Year of the Dragon: 2024 Japanese New Year Greeting Card
Greetings to all. I hope this year brings you all the best! 2024 is the year of the 辰 (Dragon) in the Chinese zodiac. The dragon is a powerful and majestic creature that has been revered in Japan for centuries. It is a symbol of good luck, strength, and wisdom. In Japan, it is customary to send New Year's greeting card called "年賀状(nengajo)", to family, friends, and business associates. Nengajo typically feature images of the year's zodiac animal, as well as traditional
Shakyo (by calligraphy) gives us mindful time
Shakyo is a Japanese word that refers to the activity of copying Buddhist sutra texts by hand, using Japanese calligraphy. I believe that doing Shakyo is a unique experience and can be one of the mindful times. We can do Shakyo anywhere if we have some writing tools such as pen and paper. However, it is a refreshing time to work on writing sutra texts in a different place than usual. What is Shakyo (写経)? Today, I would like to share my
What we need for Shakyo (by calligraphy)
In the previous article, Shakyo experience, I explained what Shakyo is. I'm now going to introduce you to what we'll need to do prepare in order to do Shakyo. Brush Since Shakyo, copying sutra tesxts, is required to write a series of small letters, the brush needs to be thin. There are some brushes made specifically for Shakyo. Paper Shakyo paper has a certain format. As sultra texts are written vertically, the paper has lines ruled vertically and at regular intervals in advance so
Shakyo experience
Do you know what "Shakyo" is? Shakyo is a Japanese word that refers to the activity of copying Buddhist sutras by hand. Sha (写) means copying and Kyo (経) means sutras. The reason I mention Shakyo here is because it's the act of transcribing text with a brush, which is another form of Japanese calligraphy. I recently had an opportunity to attend a Shakyo session at a temple in Tokyo and had a very fulfilling time. I would like to introduce
Japanese font and kanji generators
If you have an opportunity to create your own website (business and private) or printables, and you want to add Japanese calligraphy characters or kanji, there are several Japanese/Kanji font generators available online. I'd like to introduce some that seem to be interesting; FREE JAPANESE FONTS Over 200 Japanese fonts including kanji, hiragana, katakana available. You will be able to find very rare fonts. KANJI NAME GENERATOR You can enter your name in English and it will be converted to Japanese kanji
“Stay home” work – Five styles of “home”
In response to the COVID-19 outbreak, many of us have to stay home for a certain period of time. In my case, some art exhibitions in which I planned to participate have been cancelled or postponed just like other events across the world. I stopped all the creations for the next exhibition. The theme and size of the work that I want to work on have changed. Basic five styles of kanji in calligraphy In that situation, I tried to write various
The first year of Reiwa – new era name of Japan
Japan's new imperial era "令和(Reiwa)" began on 1st May 2019 in Japan. This is a special thing for the Japanese and "元年" means the first year. Reiwa consists of two kanji characters of Rei 令 and Wa 和. As for the meaning, there are several English translation such as "order and harmony" and "auspicious and peace" according to some foreign media. Alongside the Western calendar, Japanese are familiar with the era name called gengo "元号" in daily life. This is used for
“Kakizome” lesson for school kids
I gave some Japanese calligraphy lessons for school kids during winter break. It was fun and great to see their motivation. What is Kakizome? There is a custom called "Kakizome (First Writing) " in Japan. This is one of the new year's traditional events and means the first calligraphy written at the beginning of a year. Anyone who wants to express one's hope or favorable words can try to do Kakizome with brush, ink and paper. Positive and lucky words are often