Characters
Mr. Fujinami
Ryunosuke's a girl that acts and looks like a guy. She's one confused and messed-up girl. You really only need to look as far as her own ignoramus of a father to see the source of all her problems.
Ryunosuke's father, is just about the most obnoxious and loud father there has ever been. His personality can be described as unpredictable and intense. He is a very strange and frightening man who is perhaps even more weird, creepy and unpredictable than Cherry.
In many ways he is the polar opposite of your modern, new-age man. He is incredibly sexist and insensitive not to mention irrational. Even though Ryunosuke's a woman, he keeps insisting otherwise and chastises her every time she does anything remotely feminine. Ryuu has endured much hardship on account of her father, who tries to deny her of anything that could be considered fun. Fujinami thinks that true man has no need of frivolous pleasures. Mr. Fujinami is vigilant in trying to keep any female ideas out of her head and keeping her from doing normal teenage things is just one of the ways he does this. Mind you he is a huge hypocrite and will still partake of all the things that he forbids his daughter to do.
Mr. Fujinami thinks that it's a man's world and so in his mind, a girl wouldn't be strong enough to be the fourth Fujinami to run the teashop. So his relationship with Ryunosuke is more similar to that of a boxing coach and his prize fighter, rather than a father and daughter. Since his wife died soon after Ryunosuke was born, he was free to rear her into a boy. Although he loved his wife, he's persists in keeping Ryunosuke in the dark about her mother. Actually when she died, he wanted Ryunosuke to have a mother so badly, that he consorted with seemingly hundreds of women and had them pose for family pictures with a baby Ryunosuke. Now after all of those women and all of those photographs, he can't recall which one was his real wife Masako.
Fujinami's greatest love is the sea. He enjoys surfboarding and finds the power and manliness of the ocean to be an inspiration that often moves him to tears. He seems to relate to the ocean as if it was a person. His business depends on the sea although he believes that it's actually the other way around. He's rather fond of yelling out the phrase "Umi ga suki!" (I love the sea) while in an emotional rage. Whenever he gets exceedingly inspired like that, it is always followed by a massive tidal wave for dramatic effect (even inland).
Fujinami has one burning obsession, his restaurant. Everything he does is motivated by his will to see the business thrive. In yet another battle with his daughter, they completely demolished the sea-side tea shop. With their home and business destroyed they moved to Tomobiki to run the student store at the High School where they would live for a while. All that time, the only thing he could ever think of was re-opening Hamachaya and controlling Ryunosuke's life.
After Hamachaya re-opened at last he then becomes enthralled with constant renovations. Even during the most inappropriate times he's out there, vending on the streets to raise more money and bugging Ryunosuke to help out.
The Meaning Behind the Name - 藤波
His actual name is never given in the series. Most Japanese children refer to their fathers as "otou-san" (お父さん). But Ryunosuke calls him "oyaji" (おやじ) which is a slightly vulgar way of referring to a father. It's pretty much like calling him "old man." It's common for boys to call their fathers as such but it's very weird coming from a girl. Fujinami (藤波) is written with the kanji for "wisteria" and "waves".
Voices:
Masahiro Anzai
Shigeru Chiba
Matthew David Rudd