Saturday 15 October 2016

Children - Blog Link Up

Children in Postcards


The topic of this week's Link Party is Children.  To be honest, that isn't my favourite topic by a mile as I am not a big fan of children.  However, I heard that once upon a time I myself was a child, so decided to search out some cards for this week.

Surprisingly, there aren't very many Gotochi cards with children on them... I found this one from Kyoto, but the explanation on the site when it is translated into English makes absolutely no mention of the children.  Honestly, it doesn't make much sense at all either! See what I mean?




The majority of the cards that I will show today were taken by a local photographer, Domon Ken. (Wikipedia is using the western way of writing his name, I'm using the Japanese way of family name first.) Domon Ken was born in the next city to mine, Sakata.  There is a dedicated museum to his work there.  It is a lovely place and of course, they sell many postcards of his work!

I really like his photographs of children, and many of his people pictures too.  He manages to capture the simple joys in the life of a child.  I'm sorry, but I don't have any information about when or where these photographs  were taken.



The woman is making some kind of sweet which I believe the boys
would like to buy!
 This final card which I am posting comes from my own city.  On the right you can see the kanji for Tsuruoka, along with a small map to show the part of Yamagata Prefecture that Tsuruoka is in.  Tsuruoka's boundaries cover a large area of Yamagata.

The illustration shows two dolls in straw baskets.  Even now, they are popular souvenirs of this area.  The reason they are so popular is that in days gone by, babies and small children were placed in these straw baskets as a way of keeping them safe and warm.


I hope you have enjoyed this look at Japanese children in my postcards.  Please visit the other members of the Weekend Linky-Party too please.  Thanks for reading!


8 comments:

Maria said...

Wow Helen, thank you so much for taking the extra mile to find these cards and photos to share for the child/children theme this weekend. I really love how the emotions on these children's faces are recorded for posterity.

Btw, I'm curious -- what are the themes that appeal to you the most ? :)

Happy weekend,
Maria

Mail Adventures said...

Children is also far away from my favourite themes. But I'm really enjoying the different approaching that people is adding to Maria's link. The black and white pictures are very interesting, even without more information. And the dolls in the basket made me smile :)

Scriptor Senex said...

That first Domon Ken card is great - so happy.

Helen said...

Maria, I've enjoyed most of the themes so far. I am just not a person who loves children. I like them individually, but not generally!

Topics that I enjoy cards on are ones that I ask for in my Postcrossing profile...things like books, food, tea, movies, crafts....

Eva - I'm glad that you like them. It was fun putting together this grouping! Glad you liked the dolls in the basket too. The actual dolls are quite cute but can be very big.

John, I agree! I also like the middle card, with the little girl. I can't help but wonder what she is thinking about.

Joy said...

What a wonderful photographer each picture a story and a straw basket sound very cosy.

Helen said...

Thank you Joy! I'm glad you like the cards.

John's Island said...

Hi Helen, Loved your introductory paragraph! I could say the same myself. Enjoyed your cards for this topic ... you sure found some cute ones!

Helen said...

Thank you so much John's Island!

I'm glad you liked the cards!