The other day, I received some chocolates from someone who has been very kind to me. The chocolates were so beautiful that I had to dress up and take a picture of them today. Of course I enjoyed the chocolates afterwards, and of course I loved the taste, but the packaging was also wonderful. Thank you for the treat!
Now, today’s tweet is about “guessing activities,” but are you all “guessing”?
To tell you a little about myself, I have been addicted to the “timelesz project” (a.k.a. “Taipro”), which has been a hot topic of conversation recently, for reasons that are beyond my years…. Last week, the day before the final audition for the new members was aired, I was in a state of mind.
I have been a fan of one of the members for the past 7 or 8 years, and I personally feel that I have finally been discovered by the world. I have been visiting the plays she has performed in for a long time, but in the blink of an eye, she has entered a different dimension in terms of the number of followers she has, and I felt a little sad that she has become a distant presence in the world. I had an experience for the first time in my life, such as wondering if this is what people call “nurturing” my “guesses”…lol I will continue to support them from the shadows, even though I feel a mixture of loneliness and hope for their success.
Putting aside the topic of my own “guess life,” the historical drama “Belabo,” which all of us at Fuhkosha are into, is also a story about increasing the number of “guesses.
Tsutaya Shigesaburo (Tsutashige), known for widely distributing “bijin-ga” (pictures of beautiful women), employed ukiyoe artists such as Kitagawa Utamaro to produce and sell large numbers of nishikie (woodblock prints with multiple colors), and one of the central works of these artists was a picture of a beautiful woman. For the people of Edo, beauty prints were literally images of “beautiful women” and were very close to what we see today in idol photo albums and posters. Ukiyoe was a popular media at that time.
Ukiyo-e was a popular medium at that time, and if an artist like Utamaro Kitagawa, who created many pictures of beautiful women, made a big hit, it seemed to generate a craze, such as “I want to be like that courtesan” or “I admire that actor”. However, at that time, there were also beauty paintings of ordinary town girls. They may have been the idols of Edo. When we look into the “guesswork” of these townswomen, we find that they are no different from us 200 years later, so please read on with a laugh.
Let us look into it,
It seems that the original idol was Kasamori Osen, a signboard girl who worked at a water teahouse called “Kagiya” in front of the Kasamori Inari Gate in Yanaka in the 1760s during the Meiwa period. O-Sen, who was a daughter of the teahouse (in essence, a cafe clerk), gained a reputation for being beautiful, and when Harunobu Suzuki, famous for his paintings of beautiful women, drew her, she spread throughout Edo and became very popular. At that time, beauty paintings were like today’s photo albums.
According to one theory, despite the high price of a cup of tea (about 3,000 yen in today’s prices), the shop was so popular that people had to wait in line to get in, so I guess it was like a cafe where you could meet idols around Akihabara in person.
The owner of the key shop became greedy because of the popularity of the tea, and came up with a business plan. He not only sold tea, but also so-called “Osen goods” such as tenugui hand towels, pictured paper, and sugoroku (a Japanese backgammon game) decorated with Osen. These goods sold very well, just as we do nowadays when we spend a lot of money to buy goods of our favorite characters….
In those days, along with Osen, Ofuji, the signboard girl of “Yanagiya,” a toothpick shop in the back of Sensoji Temple, was also popular, and these two plus Oyoshi, the signboard girl of “Tsutaya,” a water tea shop in Nijukenchaya, were known as the “Three Meiwa Beauties. The Edo people’s sense does not seem to have changed this much. Edo people are a bit cute.
However, Osen suddenly disappeared at the peak of her popularity. This led to the theory that she was kidnapped and abducted by a stalker, and her fans were in an uproar.
The fact that rumors like this are going around is proof that there were idol stalkers even back then, but it seems that the truth behind Osen’s disappearance was her marriage. (I laughed out loud here.)
(I had a good laugh here.) She was married to Masanosuke Kurachi, a shogunate bannerman and landowner of Kasamori Inari, and the story of her marriage to a promising elite bureaucrat and her retirement is now legendary. (In fact, Masanosuke even rose to the position of paymaster-gokin magistrate, in charge of the shogunate’s coffers.)
