Long Time Expat In Japan
The best part of the level up test is when you can write free hand. Normally, I have to copy as perfectly as possible. That can be fun but a little boring. Of course, Sensei always helps with composition, but I really do have a free hand. This time, the assignment was the following waka … Continue reading Kana Level-up Test
Sensei tells me that I'm finally getting my lines straight. I love how she says it. It's onomatopoeia, "Pshee!" Which means like wicked straight. I must admit, the following is probably the most "Pshee!" I have ever written my kanji. Kana is still my strong suit, but I had a hell of a time this … Continue reading June Shodo, aka “Pshee!”
Tobikyu \ˈtō ˈbē ˈkyü\ Verb (used without object) 1) To tobu a kyu 2) No really, you tobu completely over a kyu to the next kyu 3) so tobu means to jump or fly, and kyu is a level, so it means jumping up more than one level at a time. Kind of like skipping … Continue reading Shodo – Tobikyu
April I feel pretty good about kana. I used to worry about where to move my brush and when. Now, it seems to just happen. I also used to bend my brush at a little bit of an angle. Now, I'm pretty much straight up and down. I'ts been a long time since I wrote … Continue reading April Shodo
I did some new Japanese Calligraphy in March. The work we write in March gets submitted around week two of the following month. This is a little late to post about, but I like what I did so I'm sharing it now. Kana is my best area. It flows and connects from one word to … Continue reading March Shodo
Hey, it's been forever since I've been able to show some progress, but in the March issue of Shodo Geijutsu, the magazine for my Shodo group, you can read that I made it to yukyu. This is up from 1 kyu. Check out the cover of the mag: My name has a big old circle … Continue reading Level Up – Kana
I kind of like my kanji submission this month. I still feel awkward and clumsy with the size, especially with the non-cursive style I have to use. But this month was fun if not skillful. Below is my kana submission. While I think I could have done better, I feel like I know more specifically … Continue reading January Shodo
Kanji hasn't really improved since last year, but my rankings among the 3 kyu skews a little to the top. I'm going to try to test up in February. Until then, I plod along with the following, which means think a thousand (times), ponder ten thousand. Which is kind of saying the same thing twice, … Continue reading December Shodo
I feel like I'm starting to get the basics. The below is still pretty pedestrian, but the balance was good, and I feel like I started to "get it" a bit more than usual. This month's kana is a waka (和歌), a 5-7-5-7-7 syllable poem. When I was writing it I didn’t really understand the … Continue reading November Shodo
Surprisingly, I leveled up in the kana section of Shodo! Again! This was doubly unexpected because it is both hard for my classmates, or so I'm told, and also because I have never had any formal education in Japanese. I studied Kanji in Chinese, and even took a couple of lessons in Shodo (which they … Continue reading Level Up! Lvl 8 Kana
B.S. Donovan 