Third trip to Japan – February 2017
This being my third trip to Japan, I’m less stressed because I know my way around and I have made a couple of friends down the road. I started this trip by visiting Eru-san. He a tattoo machine builder and he is the owner of WTS Tattoo shop in Kanagawa. Eru-san took the time to show me his workshop and his shop. He asked me to come and do a guest spot next time.
After that, I had 2 days of tattooing to get done on my arm. Shige did the inside of my upper arm: ITAI! (痛い), meaning OUCH in Japanese! Once again, I took the time to appreciate being at Yellow Blaze studio and discuss with Shige.
Since I had 2 more sessions of tattooing to do with Shige at the end of my trip, I took the rest of the time to do more sightseeing. I went to see the Ghibli Museum of Mitaka, because I love the work of Hayao Miyasaki. I also went to the Robot Restaurant in Tokyo, which was fun, but it was more for tourists, no Japanese knew about this restaurant. I also visited the Hokusai museum in Sumida. This museum made me understand more the essence of Japanese tattooing. We must not forget that Japanese tattoos art based on Ukiyo-e. And there is no greater Ukiyo-e artist than Hokusai!
Of course, I visited more temples. I climbed Takao-san which is the tengu mountain! This place is great for tengu references, and once at the top, you can see mount Fuji. I also went to Nikko which is known for all the dragon references you can see. Nikko is very famous for its dragon paintings on the ceiling of the temples. If you ever have the chance of going to Nikko, I recommend 2 things: First stop to see the dragon painters in the little stores while going up to the mountain. Second, stop to eat yuba, which is a traditional Japanese tofu very famous in Nikko.
For those who know me well, If I’m not getting tattooed of sightseeing, you can find me in libraries. I’m a collector of artbooks and I can spend hours in libraries. I even bring an extra suitcase for all the books I buy while traveling.
For the second part of the trip, I headed to Gifu which is in the region of Chūbu. I had an appointment to get tattooed by Tomoya, a tattoo artist friend I met a couple of years ago. He was going to do my first ever tebori tattoo. I let him choose the design and the subject of the tattoo. He took in account the time of the year and my life goals to create this piece of a Daruma doll in a kite. Indeed, since we were in spring, he decided on a kite because children play with kite in spring. And he chose a Daruma doll to represent my life goals.
The day before getting tattooed, we went to pray at the Dairuy-ji, which is the Daruma dragon temple. The prayer would bless the tattoo and bring its goals to life. This is not something I’m familiar with but I must say that this experience brought a very deep meaning to this tattoo. I think it made me understand more the essence of Japanese tattoos.
Next, I got tattooed: I endured 7 hours of tebori tattooing in my ribs. At the beginning I must say that I found tebori style tattooing less painful than tattoo machine tattooing. But after the 7 hours, I wasn’t sure anymore what was worst.
The last stop of the trip was to head back to Yokohama for 2 more sessions of tattooing by Shige. With these 2 last sessions, we manage to finish this piece that was started in 2013. I am very greatful for all this time spent at Yellow Blaze and I’m very thankful to have had such an amazing opportunity to see Shige in action and discuss with him.
During this trip, I have endured more than 30 hours of tattooing in 3 weeks. It was totally worth it because I have met new friends, reinforced old friendships, learn new technics and I have learned about the roots of Japanese tattooing. I even had the chance to leave a sticker of my studio on Shige’s door. A little piece of Canada is now in Japan.