One thing that can be said is that beautiful women are still a treat today, and nothing has changed in the more than 200 years that have passed since then, not even the sad ending to the pure love of idol geeks! That was that.
Such human and commercial patterns related to “guesswork” have apparently not changed for more than 200 years, but the current guesswork market is said to be a whopping 8,000 timid, though I am not the owner of the key shop at Osen no Chaya. I feel that the culture of “guesswork” that has been cultivated for such a long time will never disappear, so I am thinking of getting caught up in the whirlpool.
I am going to be swept up in the whirlpool. (Staff Y)
FUKOSHA holds an appraisal session on the 21st of every month.
This month, it will be held on Friday, February 21st, from 10:00 am ~17:00
No prior notice is required, so please drop by at your convenience.
If you have any items at home or at your parents’ house that you wonder how much they are worth, please bring them in for evaluation only. If you have large items that are difficult to bring in, we will be happy to assess them by photo.
As I mentioned earlier, this year we entered the “rainy water” season of the 24 solar terms on February 18. It is said to be a good time to start preparing for agriculture, and since the middle of the Edo period (1603-1867), it has been a popular custom among commoners to visit the Ise Shrine during “Amamizu”.
It was also around the time of the Hina Festival, which celebrated the healthy growth of girls, and it is said that “if you display hina dolls in Amamizu, you will be blessed with a good marriage”. Originally, hina dolls were used to transfer the bad luck that befell them to the dolls, who would then take the place of the dolls and be washed down the river. Therefore, it was thought to be a good time to display dolls during the rainy season when water was abundant.
I didn’t know such a legend existed, but I have been late in decorating dolls every year, so this year, I decorated them right after the first day of spring. I guess it’s just a matter of feelings, but I decided to decorate them after the rainy season next year. Unless I forget….
Foods that are in season at this time of year are said to be rich in nutrients, and clams are said to be delicious as they store plenty of nutrients in preparation for spawning. The two shells overlap perfectly, symbolizing marital bliss, and soup is an indispensable part of the Hinamatsuri celebration.
In addition to other fish such as yellowtail and Spanish mackerel, I feel that daikon radish and Chinese cabbage also add sweetness to the dish. Personally, I feel that broccoli at this time of year is sweet to the core and delicious! I feel that broccoli is sweet to the core this time of year!
I also need to take vitamin C to stay in good health, but the price of oranges, which I used to buy in large quantities every year, is so high this year that I can’t afford them. I looked beside the store and saw “ponkan” oranges from Shizuoka Prefecture on sale, which made me nostalgic, so I bought some for the first time in a while. My family liked it because it was sweet like an orange and had a refreshing taste with little acidity.
Ponkan” sounded cute, so I looked it up and found that it was a citrus fruit that originated in India. It is believed to have been introduced to Kagoshima in 1896 via China and Taiwan.
The “Pon” in “Ponkan” comes from “Poona,” the name of a place in western India, and “Kan” is said to be named after the citrus fruit “Kan. The variety has been further improved in Japan and many varieties have been created, including the Ota Ponkan, Imazu Ponkan, and Yoshida Ponkan.
I have always been a fan of Onshu Mikan, so I wanted to try a variety of citrus fruits.
I wondered if the “Pon” in Ehime’s “Pon Juice” came from “Ponkan,” but to my surprise, I found out that it came from “Pon,” which means “Japan’s best. Sadatake Hisamatsu, then governor of Ehime Prefecture, is said to be the godfather of the name.
The advertising poster reads, “Pon juice born in Japan and shining in the world,” expressing the hope that it will become the best juice in Japan. It must be common knowledge to people in Ehime Prefecture.
Today, we received Japanese sweets (monaka) from a customer on a business trip. We enjoyed it very much! Thank you very much.
