2015 Kanji of the Year

Today is December 15th, the day that the Kanji of the Year is chosen in Japan.

The JapanToday website wrote:

The kanji character 安 “an,” meaning peace or safety, has been chosen as the character best representing the sentiment and events in Japan in 2015.
The character refers to the controversial security legislation that the government passed in the summer.

The Japan Kanji Aptitude Testing Foundation, a Kyoto-based organization that promotes kanji, conducts the survey nationwide every year. The foundation said 129,647 submissions were received this year, with 安 being the most popular, garnering 5,632 votes.

In an event held on Tuesday, Seihan Mori,the head priest at the world-famous Kiyomizu Buddhist temple in Kyoto, drew the character with a large calligraphy brush, whose bristles were the size of a bowling pin, on a huge piece of “washi” (Japanese paper).

The second most popular character was 爆, “baku” (explosion), a reference to “bakugai,” meaning explosive buying (shopping sprees) by Chinese tourists visiting Japan.

The third most popular kanji was 戦, meaning war, referring to the many conflicts going on in the Middle East and the war on terror.

The best city in the world

Since 1995, “Travel & Leisure” magazine has done an annual survey of travelers to find the best city in the world for tourists.

And, for the second year in-a-row, Kyoto, Japan has been ranked the world’s best city.

Last May, my family and I went there again, (Click here to see my post and photos from that trip), and we agree – Kyoto is a very lovely city!

(This photo of geisha near Kinkaku-ji in Kyoto is from “allworldtowns.com”)

Personally though, I think that Tokyo is the best city in the world…but maybe that’s because I’ve lived here most of my life and I know my way around Tokyo very well. Either way, I can understand why Kyoto is so popular with tourists!

The Travel & Leisure top-ten cities for 2015 are:

1. Kyoto, Japan

2. Charleston, South Carolina

3. Siem Reap, Cambodia

4. Florence, Italy

5. Rome, Italy

6. Bangkok, Thailand

7. Krakow, Poland

8. Barcelona, Spain

9. Cape Town, South Africa

10. Jerusalem, Israel

(Click here to see a news article about the list).

What do you think about this list?
Have you ever been to Kyoto?

Leave a comment!

Kyoto trip

Today is the last day of Golden Week. It’s a series of consecutive holidays in May that are known collectively as “Golden Week”.

We decided to take a two-day trip to Kyoto during Golden Week this year.  So, in early morning of May 4th, we took a fast but comfortable 新幹線 (bullet train) to Kyoto. We stayed in a nice hotel that overlooked 琵琶湖 (Lake Biwa), the largest lake in Japan. And we took the bullet train back to Tokyo in the evening of May 5th.

We had a really good time and got to see many of Kyoto’s famous sites.

Here are some of the photos I took:

We took this 新幹線 (bullet train) to Kyoto from Tokyo on May 4th.

View from the bullet train window.

Even the local trains were a bit different from Tokyo’s.

The famous Fushi-Inari Temple in Kyoto.

1000 torii gates at Fushimi-Inari.

Wisteria at Byoudou-in

The famous Byoudou-in Temple in Kyoto.

This temple is shown on the backside of the Japanese ¥10 coin.

Kyoto Tower

Our hotel had a lovely view of the largest lake in Japan: 琵琶湖 (Lake Biwa).

Delicious dinner at our hotel. 近江牛 (O-mi-gyu Beef)!

The second (and final) day of our trip (2015 May 5th), the weather was much nicer!

The famous 嵐山公園 (Arashi-yama Koen) in Kyoto.

many people wear kimono in the ancient city of Kyoto.

Tenryuuji Temple

The famous 金閣寺 (Kinkaku-ji) Temple is covered in gold.

6PM on May 5th, 2015 at Kyoto Station to take the bullet train back home in Tokyo.

京都駅 (Kyoto Station)…we had a good time!

Review & Giveaway 15: Japan Journeys

Here is another book that Tuttle Books have kindly given to me to review and, again, they have agreed to give (given) one free copy of this book to a random visitor to my blog!

(Click here to read all of my reviews and giveaways.)

This book is titled “Japan Journeys: Famous Woodblock Prints of Cultural Sights in Japan” by Andreas Marks.

“Japan Journeys: Famous Woodblock Prints of Cultural Sights in Japan”

I will put the details of the free drawing for this book at the end of this post.

“Japan Journeys: Famous Woodblock Prints of Cultural Sights in Japan” is a hardcover book full of large, beautiful pictures of all kinds of ukiyoe (Japanese woodblock prints).

Mr. Marks is a historian of Japanese and Korean art and he gives explanations of the prints that show famous sights around Tokyo, Kyoto and other parts of Japan.

I have been to many of the places shown in these prints and it’s fun to see them depicted in artwork that is sometimes centuries old.

This book would be treasured by anyone interested in Japan, Japanese ukiyoe art, or artwork in general!

“Japan Journeys: Famous Woodblock Prints of Cultural Sights in Japan” can be purchased through Amazon here.

But, as I said above, Tuttle Books has agreed to give (given) one random visitor to my blog a free copy of this book.

