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Hisae's top 10 blog picks
A couple of years ago we had a little feature here on Click Opera which listed Hisae's Top 5 blog picks. Today -- nudged by rumblings in the gaijin blogosphere about how boring, uncreative and compromised Japanese-language blogs are, based on and perhaps justified by the mainstream most-hit pages listed at the Japan Alpha Blogger Awards -- I thought I'd ask Hisae again for a list of her most-visited, most-appreciated Japanese blogs. She gave me a list of ten, and we were soon scrolling through them in Safari 4's groovy new cover flow mode.
1. Emeraldclitorix
Hisae: This is a guy based in Kansai who posts images, links and information about stuff happening around him, usually in the form of a single line. He has a good circle, some interesting friends. This is one of the blogs I look at every day.
Nick: "Emerald Clitoris" is a funky name for a blog. His visuals are pretty good too, and I can see a hiking theme emerging.
2. Penifikko
Hisae: Penifikko is friends with the Emerald Clitorix people. He publishes a little magazine called Meris. I like this very much, it's one of the blogs I check each time it updates. I like this very strange visual style they have. If I had to make blog, I'd want it to look like this.
Nick: That really is a great look they have! It reminds me a bit of Joe and Emma's style. Hiking again seems to be in vogue here -- there are drawings of hikers, and the Meris magazine is referred to as Meris-Hike. I can't find any images of it online, though. I imagine it as a handmade, incredibly trendy neo-hiking mag. The February 2009 edition seems to be out now.
3. Fukuhen
Hisae: This is a blog by the co-editor of Brutus magazine. It's nice to know what he's doing apart from publishing Brutus.
4. Native Heart
Hisae: This blog gives information about medicines and healing. It's focused on Native Americans. I like this kind of blog, it sounds superstitious, but does tell you a lot about Native American values.
Nick: I've noticed that when Japan looks to America, it often finds a lot to identify with in the indigenous Native American culture. And black American culture, too. White American culture, not so much these days.
5. Heimin Shinbun
Hisae: This one shows one part of contemporary Japan -- young people who are very poor, temp workers, the so-called "Lost Generation", but I don't want to use that term. It shows real life, not just eating cakes in cafes. I find it very interesting and moving.
Nick: I see cats, food, painful pictures of painful things.
6. Metabolism
Hisae: It's difficult to find Japanese blogs that talk about design unselfconsciously, but this one does. It's by a designer with a company called Glyph, Yanagimoto Koichi.
7. Kuroteru
Hisae: Teruo Kurosaki runs a design school in Sangenjaya, it's called Schooling Pad. He writes kindly and simply, maybe because he's a teacher.
Nick: I like that, "kindly and simply"!
8. Tatsuru Uchida
Hisae: This is one of the most widely-read blogs in Japan. Uchida writes books, teaches at university. He used to be into French literature, now he's more of essayist, writing about society, the world. I like to see people's thinking. Also he picks up interesting topics.
9. Blog of Seino
Hisae: This guy lives in Akabane in Tokyo, he's a mangaka. There are so many interesting people in that district, a bit to the north of Shinjuku. He often picks up and befriends eccentrics. I want to live in Akabane when I next live in Tokyo!
Nick: Wow, these pictures where he mosaics out old people's faces look spooky!
10. Zozo People: Eri
Hisae: Eri is a designer for a clothes line called Mother. She was the model for that famous photo by Hellen Van Meene, she posed with hair spilling out of her sleeves. In her blog she talks about her work and her clothes. Recently she put up lots of photobooth snaps, but she usually takes nice pics. I check this blog every day, I like her models.
Nick: Ah, yes, I mentioned Hellen Van Meene's Japan Series a couple of years ago. Thank you, Hisae, I think you just saved Japan!
1. Emeraldclitorix
Hisae: This is a guy based in Kansai who posts images, links and information about stuff happening around him, usually in the form of a single line. He has a good circle, some interesting friends. This is one of the blogs I look at every day.
Nick: "Emerald Clitoris" is a funky name for a blog. His visuals are pretty good too, and I can see a hiking theme emerging.
2. Penifikko
Hisae: Penifikko is friends with the Emerald Clitorix people. He publishes a little magazine called Meris. I like this very much, it's one of the blogs I check each time it updates. I like this very strange visual style they have. If I had to make blog, I'd want it to look like this.
