This photo and essay book was written by Moon Troupe Top Star Sena Jun and published during promotions for the 2008 show ME AND MY GIRL, where Top Musumeyaku Ayano Kanami retired. It’s very charming and occasionally emotional.
Some chapters are very short, or contain only pictures, and thus are combined.
The book also featured dual Japanese and English chapter titles, which were not always the same. Where these differ, both are included, with the translation of the Japanese title following in brackets. (For example, Chapter 8 is That time [The era of Asa and Osako])
007. Teddy Bear [Selfish daughter]
When I was a Lower Student1, teddy bears became popular among all my classmates.
I didn’t actually care much for stuffed toys, but maybe because I was homesick and lonely living apart from my parents, I got really jealous of everyone else’s teddy bears.
And what I was even more jealous of was all the care packages everyone else got from their parents.
Everyone else would get phone calls from their mothers, or parcels with food and clothes.
I got…nothing at all.
No matter how I waited and waited…nothing.
They’re the guys that wouldn’t even give me a strawberry, right?
Of course it’s like that…
But I think I was really lonely anyway.
I called home from the Takarazuka Hotel’s public phone2.
Me: ‘Mom, send me a teddy bear!’
Mom: ‘Teddy…bear…?’
Me: ‘A bear! A bear plushie!! (slam 💢)’
The next day, I got a package from Mom.
Ya~y, ya~y!
I was so~ happy, I felt like this was real parental affection!
I opened the box right away.
Me: ‘……’
In the box was a super realistic moon bear plush.
I ran straight to the Takarazuka Hotel to use the phone.
Me: ‘That was the wrong one 💢, I want one wearing a dress 💢 (slam 💢)’
I was the epitome of a bratty daughter from a comic book.
After that, I got a package with a perfectly proper teddy bear (dress version).
Mom, I’m so sorry.
It wasn’t that I actually wanted a teddy bear.
It’s been 19 years since then, and though I gave away the bear in the dress to somebody, the moon bear gives off such a strong personality that I still have it guarding my bedroom now…
To make sure I don’t turn into that selfish daughter again.
On this topic, Koshino Ryuu adores this story about the moon bear, and the first time she came to my house to hang out, the very first thing she did was find the moon bear plush.
She got so excited: “That’s it!! That’s the one!!”
1 – A first-year student at the Takarazuka Music School.
2 – It is unclear from the information available on the Violet Dorm whether there was no public phone in the building at this time or whether she did this from the hotel because of noise rules from the Upper Students.