Gold Fish Camellia

It was about a thousand years ago. This is the story of a monk on his journey, while he was traveling along the Tokaido Route. He stopped by at a farmhouse around Yatsuhashi to have lunch. The family members treated him very kindly, so the monk on a journey was able to recuperate from his fatigue quite well.

When he was about to leave the house, the monk said to the family, “Thank you for your kindness. I would like to leave something as a token of gratitude for your service, but since I do not have anything to give, I will leave the chopsticks that I used for the luncheon box. Take good care of these. They may turn out to be an unusual tree,” and he left the house.

The family diligently followed what they were told, and caringly watered them every morning and evening to nurture them. The tree started to grow bigger and turned into a camellia tree with three branches full of leaves. The leaves looked like the tail of a gold fish, so the villagers started to call it “Gold Fish Camellia.”

Later, it was found that the monk on his journey was Kobo Daishi, and the villagers started to have faith in Kobo.

Gold fish camellias currently grow along the Kamakura Kaido of Yakushi in Yatsuhashi-cho, and some people tenderly grow camellias from the cuttings. These camellias are also known as “Manyo camellias”

The end.