June Perry on fri 22 aug 97
One one of my Japan trips we had as usual, a beautiful tray set in front of
us at dinner with a wide range of small dishes and assorted foods. I took a
taste of the bean sprouts which didn't taste like bean sprouts and then took
a closer look. The transparent beans sprouts had eyes! They were tiny
transparent baby fish, eels????? Not liking the taste very much I avoided
that particular delicacy and went on to the other food on my plate. One night
the group went to a restaurant in Tokyo which only serves eel. It was my
friend Masakos fathers birthday and since eel was his favorite food, this was
the place to go. We had eel soup, broiled eel, and on and on. One of the
people in the group was very hungry and would not even taste any of the
dishes. Poor dear was totally turned off by the whole idea of ingesting eel
in any form.
We also had a wonderful visit with Shimaoka who have this large group in his
house for tea, gave us a tour of the pottery and also did some throwing for
us. His father was a rope maker and many of his pots are decorated by rolling
pieces of various ropes around and across the pots. He also sold us pots at
very good prices and then took them to the packing room and sat and signed
all our boxes. It was a wonderful visit and he was a most gracious host. I
wish I had purchased more than my one small white slab bottle with copper
brushwork.This was just a year or two after Hamada has passed away. After our
long visit, Shimaoka then sent us down a wooded path to go visit some other
potters in the area. One of them was very proud of his new gas kiln which was
fired with propane. He had a whole bunch of tall slender propane tanks linked
together for firing this kiln. I guess he either couldn't bring in a larger
tank or they weren't available. It was wonderful walking the dirts paths
behind the town. Everyone we met on those trips was gracious and generous
with their time.
Those trips with Masako were incredible. She really did her homework and
dragged us all over japan to visit not only potters, but other master
craftspeople. We went to Iga, Shikaragki, Onta, Takayama, Kurashiki, Kyoto,
Nara, Kyushu,Mashiko,and on and on. We visited potters in mountain top
villages where the locals had never seen occidentals, incredible craft and
folk art museums in Kurashiki, saw the wonderful outdoor sculpture museum,
visited a communal crafts community in the mountains, etc. When the U.S.
dollar weakened Masako stopped doing the trips because the cost was too
prohibitive. I cherish the memories of those two trips I did take with her.
If the economy ever shifts I'll be one of the first to sign up for another
trip.
I remember going into one pottery, forget where (maybe Kagoshima), but they
traditionally do hakeme brushwork and then a pine tree design. Anyway, the
young potter took us into his display room and there in the Tokonomo was a
large Bernard Leach slip decorated pot. I have a lot of photos of these
trips. Maybe when I can figure out how to put them up on my free site that
has been in limbo for a month, I'll report back so you can see them. Last
time I tried to download a photo I was told that I couldn't do it with my
present aol browser. I downloaded netscape yesterday (all day!) and if I can
figure it out I may be able to do a test upload later today, with my photo or
my puppy Shanti.
By the way, does anyone know an inexpensive source for getting photos and
slides digitalized. Also I need to know the best and fastest format - jpeg,
gif????? I don't want a site where people have to wait five minutes for one
small photo to load.:-(
Thanks!
Warm regards,
June
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