Recycling old information
I once came across a famous old Japanese expression that very much intrigued me. It goes “furuki wo tazune, atarashiki wo shiru” (or onko chishin 温故知新 in Sino-Japanese), literally meaning “inquiring into the past, knowing the new”. It says that from the study of the past new knowledge can emerge. I like the idea behind it and I boldly interpret this expression as “looking into the past to find solutions for the future”. Because that’s what I want to do.
This sounds quite retro and controversial, especially in this high-tech world, but I think that in these old texts there are many hidden gems to discover, among all the gobbledygook. Precious knowledge that is lost. I am into treasure hunting, so to speak. And maybe there are other people out there, who too are into rediscovering old knowledge of all sorts. And are interested in the information I dig out. And want to try it out. That’s why I started this website.
Plants
This ‘old’ knowledge is mostly about plants and what the people did with them. Practical knowledge. Plants are no “intruders” or “enemies” or a “threat”. They are just there and flourish in places they like. They also do not possess any nationality.
Texts
There is an old Japanese writing style called kuzushiji in which characters are written in a cursive style. I admire this (mostly) beautiful style, but the characters are sometimes really hard to decipher. Many of the sources I use are written in this style, and this is the reason why it takes some time to upload a new post. The sources want to be cherished. Probably.
It is often the language barrier that prevents one from getting more valuable information about things one is passionate about. The same applies to Japanese. Not everyone is into classical or modern Japanese. So I hope I can be of some help to you.
Feel free to use these posts in the classroom or for your paper at school or college, but please respect the TERMS OF USE. And if you want to try out the historical recipes or other translated hands-on advices, I’d be very interested to hear about the outcome!
More about
I like food, nature and art. And cacti.
I have been into the healing arts, natural medicines, shiatsu, acupuncture, yoga etc for quite some time, and also into (classical) Japanese and the history of medicine in Japan. After years of jumping from one interest to another, I eventually came to the point where I realized that I could combine all of them. This led to a PhD. And to this site..
