Iroha -chi-

iroha

is 

back

if you would like to see the other iroha-'s on my blog

please click the above photo

We've finished the first line...

now on the second...

starting from "chi"

chi

"Chi" is not to be confused with the Chinese "chi"(energy) which is "ki" 「気」in Japanese.

"Ki" is the symbol/character I will talk about....30 characters from now...

So, back to "chi".

Coincidentally, I found two makeup related brands that start with chi.

The first is Chikuhodo, a makeup brush brand based in Hiroshima  (try saying that sentence 3 times in a row!) which is well known for their brushes.You can find the English information about the company here:  Chikkuhodo

The below travel size makeup brushes are from a set that I received using my frequent flyer points (JAL).

I couldn't find the exact same set on their website but their brushes are anywhere from US$50 and....up...

The next makeup brand is a LOT more affordable.

Chifure

They are a relatively eco friendly company, very clear on the ingredients of their products and don't rely on lots of advertising.  They are super affordable...you can find out about the company in English here: Chifure

Their face cleansers and creams are anywhere from 5 to 8 US$.  The lipsticks are 300yen, less than US$3!!!

You buy the lipsticks in the little tube with the white cap you see above.  You purchase separate lipstick cases which are reusable...the plastic ones are 100 yen (less than $1 and the metallic ones are about  $3!)

I put the Revlon (matte lipstick in Heavenly Mauve no. 01) just to show you the shade similarities.

(The Chifure lipsticks are more similar to the Revlon Lip Butter textures than the matte ones...just in case you are interested in that sort of thing.)

Other words that start with "chi" are....

chikyu (Earth)
chikyu-gi (globe)
the "gi" is pronounced like the "gui" in guitar

My mom bought me the above globe about 10 years ago for my birthday... it was a "feng-shui" thing.
Supposedly if you put a globe in the eastern side of your office, your work will go global....or something to that effect.

It is actually kind of ...funny...?... because now I do get to travel a lot in Japan with at least one chance a year to travel abroad.

Globe power...

Chiheisen (chi-hay-sen) is horizon.  Specifically land horizon.  There is another word for the horizon you see when you are at sea..."suiheisen"..."sui" meaning "water".

There aren't very many places where you can see a "land horizon" in Japan especially if you live in the city.  This photo I took from the airplane will have to do for now...

Somewhere above the Kyushu island in south western Japan (2012)

...

 An adjective that starts with chi...chiisai (chee-sigh):

small

chiisa na ki
the small tree

I will talk more about the book someday, perhaps when I get to ki= tree.

Chi means:

blood, earth/land, knowledge 

all have different kanji (Japanese characters) but sound the same

....

a pretty important sound, "chi" is

I hope you have a great day/night wherever you are on this Chikyu!

Coming out of my closet...literally.

My New Year Resolutions is:

Keep it simple.

There are many reasons why I have chosen to  keep things simple.

Here is one of them:

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

You have probably run away from the computer
and are trying to turn off your browser with a ten foot pole right now.
But wait....

Now, for the really scary part....that is actually an AFTER picture NOT a BEFORE!
We couldn't see the CD shelves AT ALL (nor the floor) the same time last year because there were so many boxes piled up!

...

A lot of people have been commenting in blogland about how we tend to show the pretty, perfect and peachy sides of our lives.

I am
one
of
them.

Or now I can say...was one of them.

That room above is not supposed to be a closet, but it is, and we are changing that.
Finally...been sort of "working on it" for ages.


Thanks to  numerous videos on youtube and websites like flylady, zen habits (and his books) and for inspiration, better homes and gardens I have been able to stay focused.

One of the most helpful were books by Dominique Loreau.  Unfortunately, I have not been able to find anything by her in English (only in Japanese and French) but I did find this lovely blog by someone who has posted about reading her and decluttering: http://l0ve0utl0ud.wordpress.com/tag/dominique-loreau/
I hope the blogger doesn't mind my posting a link....

so here are three steps I have taken so far:

step 1.

I went through my summer wardrobe and threw away everything I hadn't worn!

