1984. Hiroi Koi farm – Koguriyama village.
On my arrival for the first time, the beauty of this village impressed me more than any other of the villages I had seen to date. For ‘photography nuts’, one can spend all day here just taking shot after shot.
The owner of this farm is Kuniyasu Hiroi, on my first visit he had many varieties of Koi for sale and some very unique single Koi dotted here and there throughout the farm. I recall huge Kigoi and Asagi as well as smaller Kumonryu and Showa.
As we were looking around the farm, which has many outdoor concrete ponds dotted around here and there, his wife came out to us with a plate of freshly prepared fruits and urged us to take some.
In his main indoor house he had many tosai, some of which I wanted to buy. When I enquired about these Koi, Mr. Hiroi told me that they had only just been harvested and were acclimatising to life in a concrete pond for the first time. He said he would lose some in the forthcoming weeks but, by the following spring, they would be far more stronger and able to be selected for safe shipping. I thanked him for his honest advice and promised to return.
I have always returned here since then on every visit and receive the same welcoming greetings every time I return.
Over the years I have bought several very high quality Showa from here as well as very high quality Goshiki which he is now famous for.
This farm also is known by the names of Yozaimon, Yozen and, more recently as ‘Conias’ – an abbreviation of Koniyasu.
My first impressions – ‘an outlet for the future’.