Nick: That really is a great look they have! It reminds me a bit of Joe and Emma's style. Hiking again seems to be in vogue here -- there are drawings of hikers, and the Meris magazine is referred to as Meris-Hike. I can't find any images of it online, though. I imagine it as a handmade, incredibly trendy neo-hiking mag. The February 2009 edition seems to be out now.
3. Fukuhen
Hisae: This is a blog by the co-editor of Brutus magazine. It's nice to know what he's doing apart from publishing Brutus.
4. Native Heart
Hisae: This blog gives information about medicines and healing. It's focused on Native Americans. I like this kind of blog, it sounds superstitious, but does tell you a lot about Native American values.
Nick: I've noticed that when Japan looks to America, it often finds a lot to identify with in the indigenous Native American culture. And black American culture, too. White American culture, not so much these days.
5. Heimin Shinbun
Hisae: This one shows one part of contemporary Japan -- young people who are very poor, temp workers, the so-called "Lost Generation", but I don't want to use that term. It shows real life, not just eating cakes in cafes. I find it very interesting and moving.
Nick: I see cats, food, painful pictures of painful things.
6. Metabolism
Hisae: It's difficult to find Japanese blogs that talk about design unselfconsciously, but this one does. It's by a designer with a company called Glyph, Yanagimoto Koichi.
7. Kuroteru
Hisae: Teruo Kurosaki runs a design school in Sangenjaya, it's called Schooling Pad. He writes kindly and simply, maybe because he's a teacher.
Nick: I like that, "kindly and simply"!
8. Tatsuru Uchida
Hisae: This is one of the most widely-read blogs in Japan. Uchida writes books, teaches at university. He used to be into French literature, now he's more of essayist, writing about society, the world. I like to see people's thinking. Also he picks up interesting topics.
9. Blog of Seino
Hisae: This guy lives in Akabane in Tokyo, he's a mangaka. There are so many interesting people in that district, a bit to the north of Shinjuku. He often picks up and befriends eccentrics. I want to live in Akabane when I next live in Tokyo!
Nick: Wow, these pictures where he mosaics out old people's faces look spooky!
10. Zozo People: EriHisae: Eri is a designer for a clothes line called Mother. She was the model for that famous photo by Hellen Van Meene, she posed with hair spilling out of her sleeves. In her blog she talks about her work and her clothes. Recently she put up lots of photobooth snaps, but she usually takes nice pics. I check this blog every day, I like her models.
Nick: Ah, yes, I mentioned Hellen Van Meene's Japan Series a couple of years ago. Thank you, Hisae, I think you just saved Japan!
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(Anonymous) 2009-02-26 05:16 am (UTC)(link)no subject
http://pipa.jp/tegaki/VBlogList.jsp?ID=125323
http://kohji.tumblr.com/
by the same owner/artist
if i could i would have a similar blog to the first one, but i dont speak or read the language. i get lost
http://pipa.jp/tegaki/VProfile.jsp?ID=194918
The Return of Interesting Hisae
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For example, it would be easy to see Emeraldclitorix and Penifikko as cool and interesting blogs, but that's only because they're cool and interesting by current western trends. I noticed halfway down that Emeraldclitorix had a link to an Ed Banger record, which means that this blogger has probably been exposed to western hipster subculture, and Penifikko's look is very nu-ravey.
The two blogs I find most fascinating are Heimin Shinbun and Seino's blog.
Heimin Shinbun is interesting because poverty in Japan tends to get swept under the carpet and flat out denied at times. For example, if you look at the relevant diagrams on wikipedia, such as "percentage of population living under the poverty line", Japan is one of the few developed country that hasn't published any statistics. There are also stories of homeless people being hidden out of view when foreign officials or important people visit certain places. According to some accounts, they get asked politely by police "Please move along for the sake of Japan's reputation" and they do so.
I'm unfamiliar with the Japanese class system. Perhaps it's not as big of an issue as it is here in Britain. If you were to get a group of British people together in a room and ask them to discuss social class and their own family's class they could discuss it for forever and a day, the issue is that convoluted and complex here. I get the feeling that in Japan that level of subtle complexity doesn't exist and that almost everyone is middle class, and that the underclass are largely overlooked. So when you see this blog, you see something interesting, beyond a middle class Japanese person eating a pretty cake in a tidy cafe, as Hisae puts it.
