I signed up for free Japanese lessons today. It was quite handy. The Narashino (my area) International Association has an office in the same building as where I'm working on Mondays, in fact it's just 1 door down. I will have a new Japanese teacher in about two to three weeks. I am looking forward to being able to say more than just hello, goodbye and I'm sorry, oh, and my favourite...'Where's the bike'. It was really easy and they're free. Well, sort of. You need to belong to the International Associate for the lessons to be free and a membership costs like 2000 yen a year, which is like 20 bucks. And they ask you to contribute to the Association through writing for their newsletter and talking to students and doing translation, whatever you're able to do. But it's not mandatory and a lot of teachers that I've talked to just take the lessons and that's it. The lady at the desk spoke English very, very well. I was impressed. She of course knew that I was from the school.
I have been learning about Japanese wood block prints. Some of the most recognizable Japanese art is Ukiyo-e, the prints. Like the waves in front of Mt Fuji picture. I'll try and get a picture here of it and you'll go, 'Oh, yeah, I've seen that'. It's done by Hokusai. Yup, there it is.
It's the first in a big series. There was a guy before him though that also did the same kind of thing with making a series. I like his stuff a little better. His name is Hiroshige. Or rather, that's what he called himself, or his master dubbed him, at the time when he was doing the majority of his larger series works. It's not his real name. I can't say that I recall what his real name is, I could look it up, but I can't be bothered. He revolutionized Ukiyo-e by making landscapes more prominent in the works. Before that it was mostly of people, like Kabuki actors or women. I like the contrast in his colours. It's like the picture of the waves. Bright colours. Pretty blues and greens. I am visually attracted to pretty blues. I found a print of his too, only it doesn't have the pretty blues and greens, it's got some serious white.
(Side note: I have a Kindergartener who is adamant about colouring with the white crayon, it's his favourite colour.) I'm going to see what I can do about finding a museum or art gallery where I can see in person some of the prints that exist. I'm working on stealing images from places to save on my computer. They're pretty.
I live in Japan. It's starting to sink in.
