"As I was being born my father claims that he was playing his
fiddle/violin to soothe my mother and when my head came out he says that
I looked right into his eyes and that my eyes were the color of
electric turquoise and in Persian the word for turquoise is Fairuza, it
also means Sacred or Precious one....don't ask me..." - Fairuza Balk
Turquoise refers to a gemstone and also a color which the gemstone has. It is a mix of blue and green. Light turquoise gives off feminine appeal while dark turquoise or teal expresses sophistication.
The color turquoise is soothing as well as invigorating as its blue element gives relaxation while its green element contains the energy of growth. Since it comprises these two elements, it creates emotional balance and stability. In color psychology, turquoise recharges our spirits when we feel mentally tired and stressed out. It relaxes and invigorates us and takes away the loneliness we feel. If you can use the color turquoise on your wall, clothing, jewelery, you'd feel immediately more relaxed and energized. Ready to face the world again! (^_^)
Our New Collection of Silk Batik Stoles, Shawls, and Wraps
As I wrote in my previous post, the first project of our shop had started and we got the result.. yaaaaay.. (^O^)/
前回少しご紹介しましたが、うちのお店の新プロジェクトがスタートして、その製品が届きました！
Over ten pieces of silk batik stoles, shawls, and wraps are ready to adorn you. (^_^)
10点以上の純シルク製のバティックのストール、ショール、ラップが、お求めいただけます。
The colors and batik patterns complement each other to create beautiful design. We chose batik style from West Java for this collection for its bright colors and cheerful batik patterns. From Tasikmalaya, we have four kinds. Each has one color: red, royal blue, yellow, and lime green. And from Cirebon, we have various kinds with some having more than one color tones.
As for the process, the batik artisans used a batik process called hand-stamped where patterns are created by using decorated stamps. The stamp is first merged on a tray filled with liquid wax then transferred on a piece of cloth to create patterns. When the patterns are done, they hand-dye the cloth and boil it to remove the wax. Since the stoles are handmade in such a way, you may notice the remaining fragrance of wax pervading from the stoles.
High quality silk was used to produce these pieces so that the outcome met the standard of excellent batiks because only with good quality fabric can good batik be produced. Not only it will make a beautiful piece but also comfortable to wear. Moreover, most the batik artisans would refuse to use bad quality fabric. They are very particular with this matter.
Today the sun is shining fully during the day. Not half not a quarter. But full! Outside looks so beautiful as if nature is awaken from her deep sleep for 4 or 5 months!..(just like this, the weather in Tottori is so gloomy in winter season so it made me so gloomy too. Except for my husband. He always says he's never been affected by the circumstance at all. It seems he's totally so-called "my-pace person"so I seriously envy him)
What do I do on such a lovely day? Not galloping in the meadow and singing like Maria in The Sound of Music... Nope! My husband and I decided that it is high time we laid our futons and blankets on the roof to dry. It sounds unromantic but we have been longing to sleep on more fluffy futons and warm cottony blankets (^_^) so..forget about being Maria in this bright warm beautiful day.
Apart from warm sun and cool air, spring marks the growth of flowers. Little buds start to emerge. New leaves are sprouting.. I LOVE spring!! And to celebrate the coming of spring, I have changed the background of my blog to suit the season.
I chose this batik piece from my private collection as the background. Because this particular piece reflects the season perfectly. The background and the choice of colors and designs were orchestrated beautifully. On a clean white background laid blossoming flowers of pink, turquoise, and green while green tendrils give off fairy-tale like tone. If you have read the book by Frances Hodgson Burnett "The Secret Garden", you will understand that even the heart of the unaffectionate and cold Mary Lennox would be melted at the sight of flowers. Flowers uplift the cold souls frozen by long winter. Let's cheer up as spring is here!! (=^O^=)/
It is not easy to find a partner with who you can communicate what you want and what you think and understands them well. For example, if a foreigner really fall in love with Batik and decide to visit Indonesia to ask Batik artists to make Batik works as he/she likes, it may be totally difficult because of the cultural (and sometimes language) differences ! In this meaning, I might be lucky because I'm Indonesian so it's not so much difficult for me to think about the business plans with understanding their situation and so on, even though I'm living in a far away place.