Monaka” is written ‘monaka’ in Chinese characters, but the bean paste of ‘monaka’ is sticky due to the presence of mizuame (starch syrup), and it seems very smooth and easily blends with your tongue, doesn’t it? The thin crust also has a savory aroma the moment you put it in your mouth, and its crispy texture is indescribable, isn’t it? The one I had was also a very nice combination of crispy skin and sweet bean paste.
By the way, “monaka” is a strange name, isn’t it? Why “monaka” and not “saichu”?
Actually, the name “monaka” seems to be a contraction of the name of a confectionery called “monaka no tsuki,” which means “moon in the middle of autumn,” but “monaka” has the meaning of “the center of things” or “the peak of the season,” and “monaka no tsuki” means “full moon in the middle of autumn,” or the full moon of the 15th night. It seems to refer to the full moon on the fifteenth night of the month, the “Mid-Autumn Moon.
This is a story from the Heian period (794-1185), and it seems that “zaichu” took its current form in the middle of the Edo period (1603-1868), when a man named Takemura Ise, who had a store in Yoshiwara, Edo, started selling round rice crackers that looked like a full moon.
It is said that the sembe was similar to the skin of today’s “¡Èmonaka¡É. Later, the ¡Èmonaka manju¡É was created by inserting red bean paste between the ¡Èmonaka moons¡É, and gradually the word ¡Èmanju¡É was abbreviated to ¡Èmaichu¡É. It was not until the Meiji and Taisho eras (1912-1926) that the “monaka” as we know it today was made in a mold, but it became very popular during the Taisho era (1912-1926) and spread to the point where it was made in almost all Japanese confectionery shops.
I had no idea that “monaka” was such an old confectionery, but I munched on it with that in mind…. It was delicious.
The other day, we took out our Hina dolls as announced, but as has become a tradition every year, we made the mistake of not knowing the placement of the three courtesans and the peach and tachibana from the other day. This year, as promised, we made the same mistake again, but we managed to put them up.
Our Hina-san dolls are not so old, but recently I happened to see them at a department store, and I thought that many of them are more compact than before, probably due to the recent housing situation. I wondered if hina decorations have been changing quickly in different times and regions, since they have been so different even in the last few decades.
To begin with, it seems that Ohinasama originated from a style of “Hiina-play” among upper class girls during the Heian period (794-1185). It seems that “playing with dolls” using paper dolls and toys made to resemble household goods was a popular activity. Such scenes appear in essays and stories of the time, and by the Muromachi period (1333-1573), the date of the festival seems to have been fixed at March 3.
In the Edo period (1603-1867), Hinamatsuri became a court event, and was also introduced in the inner chambers of the shogunate. Meanwhile, Hinamatsuri spread to the common people around this time, and a form of celebrating a girl’s first Doll’s Festival by displaying dolls was born. In the early Edo period, there was only one pair of Uchiuri-hina, but by the mid-Edo period, tiered decorations appeared, and the number of dolls and doll implements, including the three courtesans, increased, creating a time when people competed with each other in splendor and splendor. I feel that we are getting closer to the modern style of Hina decorations here.
And after the Meiji period (1868-1912), this style of Hina Matsuri spread widely to rural areas, and it seems to have spread widely to the present day.
You can see such Hina decorations in many places in Japan this time of year, and there are many Hina Festival events held here in Aichi Prefecture and Nagoya City. Here are some of them.
