Reunification Through Time – A Chance Encounter with Late Namiki Founder’s Granddaughter

Ms Yoko Namiki was browsing for daily items along Orchard Road to replenish her new home in Singapore. It was a fresh start for the housewife who had just followed her husband in his new posting as a visiting teaching staff in a university in Singapore.

Along the walkways of a mall, a wide open book caught her eyes, something warm and familiar. It was not so much the theme of the book but a portrait illustrated on the book – a picture similar to the one she had at her home in Japan since she was small.

It was a pen boutique, Elephant & Coral, with so many maki-e pens and other unique items decorating the carefully designed storefront window. The book was Namiki: The Art of Japanese Lacquer Pens by Julia Hutt and Stephen Overbury.

As she enquired more within the boutique about the book, she realised that it was a book written about the history and tradition of Namiki fountain pens. The portrait in the book was that of Mr Ryosuke Namiki, the late founder of Namiki Manufacturing Co. Ltd., who was also her grandfather!

Although her grandfather had sold the company many years ago, it excited her very much to see a book honouring the wisdom and vision of Namiki’s beautiful pens. Ms Namiki bought the book for S$380 and she was excited to show it to her husband, as well as relatives back home in Japan.

Seven months later, Ms Namiki returned to Elephant & Coral. She graciously shared with everyone a photo she had taken with all her relatives, with the book she had purchased, at the shrine of the late Mr Ryosuke Namiki during the memorial day of her grandfather.

As a form of remembrance of this chance encounter at Elephant & Coral, Ms Namiki gave a Japanese ceramic cup as a gift to Elephant & Coral with good blessings. She also autographed against the portrait of his grandfather: “His Grandchild, Yoko Namiki, Oct 4, 2000.”