The story of how a Community Revitalization Corps member tried to join the Literary Flea Market and ended up getting a nice feature

Hello! I am
Hiyama, a laid-back manga artist. I am
working as a member of the Community Revitalization Corps in Ofunato City, Iwate Prefecture.

On June 21st, I participated in the Literary Flea Market Iwate held in Morioka. I intended to set up a booth just as a hobby, but
the scene was covered by NHK, so it ended up looking like a Community Revitalization Corps activity. This time, I would like to write about what happened then.

Ever since I first participated in 2023, participating in the Literary Flea Market every year has become a regular event for me, and I, Hiyama, signed up this time without much hesitation, but since this is my first year as a Community Revitalization Corps member, I had decided that I would make a ZINE about the Ofunato region!.

However, there was just one problem. That was...

Even though it was early June, I hadn't drawn a single page...!!!!

No way...!!!
At this pace...!!!!!

Just then...!!!

A divine revelation strikes Hiyama...!!!!

The phone rings...!!!!

Who...!?

"This is NHK calling..."

WHAAAAAAAT!?!?!?!?!?

To summarize the phone call, it went something like this: "
We are planning to cover the upcoming Literary Flea Market Iwate for an NHK program. We would also like to interview the circle members who will be exhibiting there, and when we searched on social media and the like, we came across your post, Hiyama-san, about participating as a Community Revitalization Corps member. Would you be willing to be interviewed?"

After receiving this call, I, Hiyama, thought to myself.

"If I accept this interview, I'll have to push myself to finish my new work!!"

And so, I, Hiyama, ended up being interviewed by NHK.

A few days later, we decided on the date for the interview, and the person in charge visited my home in Ofunato from Morioka. At that time, I was certainly desperate to make progress on my work just to save face! Thanks to this, right at the last minute before the Literary Flea Market, I was interviewed about
the background of how I ended up making a ZINE, my thoughts on the Literary Flea Market, and my new ZINE, and because of this, my ZINE about Ofunato, 'OFUNATALK', was completed...!!!!!

As for the printing, it was seriously finished right before the event date, so I used a print shop in front of Morioka Stationthat was introduced to me by a fellow creator, Acca.

The speed of being able to submit the data in Ofunato, head to Morioka, and pick up the finished product in front of the station on the same day was very helpful.

And so, the day of the Literary Flea Market Iwate arrived. Even though I couldn't do any promotion beforehand, I was happy that
more people picked it up than I expected. It's always appreciated that acquaintances and fellow creators buy it almost as a way of celebrating just because it's a new work, and this time, I was confident that the cover would catch people's eyes, so I did a fist pump when someone said, 'I don't know anything about Ofunato, but I decided to buy it because the cover is cute.' Of course, I was also happy that people with ties to Ofunato were delighted, saying, 'Isn't that Sanria (the shopping center drawn on the cover)?!'.

So, the NHK crew also filmed those interactions with customers, and it was later broadcast in a segment of 'Obandes Iwate'.

Unfortunately, the link is dead and the archive is no longer available, but I really felt that they interviewed me very carefully. It was their professional interviewing skills; in any case, the background I explained was summarized without any discomfort or misunderstanding, and since it was all composed of the words I spoke, there was absolutely no part distorted by the interviewer's subjectivity, which I was completely convinced by.

With that said, it's been a while since my last update, but I was feeling a bit sluggish after the Literary Flea Market due to poor health, the rainy season, and the heat, so I was finally able to write about what happened a month ago. I'd like to keep things as organized as possible.

See you next week for the next update!
This was Hiyama, the laid-back manga artist!