The native language of the overwhelming majority of the more than 120 milions of population of the Japanese archipelago is called Nihongo, which is also a subject that they take with high pride. Why is that so? Well, it is rather hard to find typical Japanese people conversing and communicating in english. They find pride and honor in the very own language that they speak. But it doesn’t mean that they can’t understand and speak english at all. As a matter of fact, english is taught in middle and high …

There are actually quite a number of japanese papercrafts but this time, I will talk and cover on kirigami or kirigami pepakura. The word ‘pepakura’ is a japanese translation of papercrafts written in katakana, while ‘kirigami’ literally means ‘cutting papers’ (‘kiri’ means to cut and ‘kami’ means paper. It is a type of Japanese art that involves a lot of cutting and also folding paper into certain shapes, ornamental objects and designs.
Kirigami is different from origami because it involves cutting to get a certain shape, though it also initially involves …

Japan is one nation that can never be separated from nature. As a matter of fact, they take pride in nature. They see and define the natural environment around them as holy beings. To the Japanese, all of the elements of nature possess spirits and emotions, aligning some the similarity to that of a human attributes. One that had been taken into deep particular interest by the Japanese is the bonsai plants.
.

Bonsai is a type of small plant (any kind of small trees!) that is nurtured in a small pot …

You know… one thing about oriental countries is how they integrated flora and fauna into their cultural lifestyle – making their culture one of its own kinds. Flower viewing is not only famous in Japan, but China and Korea as well. The concept doesn’t differ much from one another too. Well, in all countries stated above, flower viewing is a leisure event where they watch and cherish the eternal beauty of natural surrounding especially blooming flowers while sitting down listening to music and sipping authentic tea.
I’m quite sure I saw …

To me, it’s like one of the many wonders in this world where we lived in – the ‘Sakura’ flowers or ‘cherry blossom’ some may have called it. When you’re looking at the pictures of Sakura trees in rows, it is so beautiful ‘as if’ like you’re watching a field of tulips in Netherlands, with a little more oriental touch. Alas, I had to admit, they’re rather incomparable to any other things in this world.
All these years of my life, when I come across the word Sakura, I only remember …