IT WAS LIBERATING!

Then I went through my winter wardrobe and threw away everything I knew I wouldn't wear this season.

Now, I am only going to buy clothes when something gets old and even then it will have to be in one of these colors:
blue, gray, green or pink.

Why?  Because I use to keep buying shirts in outrageous colors that I could never match with my business suits etc.  (They looked pretty in the shops...)  If everything can be coordinated it makes it easier to pack for business trips etc.

Once I cleaned out my wardrobe I could feel the weight of my belongings lift up, rise...and...
....
fly away
...
Less clutter in your home means less vibes you are constantly getting from your "stuff".
(check zen habits again here: http://zenhabits.net/a-guide-to-creating-a-minimalist-home/)


Miraculously throwing things away started to get easier and easier.
I started to throw away a garbage bag a week just by opening up two or three boxes at a time.

step 2.
They key was to not overdo myself.  But since it was fun, I would clean out a corner of my apartment or 3 or 4 boxes every other week. (I had LOTS of business trips over the weekend last year, so under those conditions I think I did pretty well!  It actually takes only an hour or two once you get in the habit of
LETTING GO.  (You just have to give up playing computer games...or shopping...or couch potato-ing.)

step 3.  

When you notice something... just don't walk by...stop, consider  (if you don't need it, if it is redundant or you had even forgot you owned it) and toss!

If you don't have the heart to throw something away, but you know you don't really need it:

have a clean garbage bag or a cardboard box or even a suitcase you no longer need open, toss stuff in.
The next time you have a garage sale, attend a flea market or charity bazar, you are ready to go!

.....

As you may have noticed from the picture, we have lots of CDs.
So this is what we have been doing:

repackaging CDs. 

Taking them out of the hard plastic cases and putting them in slim cases.

It saves a lot of space!

The CD shelves start to look like this:

We are putting them in alphabetical order.

Where there is a little bit if space, I have placed some of the stuff that came out of the boxes...

I know, I know...more stuff...but I am taking things one step at a time.

AND enjoying it!

Although we had to buy lots of plastic CD jackets, don't forget, I have found that the trick is not to buy more stuff to organize your stuff.  

Get rid of what you don't need first, then and only then, find the perfect place for what you have.

If you are like me, and like to collect boxes and bags, you already have lots of storage!

Thank you for reading this not so pretty blog but...

I am still on the path to clarity (mind and material).  

The art of living in Japan (and anywhere else) for me, is to:

Keep it simple.

if it's tested in Japan would that make you feel better?

A colleague of mine recently sent me a link to a show
called "Ben and Teller".  The rest of the title is not appropriate for my blog...(let's just say, it is "cow poo").

The theme of the particular episode is about recycling and how we have been duped into believing that our behavior of recycling will help the environment.

The reason why I am posting this isn't because I have any sort of opinion about recycling (not that I don't), it is because at around 7 minutes and 19 seconds they say that whenever they wanted to close the deal they always mentioned the Japanese because it would help close the deal!

That just cracked me up.

Please note that the content of this video includes the f-word and s-word rather frequently.  If you don't mind, then watch away! but if you do, you may want to keep the volume low and have a bar of soap handy to wash out your ears later or, just not watch it all. :-)

the best stationery itemsI used in 2010

There are several things in this world that help me release stress.

One of them is buying stationery.

Stationery can be divided into various types…today I would like to focus on paperclips and notebooks.

For work and for my “research” I think I have settled on the Cornell Method Note that can be bought in Japan through Gakken.

(http://www.gakkensf.co.jp/lineup/cornell/index.html).

Kokuyo, the largest stationery/office equipment company

(http://www.kokuyo.co.jp/), has many notebooks that I have been using for my book diaries for the past 10 years or so.

http://www.kokuyo-st.co.jp/stationery/campus/). 

