 In
1995, Ume no Yado changed master brewers. Previously, the brewing
staff had come from the Tajima Brewer's Union from Hyogo Prefecture.
Takahashi toji is a member of the Nanbu Brewer's Union from Iwate
Prefecture. He is from the Kuzu area of Hanamaki City, famous as the
home area of renowned author Miyazawa Kenji. Through spring and summer,
he grows rice on the six hectares of his paddies, then comes to the
Kansai region to brew sake in the winter months. This is a cycle he
has lived by for twenty years. He first worked in a local sake brewery
as a kurabito at the age of twenty, so he with a wealth of forty years'
brewing experience he is very much a veteran toji. Yet, he says modestly,
"every year is like the first, really. Because the rice and the
climate are different every year, each season I start from the beginning
again." Takahashi san is a retiring, straightforward person.
Last year, I turned 60." [which is kanreki in Japanese]. "Someone
said to me that kanreki is being born again, so I'm trying to start
all over again from zero," he says.
 What
Takahashi toji strives most for in his work is wa-harmony-amongst
his staff. "If you have a brewery where everyone can work cheerfully,
then you get good sake. If you don't take care of your people, nothing
goes the way you want it to." It's certainly true that the young
people here say that their work is "exhausting but fun",
and seem to work in a convivial atmosphere.
Having completed his fifth season here, he says "I've got used
to the brewery, I've got used to the rice." Also,"the kurabito
are young but well-informed, and all very enthusiastic. It's thanks
to that that we received a prize in this year's National Contest for
New Sake." As he rates his staff highly, so it would seem that
a sturdy trust has been established between the master brewer and
his team.
At home in Iwate in the summer, he is the kindly Granddad to four
grandchildren. But when the brewing season begins, he undergoes a
 transformation;
as he puts it, "My eyes change colour". This year, too,
the skill, experience, and instincts of the toji, combined with the
philosophy of harmony, will bear fruit in the form of umakuchi no
sake, Ume no Yado.
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