The only thing I don't like about this blog is its name: 平民新聞 which I would translate as "The Plebeian Times". It's much too self conscious and makes you wonder about the authenticity of the blog.
Seino's blog is interesting for similar reasons -- it has an everyday-life feel, you feel like you’re getting a glimpse into lives rather than stylish content. It's especially interesting since Hisae seems to think Akabane is a notable area.
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I don't think we need to insist on "purity" here. For instance, take one of Seino's discoveries, Peiti (http://usurabaka.exblog.jp/10051753/), a bag lady from Akabane. Seino set up a MySpace page (http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=1004210634) for her, with recordings of her singing Christmas carols and When The Saints Come Marching In.
Now, When The Saints Come Marching In is just as Western as Ed Banger, but I don't think anyone would say Peiti is someone inauthentic and compromised as a result.
Also, although you're right that poverty has been somewhat hidden in Japan, things are changing. Not only are there documentaries like Soda's Mental (http://imomus.livejournal.com/433999.html), or the Public Blue film about Osaka homeless, the lead news story today in many Japanese papers is about how members of the "Lost Generation" are now posting exact records of their temp earnings on 2ch, revealing how little they earn on a public forum (anonymously).
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I used to know this Japanese girl called Mai who was an Anglophile and the stuff she liked about British culture was so weird sometimes, it made me think "Are Japanese people gonna think this about me when I talk about Japan?"
For example, she liked watching clips of Bullseye; do you remember that stupid show? She loved it.
There is something quintessentially English about it. The contestants were nearly always working class, there was a working man's club atmosphere to it and The game of darts itself is very British. I can understand how someone interested in British culture would find it interesting, but to me it's just a naff memory from my childhood.
Ask Hisae for me (and she's perfectly entitled to decline an answer because I know it can be a sensitive subject) what social class she considers her family to be part of and what her understanding of the Japanese class system is. If it's too complicated to summerise, dont worry about it.
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She says her family is middle class. "Of course there is a class system, but it's not the same as the British one. In old days there was the agricultural class, salesman class, and so on. It's called shinokosho system."
A quick google brings up the following explanation: "During the middle ages (Kamakura Muromachi periods), many farmers were part time warriors and it was a serious threat for established seigniors. Toyotomi Hideyoshi organized a separation among 4 categories of people (warrior farmer artisan and merchant) by confiscating sabers from farmers (Katanagari) and Edo shugunate completed it. But due to the development of a money base economy, daimyo became so poor that many wealthy farmers and merchants could buy warrior position (Shibun)."
Hisae adds: "People don't look at class by occupation much these days, but there's still some kind of discrimination if you're a butcher or a funeral organiser. Some people -- not everyone -- still think about them in that way."
"Below the middle class, there are people who get money from the government because of their too-low income, and there are many working poor, too. I think their numbers will increase soon."
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(Anonymous) 2009-02-27 12:47 am (UTC)(link)Marxy
Hisae blog
(Anonymous) 2009-02-26 05:17 pm (UTC)(link)Re: Hisae blog
If she starts a blog, I'll link it from here.
Re: Hisae blog
(Anonymous) 2009-02-27 12:22 pm (UTC)(link)no subject
(Anonymous) 2009-02-26 05:50 pm (UTC)(link)Is it too much to ask for you to play the older schtuff like "Murderers.." "Voyager" and "The Guitar Lesson" ever again mate?
Joemus is a classic in its own right, but the older stuff brings back memories and would be a nice treat for some of your older fans from the days!
Thanks Momus, never stop writing!
~From a frequent reader
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Scottish Lips
The Artist Overwhelmed
Pleasantness
Beowulf
Widow Twanky
The Vaudevillian
But it's a tour punctuated by songs, rather than a concert per se.
Glad you're liking the new album!
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1. Looking at the pictures makes her too hungry.
2. They're getting on, so she's a bit afraid of seeing the site wreathed in black with death announcements some day.
Hisae gets most of her recipes from Cookpad (http://cookpad.com/) these days. As for knitting, she looks at YouTube. The only site she can recommend is one dedicated to pom-poms, Pom Pom International (http://pompominternational.com/).
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