(By the way, if you understand Japanese, the Kokuyo website currently has videos of Ryuichi Sakamoto talking about Ecology and Creativity. From the second video, Everett Kennedy Brown appears to talk about his experience in Japan etc.  and what people can learn from Nature.  His website is here:

http://www.brownsfield-jp.com/about)

This year, my schedule book is from Muji (http://www.muji.com/) and I just found out that they have apps for the iPad and iPhone too.

The scheduler comes with a canvas type cover that I am thinking about dressing up with iron-ons later.

I added a trim with decorative masking tape as well as ribbon bookmarks.

The checkbook-like notebook on the right is for the months and the notebook on the left is for the weeks.

I think this will be very easy for me to use this year and I am looking forward to filling it up with fun events!

More notebooks that I really liked last year and kept buying for various reasons were:

The one on the left is from Midori (http://www.midori-japan.co.jp/md/).

The pink one in the middle is one that I found in a store in Kyoto called karankoron (http://store.shopping.yahoo.co.jp/karancolon/index.html).  My favorite from last year is on the right.

It is from Tsubame Note and this series comes in all sorts of sizes and shapes (http://thinkbeforesearch.com/) and the pages are perforated but sturdy so they don't fall apart.

Now, for paper clips...

My favorite elephant shaped ones and fruit shaped ones are not here but this is to give you an idea of what is out there and what I actually use. 

I use these kinds of paperclips as often as I can because I read somewhere that the most circulative stationery is the paperclip.  

This means that more than any other stationery, the paper clip is the least likely to stay in one place.  It is reused and passed on to people so you never know where your paperclip is going to end up!  I figure if that is the case, why not send around a bit of happiness and excitement too?!

And last but not least one of my most favorite items carries my paperclips and post-its...

(http://www.samiraboon.com/wawcs0116335/furoshiki_shiki.html)

It is an amazing piece of vinyl that I bought at the Nagasaki Museum a while ago and it is awesome.  I bought a larger one for my receipts too.

Have a nice day!

http://cementdesign.com/index2.html

thinking about our planet...

I would like to see this movie...if you have a chance to see it please do!

The Age of Stupid: final trailer Feb 2009 from Age of Stupid on Vimeo.

from the movie homepage:http://www.ageofstupid.net/

The Age of Stupid is a 90-minute film about climate change, set in the future, which will have its world premiere in London on March 15th 2009 and then be released in UK cinemas on March 20th 2009, followed by other countries.

SYNOPSIS

Oscar-nominated Pete Postlethwaite (In The Name of the Father, Brassed Off) stars as a man living alone in the devasted world of 2055, looking back at “archive” footage from 2007 and asking: why didn’t we stop climate change when we had the chance?

Mottainai

"Mottainai" is one word that means "too good to waste".  It is a word and way of thinking in Japan that is a part of its history and you hear it used almost everyday. 

It is reduce, reuse, recycle all in one.

The woman who helped make this Japanese word a part of global vocabulary is Wangari Maathati, an extraordinary person from Kenya who is responsible for the Green Belt Movement.

(Please check out the website at      www.thegreenbeltmovement.org

For the Japanese website www.mottainai.info )

One of the things that you cannot exclude from the mottainai philosophy is the furoshiki.

Reusable tote bags/grocery bags have become a part of everyday life here in Japan (I'm sure it is the same elsewhere too).   But this is not a new concept for the Japanese.  There is the amazing furoshiki.  As seen in the picture above, they are reusable cloths that perform like a bag. The great thing about the furoshiki is its simplicity.  It's just a cloth, so you can fold it or wrap it around anything.  You can shape it into the bag you need. Of course you can make one yourself too!  (No leather is also a nice thing!)  The furoshikis in the picture above, are all very traditional Japanese style BUT there are a lot of new furoshiki designers making new "fashionable" designs as well.   

I like to have many colors on hand so that I have one furoshiki that matches each of my purses. I store my furoshiki in each purse so that when I change purses I don't have to waste time looking for the right color.  It also means that I will always have an extra bag in my purse and I can say "no thanks!" to any plastic!  They are durable, washable and can be used for other things as well : tapestry, book covers, table cloths, scarves....with a little imagination, just about anything!