I was really happy when I met Riri. At last I found a partner whom I can work together well. She is a mother of a-year-old baby daughter. She and her husband run a batik business together. She is among the few Indonesian who think that being a self-employed is better that becoming a government officer. I really like her progressive mindset :-). Enthusiastically, she immediately accepted my idea of producing silk batik stole with batik designs from Tasikmalaya city where she has been acquiring high quality hand-stamped and hand-drawn batiks for the past few years. And she has known the batik artisans very well.
When it comes to batik making, Tasikmalaya may not be as well-standing as batik-making centers in Central Java such as Jogjakarta, Solo, Lasem, or Pekalongan or even those in West Java such as Cirebon or Indramayu. However, the city had her golden age in batik between 1950 - 1960.
Tasikmalaya batik patterns received strong influence from those of Jogjakarta and Solo, which is quite characteristic in comparison to other famous batik making centers in the West Java. For example, the preference for geometric patterns such as those favored in Jogjakarta and Solo. Also the choice of color tones such as soga brown, black, indigo, deep red on a cream background. These are some of the examples:
Fortunately, Riri has been working together with progressive batik workshops who dare to apply more various color tones. And given this, I thought that it would be a nice idea to apply Tasikmalaya batik design on silk stoles, wraps or shawls.
And the result is gorgeous silk batik stoles ever! Using lined silk which has two weaving patterns alternating, the silk stoles look so elegant and beautiful as you can see below.
During last home-coming, I was fortunate to meet with a few passionate batik artisans and lovers. I learned that batik has been in their life for years. They have fallen in love with batik, laughed, cried, and worked their fingers to the bone for Batik. In their sleep, they dream about flowers, phoenix, tree of life, clouds, dragon, leaves.. When they are awake, they put all of them onto cloth. It was an honor meet them.
We met mas Bayu and mbak Dani at mas Bayu's home in Jogjakarta (mas and mbak are Javanese titles used when addressing people. Mas for men and mbak for women. Especially used when addressing men or women of about the same age or a bit older or in some cases a bit younger. For example, Bayu is much younger than me). Mbak Dani is pretty and energetic lady. Educated at one of the top universities in Indonesia and attended a short course in Oxford Unversity, England. Upon finishing her studies, she decided to run a batik business. Her love for batik had been her strongest motivation. Mas Bayu is a graduate of Indonesia Institute of Art in Jogjakarta, a city most associated with culture and art. Founding his own batik studio called Hotwax Jogja, he has designed and made beautiful pieces of batik. Highly influenced by Japanese art, he ingeniously incorporates Javanese, Indonesian, and Japanese styles in his batik pieces (he also can draw Japanese black-and-white paintings called "Suiboku Ga" and he said one of his hero is Akira Toriyama who's the writer of "Dragon Ball"). Meeting and talking with these people was an incredible experience and has deepened my knowledge about batik.
But long before that, I had met another energetic lady in Bandung. Also an young entrepreneur in batik. She travels to the remote areas in West Java in search for hidden treasure. She meets with batik artisans and brings their works to Bandung and sell them. She has become a bridge between these village artisans to the market of batik lovers. We had a very long chat over a nice coffee and some yummy snacks. We came to an idea of producing silk batik stoles, shawls, and wraps involving artisans the city of Tasikmalaya, whom she has known well for a long time. Some of them are ready to be shown in my next posts. Be ready to check them out!! ^_^
I was browsing the net as usual a few days ago and was getting ready to post a new entry on my blog when suddenly a pop-up came out. This pop-up appeared to ask me to scan my computer. Without thinking any further, I clicked.
My husband is very cautious about our computers' security as we use internet a lot. Therefore, we're prone to viral attacks. He regularly scans and re-installs his and mine. He also installed an anti virus software. This software oftend reminds us to scan when it comes across a suspicious website.
When I saw the pop-up, I thought it was the software that told me to do so. I did and suddenly my computer went nuts!! Another pop-up appeared and this pop-up multiplied! I panicked!!
I called my husband who came up and immediately ran a check-up on my computer. After a while he said, "a virus (maybe it's so-called Windows 7 Recovery) has attacked your computer. Just like it did to mine several months ago." I couldn't believe it!!.. I remembered when a certain virus had attacked my husband's laptop and it deleted most of his files. It took him days to work on it and he couldn't get his files back. And this is happening to meeeeeee!! I thought panicking. I didn't think I had opened a suspicious site. How could that happen??
Having experienced and dealt with the same mischievous virus before, my husband knew how to handle it and my files were safe.. pheeeew.. What a relief!!
