It has become a rainy season series unexpectedly recent blog, today is about a song that reminds me of rainy days, as I feel that the mood is mostly influenced by the weather.

The theme song of movie “When Marnie Was There”, “Fine On The Outside”. Somewhat suddenly, this song remembered on rainy days, especially during the rainy season before summer. I think the melody and lyrics are suit rainy days.

In the blog of “Hawaii Island – Language –“, I mentioned that there are 130 words to express rain in Hawaiian, so that I searched about Japanese one, and I found a book “Dictionary of rain words”.

This book is a dictionary of words related to rain that number About 1200 words. I thought it is about a bit more than 130 in Hawaiian? but no way, almost 10 times! What a Japanese words.

It is time rainy season (Tsuyu) in Japan, there are 32 rain words for example.

As the summer gets closer, the colors of clothes people wear are bright and colorful, so I like the atmosphere where the city is gorgeous.

And speaking of summer clothes in Japan is a Yukata. After the rainy season is over, when the fireworks festival and the Bon Dance festival season comes, we can see many women who wear Yukata. I think that the figure walking narrowly steps with bare feet to clogs is beautiful.

I think that there are many men who feel happy seeing such women but I would like to talk with a big voice. Men’s kimono and yukata are also very nice. Emphasis on glossiness, sexiness, masculinity, dramatic increase in masculinity! And I think it is comfortable to wear. Yukata is cooler than clothes.

I write about the book “Japan the Beautiful and Myself” by Yasunari Kawabata which I wrote about it in my blog “In the spring, cherry blossoms In the summer, the cuckoo“.

In 1968 Yasunari Kawabata was awarded the first Nobel Prize for literature as a Japanese, attended at the award ceremony in Stockholm with formal wear of a Hakama. He gave speech with a magnificent Japanese and a deep impression. This book is the full text of it. (from Description of item amazon Japan)

The content is described by a song of a priest such as Zen master Dogen, the word of a novelist Ryunosuke Akutagawa and a monk Ikkyu. In the part about “Karesansui” in the Japanese garden and “Wabi Sabi” in the tea ceremony, he also mentions specific arts such as bonsai, flowers, pottery etc. And tribute to Japanese culture is stated through classical literature such as “Ise Monogatari”, “Genji Monogatari”, “Makurano soshi”, “Kokinshu” and “Shinkokinshu”.

I have learned about wearing Kimono, I have learned about the knowledge about kimono as well. It is so much fun to learn for me, and today is about “Edo Komon (a fine pattern)”.

In the Edo period, the patterning of Kamishimo(ceremonial dress worn by feudal lord) is the origin. Feudal lords gradually began to compete with the luxury of that pattern, so that the Edo government regulated to make clothes simple. And Feudal lords began to minutely pattern to look solid from the distance. As a result, the Edo Komon became a dyed product making full use of highly advanced dyeing technology.

The patterns that can be used at each lord have fixed as below.

The three highest ranks
– The House of Tokugawa in Kishu: Shark
– Date clan in Sendai: Gyogi
– Matsumono clan in Shinshu: Kakudoshi

– Shimazu clan in Satsuma: Daisho Arare
– Maeda clan in Kaga: Mansuji/Kikubishi
– The House of Tokugawa: Omeshiju
– Nabeshima clan in Saga: Goma pattern

Meanwhile, the townspeople also began to imitate this Komon, and this seems to have enjoyed the fancy by making detailed items such as daily necessities in close proximity.

I have been interested in Zen and I study in books etc for 10 years. The number of people who practice meditation, mindfulness, breathing methods are increasing, so I am happy as a Zen lover. I sometimes practice Zen meditation, today is about that.

Chokokuji (zen temple in Nishiazabu, Tokyo) offers its Zazenkai (group Zazen session) from 6:30pm to 8:30pm every Mondays. Participation fee is 100 yen. For participants who need language assistance in English, it is highly recommended to come with an interpreter on the first day (introduction) and the second day (the first Zen session) since we cannot provide translation service. From the third day, you could come by yourself.

I can do “Just sitting” at my place but the reason why I go to Zazekai is I like the atmosphere. Despite the city center of Nishiazabu, the temple is very quiet, the air is clear and fresh feelings. In the Kannondo on the right after going through the gate, Azabu Kannon which was built by carving Kusunoki, looks gentle with a calm feeling. And the buildings where for Zazenkai, the dimmer space, incense scent, tatami mats, monk’s black robes, Buddhist decorations… Straighten up but I feel calm with the nostalgic space somehow.