To enter the drawing for the free book, submit this form by 2015 May 10th:

***** Updated May 10th, 2015 *****

This special promo ended on 2015 May 10th. One random winner was selected and contacted directly by Tuttle Publishers (via email) with the details about the free book.

Thank you to all who entered, but only the winner was contacted.
*****

Tokyo is the world’s (second) “most livable city”

Monocle magazine makes a list of the world’s most livable cities every year.

Tokyo is ranked number 2 on the list behind Copenhagen, Denmark.

In fact, three Japanese cities, Tokyo, Kyoto, and Fukuoka are on the top ten.

Six of the other seven cities on the top ten most livable cities in the world are European.

The criteria used to judge the most livable cities were:
economics, society, functionality, everyday living, happiness of people, crime rate, health care, public schools, public transportation, access to nature, culture, sunlight/climate, number of electronic vehicle charging spots, ease of starting a new business and tolerance.

Here is Monocle‘s list of the top ten most livable cities in the world:

1. Copenhagen, Denmark
2. Tokyo, Japan
3. Melbourne, Australia
4. Stockholm, Sweden
5. Helsinki, Finland
6. Vienna, Austria
7. Zürich, Switzerland
8. Munich, Germany
9. Kyoto, Japan
10. Fukuoka, Japan

Big Bird came to Japan

I didn’t know that there was a Sesame Street special that had Big Bird visit Japan.

He and his dog got seperated from their tour group in Tokyo which led to a number of cultural misunderstandings … such as Big Bird thinking people were telling him that they were from the U.S. state of Ohio when they greeted him with “Ohayo” (‘good morning’)… until he was helped by a mysterious woman who turned out to be “Kaguya-hime” (a famous Japanese folktale “Bamboo Princess”) and she helps him and his dog get back to Sesame Street in America.

Here’s the special on YouTube:

2013’s “kanji”

Every December, a Japanese kanji character is chosen as 「今年の漢字」 (“the kanji of the year”).

You can click here to read my post about last year’s (2012) kanji of the year,
click here for 2011‘s,
click here for 2010‘s,
click here for 2009‘s,
and click here for 2008‘s.

This year’s (2013) Kanji of the Year was just chosen.

It’s　「輪」 (りん(“rin“)).

It means “ring” and was chosen in honor of the Olympics rings because of Tokyo’s successful bid to host the 2020 summer Olympics.

Storm on Grandparents Day

It’s a three-day-weekend in Japan.
Today is 敬老の日 (Respect For Elders Day).

Even though today is a holiday, we’re staying indoors … and if you’re in the Tokyo area, you should too!

Because a big typhoon is currently hitting eastern Japan!

Trains have stopped, bridges are closed, houses and cars have been torn up, some parts of Kanagawa had a black-out, Kyoto and the city of 小浜 (Obama) have been flooded.

(Speaking of the Japanese city with the same name as the U.S. president, I wrote a post here:
https://tokyo5.wordpress.com/2008/09/10/obama/ )

This years kanji

Every December a 漢字 (Japanese kanji character) is chosen in Japan that best summarizes the year that is ending…and it becomes the official 「今年の漢字」 (“Kanji of the Year”) in a ceremony in Kyoto with the temple monk writing the character in calligraphy brushstrokes on a large board.

The 2011 Kanji of the Year is 「絆」 ("Bond").

The official character for 2011 was announced today. It’s 「絆」 (Kizuna)…which means “(to) bond“.

This was chosen because of the way the people of Japan and the world came together to help the victims of the March 11 earthquake.

(Last year (2010), the Kanji of the Year meant “hot”. Click here to find out why.)

人力車

I was watching a TV program called 「きょうは何の日」 (lit. “What day is today?“).

This show tells something that happened in history on the same date in history. Something like “On this date in history…” might be a better translation of the show’s title.

It said that 140 years ago today, on 1870 March 22, the 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“) was invented in Japan.

(Click here to see a post I wrote about a trip we took to Yokohama about two years ago…and I took a photo of a 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“) near Yokohama Chinatown (there’s also photos of cool graffiti in that post)).

There seems to be a bit of controversy over who exactly invented the 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“).
Some say a Japanese businessman in Tokyo named Yosuke Izumi invented it, but others say it was invented by an American missionary in Yokohama named Jonathan Goble.

There seems to be evidence supporting both stories and neither can be proven conclusively.

Either way, the 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“) is 140 years old today and, although it was used as a major form of transportation in Japan back then, it is mainly only ridden by tourist (both Japanese and overseas visitors) in parts of Japan with a lot of traditional history…such as Asakusa, Kamakura, Yokohama, Kyoto, etc.
The 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“) pullers double as tour guides explaining the history of the sites to his customers.

Also, geisha can sometimes be seen riding in them as part of their image.

The 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“) was imported into other parts of Asia.
So the word “rickshaw” is famous around the world…but in Japanese, 「人力車」 is actually pronounced “jin-riki-sha“…literally “human-powered vehicle”.

Have you ever ridden in a 「人力車」 (“rickshaw“)?