Iehiro Tokugawa arrives at the publishing house Kobunsha, for which he works on occasion as a translator, accompanied by his Vietnamese wife. He is all in black; she is in blue jeans with a waterfall of shining hair down her back, and very lovely too. Speaking in fluent English, he extends his hand to introduce himself as potentially the 19th shogun in the Tokugawa family line — should Japan ever have use again for a new-style feudal lord with an American accent and an international marriage, that is. "You will remember that Ieyasu Tokugawa established his power base in Edo in 1603," he begins, clearing his throat nervously. "My family then ruled until the Meiji Reformation towards the end of the 19th century."
He explains that the last and 15th shogun, Yoshinobu Tokugawa tried hard to reform the outdated shogunate regime but proved unsuccessful. After offering his resignation to the emperor in 1867, he went into retirement and lived until 1913 out of the public eye, taking photographs and fishing.
"Yoshinobu was a very interesting man. Bright. Sensitive. But unpredictable, as intelligent people often are. He had a tendency to flip flop. Do I flip flop?" After a smile chases across his face he replies dead pan: "No, I'm more on the dim side." To which everyone in the room falls about laughing.