A few years ago I knew Mr. Teiichi Sato at the contemporary art school event. He operates a seedling shop (Sato Seed Shop) at Rikuzentakata-city in Iwate prefecture, Japan and who is victim of the East Japan great earthquake tsunami, and he recorded the first edition of the disaster issued on March 11, 2012. The title is ”The Seed of Hope in the Heart”, it is written in English. Despite being not good at English, the reason why he wrote it in English was too hard to record it in Japanese (mother language). He said that he wanted to put a little distance between heart and word. Mr. Sato thought that it should tell the fact and he wanted to tell that in his own words. The English version is now 5 version (as of 2017), and he records it in Chinese and Spanish as well because he wanted to tell his thanks to people who gave huge supports in those whose own languages.

I was very impressed by his action “Leaving the facts and tell” and “Writing in English (other language)”. I respect for his sense of mission that telling the fact, and I’m touched by the honesty of writing in English because it is too sad write it in Japanese, also I sympathized for his choice.

I was in Tokyo at the earthquake, even in Tokyo I was panicked by an unprecedented disaster and I remember the fear of death. After that, there were opportunities to go to Tohoku several times and there were times when we talked with the victims. I felt the strength of the core that they take the facts and go live, and the kindness who had various experiences from people in Tohoku. I have never met Mr. Sato directly, but I feel his personality through the movie (Mr. Sato’s activity was also a movie “Traces of Breath“).

The opportunity to actually write letters decreases because the advent of computers that can input characters, such as word processors and personal computers. It has been becoming convenient and the accuracy of convenience increases. On the other hand, I do not think that the opportunity to actually write letters will be completely lost, and I do not want to lose it.

If I say so, I sometimes forget about how to write Kanji (Chinese character), make mistakes to write kanji or sometimes I am stunned by the poor character I wrote. It has been a few years since I need to face to write letters by hand… I tried practicing with the pen writing exercise book, but it does not last long and loses the temptation of convenience.

While watching Japanese paintings, ukiyoe prints, picture scrolls, old documents at the exhibition of the times, I thought “Vertical writing looks beautiful” as I felt restless with my hand writing for a while. And I thought, okay I try! then I went to the stationary shop. It is high level to write Japanese with brushes, and I found a nice fountain pen. I bought a nice one, it is perfect for writing comfortable, the appearance and the price is good. ” rel=”noopener” target=”_blank”>This one. It is very easy to write because the pen tip is heavier, and the look is cool.

I visited the exhibition “Léonard Foujita Private on Works(only in Japanese)” at Meguro Museum Art. As the title, the exhibition focuses on his book works or private works such as book design or illustrations or post card to his friends. Many works were painted with pens and thin brushes, and the impression was simple with few colors because most of them art small works.

I like the masterpieces of artists, but I also like sketches to get glimpses of their everyday life like postcards to their family or friends. You need preparation and physical fitness to face to art works such as expressing the artist’ impulse rising in their lives, but there were more relaxed works at this exhibition.

One of my favourite was 5 illustrations called “la fleur aux mille pétales d’or”. The five Japanese women were drawn in each, one looks down, one looks far away, one looks straightforward etc. Precise line drawing captures the soft curves of women brilliantly, the color scheme of making use of the plain background and women who feel the strength of the core somewhere despite grief. And their Japanese hair and kimono seem to complement their beauty more. Also, his touch like a foreign pain like a Japanese painting is also mysterious. I was drawn into a wordless mysterious world.

My job is designing printed matters or digital stuff (websites or apps), today is about typeface which is indispensable to my work.

Commercial design has the role of “telling”, so each product has a message, and the ways to tell it will be images such as pictures or illustrations, and texts. And selecting which typeface should be used is important to design.

There are typefaces that already installed and you need to purchase for a fee. Paid typefaces are high design and quite elaborate.
*Designing typefaces is a highly specialized and delicate world, there are typeface designers.

Both already installed and purchased are displayed on the character palette of professional editing software (illustrator, photoshop etc) when designing it, and you can select it.

There is a typeface genre I have never used before even though I see it on the character palette, I’ve been engaged in work in various industries so far and I think that the number of things you probably made is four digits though. I wrote about my “Oh I see!” discovery of “that one”.