Tokugawa Art Museum Special Exhibition “Owari Tokugawa Family Hina Festival 2025
Period: February 1 (Sat) – April 2 (Wed), 2025
Venue：Tokugawa Art Museum
Seto City] The 24th Hina Festival in Seto, the City of Pottery
Period：February 1, 2025 (Sat) ～ March 9, 2025 (Sun)
Place of the event：Around the Seto warehouse area
The 13th Inuyama Castle Town Ohinasama Tour [Inuyama City
Period: February 10 (Mon) – March 10 (Mon), 2025
Place: Former Isobe Family Residence
Oguchi Town] Oguchi Town Museum of History and Folklore Winter Exhibition “Hinamatsuri (Doll Festival)
Period：January 25, 2025 (Sat) ～ March 9, 2025 (Sun)
Place: Oguchi-cho History and Folklore Museum (3F Hohoemi Plaza, Oguchi-cho Health Culture Center)
Chita City Museum of History and Folklore Collection “Peach Festival Hinamatsuri Exhibition
Period：January 18, 2025 (Sat) ～ March 9, 2025 (Sun)
Place of Exhibition：Chita City Museum of History and Folklore
Okazaki City】Hina Matsuri at the Former Residence of Tadatsugu Honda
Holding period:February 4 (Tue) – March 9 (Sun), 2025
Place of the festival：Former Tadatsugu Honda Residence
Toyota City】Chuma no Ohinasan in Asuke
Period：February 8, 2025 (Sat) ～ March 9, 2025 (Sun)
Venue：Asuke Jyudenken-no-machinami area and Korankei Gorge
Tahara City】Tahara City Museum (Atsumi Local History Museum) Special Exhibition “Hinamatsuri Exhibition
Holding period：February 1 (Sat) to March 16 (Sun), 2025
Place of the exhibition：Atsumi Local History Museum, Tahara City Museum
I could only introduce some of them, but there are quite a lot of events.
Even nowadays, we can see that hina decorations are changing, and it seems that they have been changing from era to era and region to region, but in the response and speed of the changes, “Let’s enjoy hina decorations” is always hidden in every era. Because I was enjoying decorating hina-dolls while struggling to keep up with the changes, lol.
The other day, I was watching the historical drama “Bera-bo” and heard the line “everything went paa”, meaning to be ruined. A family member who was watching it with me asked, “Did they ever say anything about it going poof in the Edo period?” I looked it up. I looked it up, but in the end I didn’t really understand it.
However, as I looked into it, I found out that an unexpected word had been used since the Edo period.
I had thought that “Maji” and “Yabai,” which I had thought were modern youth words, were used in the Edo period.
We hear “yabai” frequently today because it is also used to mean “eclipsing good. I worry that my children and others might not have a good vocabulary because they can get by with just “yabai” to a great extent.
The word “yaba” was originally used to describe an inconvenient or dangerous situation in violation of the law, and the expression “yaba koto” can be found in “Tokaido chu hizakurige,” a comic book written in the Edo period (1603-1867). There are various theories as to why dangerous things are called “yaba,” but there is a theory that the word “yabai” was derived from “yaba,” a shooting range in the Edo period, where people ran illegal stores behind the yaba and were watched by officials, thus giving birth to the word “yabai.
Maji” is still used today to mean ‘serious’ or ‘earnest,’ but in the Edo period it was used as a backstage term by geisha, and was apparently an abbreviation for ”serious. It seems that Kabuki also has lines such as “serious mind,” which makes me laugh a little when I imagine it.
The word “beranme”, which is also used in the title of the drama, is an Edo dialect meaning “out of the ordinary”, and is used today as in “beranme ni takara”, which means “very high”. The Edo dialect is often referred to as “beranme-te” style, which is a corruption of the word “berobo-me.
The Edo dialect was developed in the town people’s society, and it is believed to have been influenced by dialects from various parts of Japan, such as the dialect of the Mikawa region where Tokugawa Ieyasu was born, as well as various other dialects, which mixed together to form the Edo dialect.
It is often referred to as the “e-ization of ai pronunciation,” with “違いない” often becoming “chige-ne” and “iru” “he-ru” “enter,” etc. It seems that the impatient Edo townspeople developed this way of speaking as they spoke quickly.
Since “what are you talking about?” becomes “teyandai,” they must have been in a great hurry.
I thought that the Edo dialect had a lot of rough words, and I wondered if it had survived because the fast-talking Edo tone is more powerful, but it seems that there are many remnants in the words used for infants.
It is said that many infant words such as “nenne” for sleeping, “pompon” for tummy, and “battei” for dirty have their roots in the Edo dialect. All of these words have a gentle sound.
There are many other interesting origins as well, such as “nogure,” “gassatsu,” “bullshit,” and “noroma,” so if you are interested, why don’t you look them up?
