During Eiichirô Oda’s secret trip to Taiwan for the opening of the third Official One Piece Exhibit, the people at China Times were granted some time to interview the manga artist that is behind the series that is popular around the world in over 40 countries: One Piece.

During the interview, Oda said that when he first started writing One Piece, he had anticipated it take only about 5 years, and he never expected it to go on for more than 17 years. Apparently, because of new characters in One Piece keep appearing — and because of the unending amount of sudden inspiration that Oda constantly experiences — it has gone on for much longer than he first anticipated. “I think I should be able to continue to draw One Piece for another 10 years!” Furthermore, the article adds that according to Oda, not all the members of the pirate crew have assembled just yet. “There’s still the possibility for more members to appear one after the other!”

When asked about the meaning behind the title “One Piece” and whether or not it has anything to do with the homonym “Won Peace” or the end of the series (meaning Luffy would bring about “World Peace”), Oda reportedly smiled and explained that the title’s meaning is indeed related to the end of the series so it would be senseless if he were to explain it now.

About the idea behind the “Devil Fruits” that appear in the series, Oda says he was influenced a lot as a kid by the series Doraemon and thus that most of his inspiration comes from his everyday life.

There are inspirations from his daily life everywhere. For example, because Oda often works alone all night in order to make his deadlines, he says that he would love to have the same ability as Nico Robin. If he were in possession of the “Flower Flower Devil Fruit” he would be able to use multiple hands at once and finish his work faster.

As for Luffy’s “Gum Gum Devil Fruit”, the idea came from Oda’s own laziness: he often wishes his hands could stretch out very far — like rubber — so he’d be able to get stuff without leaving his chair when he’s busy working on something.

The powers used by female characters in the series, are related to the wishes of the everyday woman . Alvida’s “Slip Slip Devil Fruit” gives her body the power to be slippery giving her a perfect skin. As for Miss Valentine’s “Kilo Kilo Devil Fruit”, it gives her the ability to change her body weight at will going from a “stout” bodyweight to becoming light as a feather making it even possible for her to fly.

Oda also stated that he usually sleeps 4 hours a day, from 8am to noon, which according to him is enough.

Source: China Times

Disclaimer: The author of this post is not completely fluent in Chinese, so there may be some discrepancies in details.

Edit: According to Japanese One Piece fansite LOGPIECE, the quote in BOLD translates as “There’s going to be more (crewmates) appearing successively!”（「まだ続々と現れますよ！」） which greatly changes the degree with which we can expect new crew mates to join the Straw Hat, but as with any translation, it’s all a matter of nuance. One thing is certain, the chance of new people joining is not inexistant at all!