Batik in general is an art of decorating the surface of a medium, may it be ceramic, wood, wool, paper and so on and so forth. Nonetheless, it is cloth which is mostly associated with Batik. Therefore around the world people know Batik as decorated cloth.
The latter involves decorating a piece of cloth using a method known as wax-resist method. This is the most traditional way to dye and give patterns onto a cloth. As it is referred by its name, this method uses wax to create pattern by preventing dye from covering the whole cloth. First some particular areas on the cloth are blocked out by brushing or drawing hot wax on them. Then the cloth is dyed. The parts which are covered with wax resist the dye and maintain the original color. This process can be repeated as many times as necessary until the desired patterns are formed.
A half of my homecoming trip was spent in the city of Jogjakarta. My husband and father in-law arrived on the 6th of February at the Jakarta airport and the next day we left for Jogjakarta with my younger sister and her 5-year-old son. We took a train and arrived in Jogjakarta at about 2 in the morning. I was sooooo relieved :-)..because the first time my husband took a train to Surabaya from Bandung in 2009 was such an nightmare for him. A supposed-to-be 12 hour-ride extended to a 16-hour ride. It was a real torture for him. So this time it wasn't. In fact the train was quite punctual. I was impressed! :)
A visit to Jogjakarta wouldn't be perfect if you didn't visit the magnificent Borobudur: a 9th-century MahayanaBuddhist monument located in the Magelang city about 40 kilometers northwest of Jogjakarta. Six square platforms topped by three circular platforms make up the monument that represents a mandala. It is decorated with 2,672 relief panels and 504 Buddha statues. The main dome at the center of the top platform is surrounded by 72 Buddha statues seated inside stupa that has holes so that you can see the statues inside.
How come a country whose 86% of the population is Moslem has one of the most grand Buddhist monuments in the world! Well, the reason is that some time before 5th century AD the archipelago (which is now called Indonesia (インドネシア)received the influence of Hinduism and Buddhism from India that went as far as Sumatra, Java, and Bali. Not all of the 13,000 received this influence though. That is why most Hindu and Buddhist temples are found in these three islands.
From the entrance to the temple it takes about 15 to 30 minute walk. If you walk fast and don't stop for a few minutes to admire this majestic animal that roams the park with its mahout, you can reach the temple less than 30 minutes. But in my case, it took a bit more than that because my nephew wanted to see Ganesh more closely. He had never seen an elephant roaming freely outside a cage :-D
the elephant with its mahout roaming in the park surround Borobudur
象使いと一緒にボロブドゥール公園を歩き回る象
now he's ready to continue his giant step to Borobudur after a closer look at Ganesh :)
象は見たから、さあボロブドゥールへ行くぞ！
Once I got there (with several stops to catch my breath), I was marveled at the spectacular relief on the panels of the temple. It must have taken years and years to carve blocks of stone to create the relief. I knew very little about what is depicted except for the story of Siddhartha Gautama from Little Buddha where my favorite actors plays as Buddha :-) I wondered if Buddha was as cute as Keanu Reeves :-D
What is noticeable on the relief is the presence of lotus. The lotus is one of the Eight Auspicious Symbols in Buddhism. Buddhas and Bodhisattva are often depicted sitting on a lotus or holding a lotus. The lotus' root is planted in deep mud. In spite of that the blossom rises above the murky water and opens in the sun with remarkable beauty and fragrance. In Buddhism, the lotus represents the true nature of beings, who rise through samsara into the beauty and clarity of enlightenment.
Not only on the relief of temples, Hinduism and Buddhism also left their lotus on other form of arts such as batik. The blossoming lotus later developed into four ellipses that represent four-petaled lotus. Inside the ellipse appear crosses and ornaments such as lines or dots. This batik pattern is then called kawung. Considering its sacred symbol, in the past where the feudal system dominated in Java, only aristocrat were allowed to wear this motif.
batikmakers are batiking at a workshop in Bandung
バンドンの工房でバティックを作る職人さんたち
Lazing about at home or spoiling my taste buds with scrumptious food sound very unproductive for such a long stay in one's home country :-) So I did something that was contra-unproductive. One thing that I had always wanted to do before setting foot in Indonesia was to visit a batik workshop and have first-hand experience in the batik making..
I visited this batik workshop in the eastern part of Bandung. This batik workshop has quite a reputation actually so I was daunted at first when arriving at the entrance. But I had made up my mind so I couldn't back down.
