Wabi Suki

Bizen Tokkuri | Anjin ABE

For a long time, collectors of sake vessels have favored the combination of Karatsu sake cups and Bizen sake bottles.
Tokkuri bottles are generally used to drink warm sake in the winter. Warm sake tastes the best in cold weather. I love it.
I personally love tokkuri because they are fun-shaped objects that you can actually fill with your favorite sake and use every night.
However, since the Heisei era, with the introduction of 480ml bottles and the popularity of cold sake, the number of people using tokkuri has been declining dramatically year by year. It seems that many people today find the extra step of pouring sake into a tokkuri to be a hassle.
There are truly fewer Sukisha among modern people.

Sukisha

Sukisha (or sukimono) is a term used to refer to people who love the tea ceremony and refined arts (flower arranging, incense, etc.) and are deeply devoted to these pursuits. It often refers to people who are particularly passionate about collecting tea ceremony implements and appreciating famous tea utensils, and from the Meiji period onwards, wealthy tea masters from the financial and political worlds were called “modern sukisha” and contributed to the protection and development of Japanese art.

Wabi Suki

Wabi-suki (or wabizuki) refers to the spirit of the tea ceremony, which dates from the Muromachi to Azuchi-Momoyama periods, and which avoids extravagant utensils and luxury, and instead pursues simplicity and tranquility (wabi) amidst restrictions as the basis of beauty, as well as the people who love it. It is a uniquely Japanese aesthetic sense of tea ceremony that was created by Murata Juko, passed on to Takeno Jo’o, and perfected by Sen no Rikyu.
The spirit of “wabi”: A state of mind in which lack, deficiency, and inconvenience are not viewed negatively, but rather accepted and enjoyed with a calm mind.The beauty of tools: Instead of luxurious items, we value simple Japanese items and tools with distortions and imperfections.
Unfortunately, there are very few Japanese people today who understand this.

It seems that many of the CEOs of large Japanese companies today are typical salaried employees who only study during their student days, and then spend their time fighting for promotion and fighting factions after joining the company, in order to climb the corporate ladder.
With the start of the Heisei era, Japan has lost out in competition with the rest of the world and is now in a severe depression.
It is precisely in times like these that I believe the spirit of a “Suki” is important. You may say that you don’t have the time for such things, but having a rich heart and space in your mind will surely be of some use.

Enjoy some warm sake in a premium sake bottle
As a WabiSuki, you must be able to entertain business leaders from around the world in a Japanese style.
I have felt this way for over 10 years, but the situation is only getting worse, so I have decided to speak out and say what I want to say….
I would like only those who understand and have experienced these things to become politicians, but that’s a pretty high hurdle!!!