The Japan Hobby Show: More Stuff I'll Never Use in a Million Years

Fearless and Ouiser returned to Japan in time to accompany the Radiation Rebels to the 35th Annual Japan Hobby Show at Tokyo Big Sight in Odaiba. "What a relief," Weather whispered to Sunshine. "I don't know about you, but I sure could use a break from Peevish."

The Japan Hobby Show is sponsored by the Hobby Association of Japan. It's usually held at the end of April or beginning of May.  This year there were 782 booths displaying the tools and accoutrements for every hobby you have ever imagined plus a few that never crossed your mind.  There was also a food section where we sampled rice-fed chicken (yum) and Japanese wine (hic).

We were not allowed to take photographs inside the exhibit hall but I managed to sneak a few for you by acting like a bewildered old foreign lady.  You are very welcome, as always. 

Scrapbooking is very popular in Japan



Knitting is also popular



Many vendors offered training sessions to interest people in their wares. Big Bird, the tall American lady in the top photograph, whipped up a pencil case and Tomoko made a fancy book cover while the rest of us stocked up on supplies and splurged a bit on finished products. After watching one man bend metal beverage cans into crane shapes, Weather bought two made out of Japanese beer cans.

Fearless bought a present for Artistic. We are starting to worry that Artistic is so happy to be back in Norfolk that she'll decide not to return to Japan when the school year ends.

Everything Seems Possible After a Day with the Ikebana Ladies

Reiko and Sheryl wanted to attend the May Ikebana program. Curling my lip slightly to indicate mild distaste, I tried to warn them off. "It's a flower arranging demonstration this month."

They were undeterred so I force-marched them a half mile down Kamakura Beach under drizzling clouds to the Prince Hotel. "I would have been happy to drive," Sheryl muttered as she splashed through puddles in her whimsical rainboots.

The demonstration was surprisingly remarkable. Unlike the five other flower-arranging demonstrations I've witnessed since 2007, this one piqued my interest. And interest, as you might recall, is the first step in the direction of a hobby or career.

Was it that Mika Tsujii is a woman while her five predecessors were men? Did the presence of the elderly parents in the audience strike a primal chord that made me more receptive to the daughter's work?

Did her cool poise and utter lack of flamboyance appeal to me?

Or was it Tsujii's simple, efficient, and refreshingly rapid approach to sticking stems in containers that made me think - for a minute at least - that I, too, might be able to slap together a reasonably cohesive centerpiece in less than four hours? This could be something worth trying if I don't have to forsake my beloved books, puzzles, knitting, and the monotonous yet essential cycle of meal preparation, laundry, and housecleaning.

Or maybe it was simply that Tsujii favored hydrangeas, some of the nicest, plumpest, space-fillingest flowers in all of God's creation.

I think it was a combination of all those things but I'm awarding extra points to her parents' presence. Call me nostalgic and sentimental for that's what I am.

Reiko and the Americans toted bundles of hydrangeas home from Kamakura. Reiko carried her flowers by their stems while everyone else seemed to be acting out girlhood fantasies co-starring Bert Parks. This is a cultural difference I will ponder while Reiko and her husband are wandering around Izumo next week on a much anticipated vacation.

Beach-Combing in January

There's a 12-year old American girl here who reminds me more than a bit of Katie at that age: blonde, bespectacled, and bookishly quiet. She heard there is a beach across the Miura Peninsula from us where glass shards and pottery sherds (thanks, Kate) wash up on the tide.

I'd been to this beach a couple of years back so I agreed to try to find it for her and her mom. This is how I came to spend the better part of Saturday driving up and down narrow little lanes, backing slowly out of dead-end beach access roads, and being excruciatingly careful to keep my wheels aligned on rusty metal planks strewn precariously across muddy culverts. "Allow me to demonstrate a Y-turn, my dear."

The tide was in by the time we finally found the sheltered cove in question but there were still a few yards of beach to comb so we did not come home empty-handed (see left). The correct route is now etched in my memory so I hope someone else will want to collect shards and sherds soon. In the meantime, I think I'll try my hand at creating a mosaic something-or-other.

Pack Up All Your Cares and Woes, Head On Up To Tokyo

Sometime between now and Tuesday I need to find a recipe for Seafood Jambalaya and make enough to feed 40 people. Oh, and I vaguely recall volunteering to make mass quantities of gumbo and salad as well. Heh, heh.

Fortunately the book I was reading last night, which should have been a cookbook but was not, offered a new technique for dealing with worries: visualize a matchbox, slide it open, tuck your worries inside, and then slide it shut. Imagining a matchbox was a snap because I happened to snag several at the Ramen Museum just last month. Do I lead a serendipitous life or what?

With my worries safely nestled inside a JFK matchbox, I set off for the Tokyo Dome this morning with Kim, Sherri, and a fully charged cell phone which enabled us to hook up with Jane, Valerie, Hiroko, and Kasayo at the indigo exhibit where we watched an elderly gentleman swish fabric in a kettle of blue (presumably indigo) dye.

We bought bento box lunches -- mine, of course, was light on vegetables and heavy on dumplings and rice -- and then we admired the fabulous quilts and wandered through dozens of stalls where vendors were hawking fabric, notions, quilting kits, and scores of other items not remotely related to quilting.

Those vendors saw me coming. Once I solve the Jambalaya/Gumbo problem, and finish knitting the ribbed scarf Stanley started, and work my way through Ulysses, I will hand Matt the five quilt kits I lugged home from Tokyo today and see if I can bribe him into translating the directions into a language I can comprehend.

Let's hope he won't have left for college by then. Hey! That would be a perfect worry for the Che Guevara matchbox!