Posts by lucinda
Confessions of a Sushi Boat
I’m so tired of them washing me, or not washing me properly. The grains of rice tend to get stuck between my wooden planks. But when Chef Jiro Sakamoto does it, it’s always different. He gives me proper care and attention, pays heed to the details of my grooves and curves…
Read MoreAnnouncing Kyoto Journal x Shoyeido
KJ is honored to be collaborating with the venerable Kyoto incense maker, Shoyeido, for our upcoming 95th issue on Wellbeing. Shoyeido has been in the business of crafting hand-blended incense since the early eighteenth century and it is the only company doing so in the ancient capital today. Incense has been an integral part of…
Read MoreCold War Modern and the Nagasaki Triptych
The English-speaking world had had to wait 35 years for the writings of the only trained Japanese scientific observer of the effects of atomic devastation.
Read MoreA Familiar Environment
“Women authors in Japan are more or less par for winning the big prizes, and they’re publishing easily as much as men, but they’re not appearing in translation. There’s a movement to try and do something about it.”
Read MoreMastery of Movement
Shodō is the Japanese word for calligraphy. It means not just penmanship, but the Way, or Path of writing. In China and Japan, Shodō has long been regarded as one of the most important forms of art.
Read MoreMourning, Rokujizo, Sunday July 21st 2019
Ken Rodgers Every ten minutes, with every east-bound train, another contingent of Kyoto Animation Co. fans descends the stairs at Rokujizo-Keihan Station. Mutely they join a line stretching from the station to an improvised, far-too-small tent in a cramped bicycle park, to offer flowers and prayers to the 34 victims of last Thursday’s tragic…
Read MoreKJ Summer 2019 Reads: Titles from Tuttle
As part of their 70th-year anniversary celebrations, KJ has teamed up with Tuttle Publishing, the Asia specialist, for this four-part series.
Read MoreTumbling Assumptions
The author says she embarked on this year in Japan in order to undertake a spiritual practice of her own. She must occupy herself while her husband seeks Soto Zen priestly credentials by training in a nearby monastery, so she joins a pottery class as a deshi (disciple) of the elderly female teacher. But she cannot seem to make the dirt and water come together to make a smooth clay, either physically or metaphorically.
Read MoreKyoto Women Entrepreneurs: Kumakura Seiko
Kumakura Seiko first worked in theatre to increase awareness of societal issues in an appealing way. As an activist and a mother she has since used her experience to launch trailblazing community projects in Kyoto.
Read MoreMeiji Poor
Huffman focuses his inquiry on the very poorest of Japan’s urban poor—the hinmin, or paupers, who flooded into Tokyo at a rate of up to 1,000 people each week in the late 1800s and early 1900s, victims of government policies that pushed farm families to starvation and forced their sons and daughters to seek jobs in the swelling cities.
Read MoreCircling around Kyo-ryori
Whoever thought that food could shape a city and its culture in such a distinguished way?
Read MoreFound in Translation: Teaching the art of the Japanese garden
Portland Japanese Garden’s Waza to Kokoro: Hands and Heart intensive training seminar to share with gardeners outside of Japan the skills, knowledge, techniques and philosophies that have resided mainly in the hands and hearts of Japanese gardeners for centuries.
Read MoreMeld
Growing up in a rural New England suburb, the only thing different about our family was that we ate rice every night and that our ancient Taiwanese grandfather would practice tai chi on the lawn.
Read MoreMonpan Shokudo
Monpan Shokudo is a homey and creative restaurant in Kyoto serving Mongoru Pan—Mongolian bread—alongside fusion recipes from around the world. There’s a particular character about Monpan, one that is difficult to describe, but that emerges through the life story of its co-owner, Haruhisa Kato.
Read MoreKazuo Ishiguro on Asian-British Writers
“Apart from a transient business community, there’s nothing in England that could be called a Japanese society. In addition, when I arrived in 1960, there were very few Japanese in England at all. Therefore, as I grew up, the problem of which society I belonged to never arose. I now accept the fact that I am a mixture, a cultural compound.”
Read MoreKYOTOGRAPHIE 2019: A review
KYOTOGRAPHIE has been successful partly because photographic images have the ability to transcend linguistic differences through ishin denshin: wordless communication, heartstrings vibrating in harmony.“Vibe,” which situates ishin denshin within a specific locale, is a fitting theme for the photography festival, now in its seventh year.
Read MoreWhere can I find Small Buildings of Kyoto II outside Japan?
Looking to get your hands on the little book? We’re thrilled to share these international stockists with you and hope that you enjoy wandering their aisles to pick up your copy, much like how John enjoys wandering the streets of Kyoto discovering the charm of the city’s urban fabric.
Read MoreConsequential Legacies
I have come to believe that she is channeling Toscanini with her hands. Equally, I’m firm in the conviction that she is channeling a fabled Persian songstress with her soul.
Read MoreTea and Women’s Empowerment in Modern Japan
“Coffee–table” books about tea tend to offer pristine views of paradise and bowls of world peace. Page after page of steamy shadows and shadowy steam, dewy landscapes fashioned by gods with impeccable taste…Enough!
Read MoreLemon
An impenetrable curse lay heavy on my heart. Call it an uneasiness, call it ill humors—like a hangover after drinking, you drink every day and there comes a time when it all might as well be a hangover. Well, that time had come.
Read MoreKyoto’s Festivals: Twelve Months of Everyday Transience
In Kyoto, one grows accustomed to the ongoing round of festivals at Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines—it’s said that you could attend at least one every day here, throughout the year. But the word ‘festival’ doesn’t quite capture the spirit of the majority of these events. With some notably lively exceptions, they are mostly rather formal annual ceremonies and rituals…
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