonna love it!”.
Persistence, energy and ingenuity was Uncle Molly’s lethal weapon. In a blink of an eye he began searching for a place to work, but back in the end of the 19th century USA was known for its remarkable racial segregation. The ‘colored people’ as they were called (Afro-Americans or blacks, Chinese, Japanese, Native Indians etc) were seen as 3rd class citizens and strictly banned from using the same toilets as the white people! Taichiro therefore was no exception. He couldn’t find a job at a sweets-shop, but instead by mere coincidence he was hired as a housekeeper by the ‘Lady who gave him a candy at the park’!
Mr & Mrs. ‘Candy’ (purportedly the actual name of the old generous couple living in Auckland was Dunning) were devout Christians. Solid protestants. Scotsman Samuel Smiles’ bestseller book ‘Self Help’ was already (inscrutably) a smashing hit in Nippon back in the 1870s – but anyhow Uncle Molly was awestruck yet moved by the lofty idealism as well as the philanthropic nature of Christianity. He resonated with Jesus’s two commandments; to love God and ‘to love our neighbors’. The extreme rectitude that he naturally possessed may have also played a role for his somewhat extraordinary behavior on an isolated foreign soil (where ironically the second commandment was beautifully forgotten, caucasians shamelessly stirring up hatred against colored neighbors); yes, against all odds sooner or later in around 1891 Taichiro was baptized.
“I must spread the gospel, the words of Jesus to my people”, he nodded, and took a two weeks long cruise ship journey back to Yokohama. However, as the prudent reader may know Japan is a ridiculously homogeneous society. When everyone’s drinking coke, never say Pepsi. As Uncle Molly started to preach whats on the Bible in his hometown of Imari, his good old countrymen grew indignant over bringing in a Gaijin deity from the land of hotdogs and ketchups. Uncle Yamazaki Bunzaemon especially was exasperated. “Didn’t you say you went to America to master how to make Western kei-kee (cakes) and kyandei (candy) and sweets whatever?! And look what you’re doing now! Buddhists we are! Wake up you damnable fool! And from now on you are banned from using our family name goddamit!” – hence it is alleged that at this point our protagonist was forced to change his name back to his original Morinaga Taichiro.
“Uncle Yamazaki is correct! I was flat out wrong!”
Struck by ‘Back to the Future’ like lightening, Uncle Molly quickly hopped on a ship back to San Francisco (he stayed in Nippon for just 3 months). Hankering after ‘chocolates and candies’, our Molly was no longer stoppable. The former pottery wholesaler got a job at a local bakery as a ‘cleaner boy’ (virtually a slave if not a street-urchin probably) working 16 hours a day, paid $16 a day. Teased, bullied and labeled a ‘JAP’, (a hugely derogatory term that still persists in ignorant White Society today) – not only by his inimical coworkers but also the customers, Taichiro was indomitable. Infallible. Unshakable. Gradually our Molly began to win trust among his colleagues for all those sickeningly slavish duties that’s imaginable – washing the dishes, apple pie deliveries to customers’ houses, cleaning up the kitchen, the windows and even the toilets. The Jap always gave 200% for everything he did. Impressed was the manager of the bakery, who unsurprisingly offered to renew the contract; and that’s exactly when Taichiro revolted.
“Please teach me how to bake a bread. Then I’ll stay”.
That very day, Japan’s future king of confectionery was born. So after 12 years in the glorious land of the Yankees, Taichiro finally went back to his sickeningly homogeneous homeland in 1899. He rented a little house and Morinaga company ( a very lilliputian factory/bakery about the size of merely 10 tatami mats) was established that same year in Akasaka (not Alaska), in central Tokyo. UberEats or FoodPanda didn’t exist at the time so Taichiro not only baked cakes and cookies but also pulled the manpowered-cart himself as a street vendor. The general public, especially the old fashioned conservatives were skeptical about this unfamiliar kyara-meru (caramel) business – but the kids surely loved everything he made. They followed him around using their precious and scarce pocket money to get a bite of mouthwatering marshmallows from the West.
“I must pass on bucket of love and happiness to all the people just as Jesus said!”, nodded Morinaga Taichiro, now a devout Christian – who had also decorated the roof of his cart with words from The Bible. Sooner or later the people began calling him ‘Christian Caramel Bloke’.
Then to everyone’s disbelief the following year on the 31st of December 1900, our Uncle Molly became the designated patisserie for Emperor Meiji – the most revered man in the country at the time! Chocolates, caramels and confectioneries of all sorts were inconspicuously delivered to the Imperial Palace for the Royal family’s New Year celebration.
The rest, is history.
When the ultra-massive earthquake struck Tokyo-Yokohama in summer of 1923, claiming the lives of over 100,000 people, Taichiro stood firm. “Two million people have lost their homes”, the Morinaga founder began, continuing, “And we will do everything we can to help and support those in need! Distribute bottles of milk to affected mothers, cans of condensed milk to families facing malnutrition, rice, biscuits, marshmallows, caramels you name it. Give ‘em all we got! Start handing them out at 6a.m tomorrow morning at Hibiya park and Shiba park all free of charge! That’s an order!”
In the first week alone 300,000 people received complimentary milk, 60,000 bags of biscuits and caramels, hundreds and thousands of rice bags as well as 15,000 cans of condensed milk were handed over to the refugees. Trucks packed not with Hi-Chew but yummy donuts were also deployed. It goes without saying that our Christian Caramel Bloke’s quintessential sagacity had saved the lives of common people that all of a sudden confronted unintelligible misfortunes in life.
Lastly, before wrapping up this chocolatey-report let me please point out that some tales that I, the rigged infidel-author read while writing this article suggests that Uncle Molly the Great (UMG)’s utmost priority in life was to disseminate Christian faith; and that running his splendid confectionary factory was merely a vehicle that enabled him to achieve that aim. Ineffable discrepancy as it may sound, simultaneously I find it pretty much plausible. And to substantiate such a narrative, the decorous protagonist did devote the last two years of his life to procure Christian action; amplifying the teaching of Jesus across the country. Transient world we all live in, but I would like to convey to the prudent reader lastly and for all that the reason why I resonate with the life-story of Morinaga Taichiro is perhaps because I myself is no stranger to racial discrimination. Roughly a century after Molly was downplayed as a Jap in White San Francisco, I had exactly the same experience in 1980s Australia. Many classmates at primary school saw me simply as a phlegmatic Chinaman from some squalid zoo. Even juveniles are impervious to discrimination. Times have changed (Canberra now boasts Foreign Minister of Peking ethnicity O’ blimey, Mrs. Wong 王) and by no means do I have any grudge towards Pat Cash or mates DownUnder today. I still bloody love Vegemite mate. And just as Taichiro overcame various predicaments through Jesus’ commandments of love, I also attribute my harsh yet memorable days in South Australia to good warmhearted people. There were plenty of amicable and reasonable Aussies back then where the word enmity, just didn’t exist in their anthropologic dictionary. Bob Hawke probably knew it all.
Chewable is life, especialy a high grade one!
In every Hi-Chew we chew
Grace splendors mellow curfew
Christian Caramel Bloke Sagacity
Love outshines ignorance and homogeneity!
