Free Announcer Aika Kanda Shares the Story Ideas That Never Made It Into Print

Writing a weekly magazine column is tough. If I simply go about my work and head home as usual every day, nothing particularly extraordinary happens—certainly nothing rare enough to justify being paid to share it with readers. But I don’t have the time or money to constantly seek out unusual experiences, and eventually I run out of interesting stories from my past.

So how do I keep producing material? After three years and three months of writing this column, I’ve developed one habit above all else: questioning everything.

For example, if I see cherry blossoms and think, “Wow, they’re beautiful,” I immediately ask myself, “Why do I find these blossoms so beautiful right now?” And if I feel nothing at all, I ask, “Why don’t they move me?” By paying close attention to even the smallest emotional reactions in daily life and examining the reasons behind them, I’ve discovered sides of myself I never consciously recognized before. New insights emerge, and before I know it, the page begins to fill itself.

That said, some ideas don’t hold up under deeper examination, while others are rejected at my agency’s discretion. So this time, I’d like to share a few of the column topics that ended up on the cutting-room floor.

These days, it seems like every interaction risks being labeled some form of “___-hara” (harassment), and I imagine many people struggle with how to relate to those from younger generations. I wanted to write about the ways I personally try to navigate that challenge and make an effort to communicate thoughtfully.

To be safe, I first asked my manager for permission to write about our conversations. He replied, “I don’t mind at all.”

“Really?” I asked. “Because if I write about it, I’ll include specific examples and details. Are you sure that’s okay?”

His response was, “But that would just be your subjective interpretation, wouldn’t it?”

“True,” I said, “but there are plenty of people my age in workplaces everywhere. If they read the column, they might come away thinking, ‘So that manager is the kind of person who does that.’ Are you okay with that possibility?”

After a moment, he said, “Ah, I see. In that case, I’d rather not.”

And just like that, the idea was shelved.

No. 2: People Don’t Really Understand What It’s Like to Be Bad at Cooking

I am genuinely terrible at cooking. One thing I particularly hate is the phrase “a pinch of salt,” which appears all the time in cookbooks and cooking shows. My reaction is always: “Using which fingers?” “How much exactly are you supposed to pick up?” I find myself thinking, “Please explain that part properly! Don’t write as if everyone already knows!” The same goes for instructions like “one onion” or “one carrot.” Produce comes in all sorts of sizes, so I immediately wonder, “What size onion are we talking about here?” By the time I’ve finished worrying about these details, I’m already mentally exhausted and no longer feel like cooking. I started writing a column about this, but then I realized that spending time writing about something I dislike as much as cooking was making me miserable too. So I abandoned the idea halfway through.

No. 3: The First Time I Tried on a Pair of Christian Louboutin Shoes

The famous red-soled shoes by Christian Louboutin. The first time I ever tried on a pair was at a department store in San Francisco. As I slipped my feet into a beautifully sculpted pair of sandals that looked like a work of art, I felt a thrill of excitement. “Have I finally joined the ranks of the world’s fashionistas?” But the moment I stood up, something felt wrong—specifically, my little toe. The shoes were so narrow that my foot didn’t actually fit inside. My little toe was sticking out and touching the floor directly. When the sales associate saw this, she let out a dismissive “Oh, really?” and quickly removed the shoes from my feet. Without even asking whether I wanted to buy them, she put them back in the box. It was certainly a painful memory, but there wasn’t much more to the story than that. Since I couldn’t stretch it into a full-length column, it was rejected.

No. 4: Wanting a Black Leather Notebook

When I became obsessed with the TV drama Kurokawa no Techo, I was captivated by how beautiful and cool Emi Takei looked in the lead role. At one point I found myself thinking, “I want a black leather notebook like that, too.” Then I started seriously imagining what I would do if I actually had one. Unlike the heroine, I had no desire to use a notebook full of secrets to blackmail people and climb the social ladder. Nor was there anything I desperately wanted to buy with a fortune acquired through such means. And honestly, carrying around other people’s secrets didn’t sound very appealing either.

Then it hit me. “Wait a minute.”

I didn’t actually want the black leather notebook at all. What I really wanted was to be as beautiful and glamorous as Emi Takei. The moment I uncovered that hidden truth about myself, the column idea lost all momentum and was shelved. There are roughly 20 other column ideas that never made it to publication. I’ve kept them in my smartphone’s notes app just in case they might prove useful someday. If the opportunity arises, I’d love to share more of them in the future.

Aika Kanda was born in 1980 in Kanagawa Prefecture. After graduating from the Department of Mathematics in the Faculty of Science at Gakushuin University, she joined NHK as an announcer in 2003. She left NHK in 2012 to become a freelance announcer. Since then, she has been active primarily in variety programming. She currently appears regularly as a main MC on the daytime television show Poka Poka, which airs on Fuji Television.