One learns through mistakes. This is really the only way to do it--experience, they say, is the best teacher but BAD experience is what they mean. If everything goes right all the time, all you learn is how to deal with the good. It's the bad, however, that leaes scars, and the scars remind you what not to do.

OK, so enough with the dramatics. Let's talk about a rock.

On a recent trip to Kyoto, I went to a hone dealer; a hone dealer with an impeccable reputation, and stones that people hunger for worldwide. Yes, that hone dealer.

As I have done a few times now, I sat down and went through rocks. I tested, inspected a dozen or so before I found a couple that seemed to have that balance of abrasive power, price and purity that mark the "sweetspot." There was one more stone that I felt was borderline--it was big, and had lovely feedback, but there was a thin line or "suji^?" running across a significant portion of the stone. It worried me becuase in places it seemed to blossom with darker inclusions. I felt it, honed a couple of razors on it, and finally said point blank. "I like this stone, but this suji worries me. What's your professional opinion?"

He said "That suji is nothing to worry about. The only suji that cause problems are the ones that sparkle, that's a harder part. This one is ok." He held the stone up to show no sparkle or shine. 

I believe him. I'm still new to this business, you see, while (as I said) his reputation was wide and clean. I bought the stone.

Later, at home, I took my time going through the stones I had bought. Some of them were for others, some of them were for me. The last stone, the big one with the suji, was for me. I brought it out last, to hone some very special razors. I riased a slurry on it, and began honing. About 15 minutes in, as I was nearing the end of the session, I suddenly felt a serious grating sensation--something large was in my slurry.

I felt carefully with my fingers, and found a piece of something like black sand. I was very disappointed in myself--I thought I had let a pieve of grit from the sandpaper I'd used to lap another stone linger around my honing area. I washed the stone carefully and began again.

This time, grit appeared in the botan^? slurry. This struck me as strange...my botan had not caused problems before, but it can happen with them.

Again, I washed the stone and this time, tried another nagura^?. Grit appeared again. Now, I was sure it was the stone.

I lapped the stone carefully, and this time tested it with water only. Again, grit appear, a small black piece of stone. At this point, I wasn't sure what to do. I knew this was a natural stone, and as such can have flaws. But at the same time, it had not been cheap, and I had bought it from a reputable vendor...it should have been safer. 

I contacted the vendor and explained the problem. He asked me to wash the stone carefully, and use my fingers to see if I could find any pits that might have released grit. I did so, and felt a very very fine crack...in that suji. I looked closer. The dark spots that I had been worried about were smaller, and indeed there was an opening there. To me, this was clearly the culprit.

I called him and explained what I had found. He asked me for pictures and, if possible, a video. I obliged, as you can see. It went smashingly, I thought.

Then he asked for a picture of the offending place. In my preparations for this, I dried the stone and tried to find the best angle. What I saw was this:

Yep, that's right. It was shiny. I hadn't looked at just the right angle...but I had now. He had told me to my face that a shiny suji was a bad one, and here it was.

I called him and when I pointed this out to him, things got weird. He began talking, and talking, and talking. He talked for 10+ minutes. He explained that these were natural things and sometimes had flaws. He explained that he couldn't offer any kind of warranty on his stones, or the price would go even higher. He explained that carpenters never complained about small suji like that. He explained that it could be fixed with a nail or pick. Then he started going on about how these kinds of things happened mostly in suita^?, though this wasn't a suita, and that this problem was unavoidable and and and...

I never asked him for anything. I simply said "OK, I understand." and hung up. Because I was tired, you see. My conversational Japanese is ok, but talking on the phone for so long was exhausting, and frankly I had given up trying to understand. I had my wife email him to tell him that we were going to be in the area later this month, so if he would like to see the stone we could meet and discuss it face to face.

He didn't answer.

We waited till the middle of the next day, and when my wife asked me what I wanted to do, I said "Take care of it."

Now, here I should say a bit about my wife. She's an amazing woman, caring and strong and intelligent. She puts up with far too much from me. But she does not, in any way shape or form, put up with anything from other people.

When I said "Take care of it," that was akin to that line in Gladiator when Russel Crowe says "On my signal, unleash hell."

My wife's email is far too long and "Japanese" to relate here, just suffice it to say that it pointed out that not only was I not a pro, but I had bought that stone particularly on his word, and that the very point I had been concerned about was the point that had caused problems, and so this was all just very unfortunate, we would take it as a learning opportunity and wished him a good life.

The fact that we had, over the last two years, spent well over $1500 on his stones might have made that last part a bit more punchy, because as soon as she sent that mail, my wife started getting phone calls. 6, to be exact, which she couldn't answer because she was at work. But the messages were all along the lines of "Please let me explain!"

My wife's only response was, "We don't need any more explanation. If you have a solution, call me, if not, thanks for your time."

And that's where it ended.

A relationship that could have grown and been of benefit to both of us ended because, essentially, the man has no idea what customer service is. If at the very beginning, he hadn't said "This suji is no problem", if he'd said "There might be some problems with this, but here's how to deal with it if it happens.." or "If you're careful, that won't be a problem..."  Or later, if he'd said "I'm sorry to hear about that! Let's try to work this out..." or "That's terrible, why don't we meet to talk about it..." things would have been much better. Instead, he took such pains to point out to me that I should have been more careful, and that certainly it wasn't his fault because he just sells natural things and all. As it is, well, lesson learned, and another point in my guide.

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