“The secret of life is to fall seven times and get up eight times”

Some of the rarest things in the world include unique gemstones like painite and pure blue diamonds, rare animals such as the Amur leopard and the Vaquita, and extremely rare elements such as Astatine.

Additionally, there are rare natural phenomena like the Sea of Stars and glowing forests.

In sporting terms, a Welsh rugby victory is on the same scale of rarity as rocking horse poo.

A well-known Japanese saying about rarity is “Ichi-go-ichi-e which translates to “treasure every encounter, for it will never recur in exactly the same way”.

Thankfully for Wales, this proved to be the case as they put the misery of last Saturday’s defeat to Japan behind them and made the second test an “Ichi-go-ichi-e moment.

Rome wasn’t built in a day and a Welsh victory has been in the building stage longer than Gaudi’s Sagrada Familia but finally after twenty-one months-644 days- it finally arrived in Kobe under the familiar settings of a closed roof.

It had a feeling of Tokyo revisited as Wales built up a decent 21-3 lead but similar to the previous weekend Japan came alive in the second half and with four minutes remaining Wales were clinging on to a 24-22 lead.

But this time the Dragons found their fire and instead of capitulating they roared forward and a delightful behind the back pass from Tane Plumtree sent Dan Edwards over the line.a

As Edwards converted his own try, a nation exhaled and began to breathe in the rare clean, embracing air of victory.

Does this win solve all or any of the problems in Welsh rugby ? Of course not, but everyone who loves and follows Cymru deserves to celebrate this victory.

Captain Dewi Lake’s Tokyo tears of sadness were replaced by tears if not of unadulterated joy, then most definitely ones of relief.

There will be plenty more optical precipitation shed in the near future, but for now Wales and its people can dry their eyes and even allow themselves the luxury of a mild grin.

さようなら Sayōnara