Yu and I

Mr Yu is thirty-something, that dangerous age when the first flush of youthful energy and meteoric promise has usually withered on the vine of a hard reality that tells us we aren't going to change the world. At least not in one day.

At thirty-something most of us face the prospect of coming middle-age and a long, hard slog to the upper echelons of our chosen profession -- Jesus Christ and Bob Marley, aside.

Mr Yu is the editor of a documentary I'm making with my producer friend Philip Dann for NHK, Japan's national broadcaster, on the scourge of obesity in Polynesia. The film is called "Tonga: Big Trouble in Paradise".

For a while it seemed -- to me at least -- that the real big trouble was between Mr Yu and myself.

My alarm bells began ringing when Yu -- he was plain old "Yu" back then, and not "Mr Yu" -- told me with understated Japanese conviction that he was a "director" and not "just" an editor.

The F-word more than adequately describes the effect on my psyche, already frazzled by an exhausting 10-day shoot in the South Pacific. "Just what I need," I thought, "another wannabe with an outsized-ego who thinks the task in hand is beneath his pay grade."

When Mr Yu told me in his precise but not quite fluent English to "just leave it with me and I'll make the film" -- and this on just the first day of editing -- I nearly hit the roof. For my own safety, and certainly for his, I made a tactical withdrawal to the nearest coffee bar and was stung for a staggering US$6 for an Americano and cream. Although the coffee was excellent and served with none of the "no worries" nonchalance of similar establishments in my home town of London, its price only added to my ire.

Day Two of the edit and the tension, the misunderstanding, between Yu and I was palpable. If anyone had walked into the room they could have cut the atmosphere with a proverbial knife.

Day Three and I could feel myself spinning out of control. A month's back-breaking hard work, the prep and research, the long, debilitating flights, the tough shoot, all was about to be sacrificed in a power struggle we would both lose.

How could I break the deadlock? The question vexed my addled brain. And then early in the morning on Day Four, as the sun of Japan rose over this most remarkable city of Tokyo, an answer dawned: "Let it go. Just let it go."

Yu had been chosen to edit the film for a reason. If he was half as good as he thought he was then he couldn't be bad at all. He might actually be very good indeed. Show him some respect. Have confidence in his ability. Let him work in his own idiosyncratic way.

I now call Yu "Mr Yu" and he's doing a grand job. If the film fails it certainly won't be on him.

And what does Mr Yu call me? Well, I'm sad to report, it's still plain old David.

I guess there are still limits to one's success, either real or imagined.