As I was walking inside, the fragrant smell of wax pervaded in the air. The sound of people chit-chatting was my lead to where I should go. My eyes immediately fell on a group of ladies who were busy with their work, applying hot wax with a canthing onto a piece of plain cotton that had patterns on it. They looked up and greeted me as I approached.
I was so nervous I couldn't control my fingers. Between fear for the hot wax and trying to control it. The hot wax was running uncontrollably on the cloth. Batiking is truly tough!! とても難しい!!! (> <。).
But! I finally managed to conquer my fear (but not my fingers unfortunately, not yet) and finished my first batik project at the workshop. My buttocks ached from 8 hours times 3 days working on this project!! (> <。)
Lotus in bloom - lotus is a divine flower so I chose it when my instructor asked me to design something
蓮の花 - 蓮は神聖な花なので、インストラクターが何を描くのか尋ねた時に、私はこれを選びました。
The lotus and jasmine are my own design and the remaining are hand-stamped.
蓮とジャスミンは私が描いて、後はスタンプしました。
My first batik project
私の初めてのバティック作品
My 24-hour batik project has got me hooked on batik more strongly and I'm planning to continue learning. Batik is my life!! *^_^*
After over 14 months since my last visit to Indonesia, I finally made another one last January.
前回インドネシアへ里帰りしてから14ヶ月、ついにこの一月帰国しました。
Traveling to the equatorial zone in winter was an amazing experience. I left Kurayoshi amidst the cold freezing air. Until Kansai airport I was fully layered in thick suede coat. 9 hours later I arrived at Jakarta's airport, enwrapped in thick humid air. The sound of people's chatters was buzzing in my ears. Everywhere flocks of people moving around dizzily. Quite an opposite to Kurayoshi's atmosphere.
Not only the weather, my lifestyle changes when I am in Indonesia. One thing is that I always wake up early no matter how late I go to bed at night. The reason is simple. It is almost impossible to wake up late among the cock-a-doodle-dooing roosters, the sound of adzan. And most of all, food vendors who shout or make sound with their plates or wooden block trying to sell chicken porridge, spiced rice, steamed rice with curry, Chinese buns and so on and so forth. How can you stay asleep when the vendors are giving you images of mouth watering breakfast? :-)
the infamous fried rice or nasi goreng
有名なインドネシアのチャーハン「ナシ・ゴレン」
Soto sulung: the savory beef soup with rice
「ソト・スルン」激辛ビーフスープとごはん
But my most favorite breakfast menu while at home is this: fried tempeh and steamed bananas. Hmmmm Yummmyyyy!! でも私の自宅での最もお気に入りの朝食はこれ。テンペのフライと蒸しバナナです。うーん、美味しい！
It's been a long time since my last post. A lot of things have happened since then.
久々の投稿です。前回からいろいろなことがありました。
I held my own batik exhibition in a town near where I live called Misasa town (三朝町). A cafe owner was very kind to host my first exhibition of Indonesian batik.
For this exhibition I acquired about 30 pieces of batik from different prominent batik making areas in Indonesia such as Tegal, Lasem, Cirebon, Garut, Semarang to name a few. I also displayed some batiks of my late grandmother who passed away last year. It was such an honor to be able to display what is to me her legacy.
Over 30 people came to the exhibition with great curiosity as to what batik is all about. Some though had already heard and known about batik but some hadn't. It was very interesting to see how closely they were watching me showing them how to create different styles of outfit by using a piece of batik.. I felt proud and nervous at the same time. I was a bit overwhelmed with pouring admiration from the guests towards the collection of batiks.
An surprising thing is that the stuffs that sold most were silk Batik shawls. In the beginning, I didn't expected that so what I had prepared most were 100 % cotton Batik fabric. But after we started the exhibition, all of the shawls were sold out just within 30minutes ! I was so surprised ! My husband said maybe they can use them with putting them on their coats or something because, as you know, there's winter in Japan. But Indonesia isn't like that so shawls aren't so much popular. And basically the coats in Japan has simple and plane colors so, if they wear them on their coats, they can match with each other characteristically. It might be the remarkable cultural difference, I think.
Basically my first trial here was succeeded enough (to be honest, I was an English teacher in Indonesia so I haven't tried business matter !). I'm really glad to know that not a few persons is there who's interested in Batik, even in these kinds of countryside. And I've got confidence about that. Now I'm planning next exhibitions to show how beautiful Indonesian batiks are and also to promote my business. Maybe in Tokyo ?
