The Hankie With The Japanese Woman On It, Finds Its Home

The silk hankie with the Japanese woman on it was in the corner of one of the pictures I took when I was working on my Refugee Hankie Quilt.

Jackie spotted it and sent me an email saying that when she was ten years old her father was stationed in Kisarazu Japan.  It was a farming community and they lived there for four years.   Jackie made friends with her neighbors and that’s how she learned the language.

That was in the 1950s, soon after the end of the war.  “I have a real affinity for Japanese things, Jackie wrote, “and my eyes lit up when I saw  the Japanese woman on the hankie…”

Then she asked if I would sell it to her.

I had already stitched some other hankies to the silk one from Japan.  I had an idea to use it in the quilt, but it wasn’t working as I thought it might.

I was moved by Jackies story.  How as children, even so close to the end of the war, they are able to become friends.

Also, I  loved the idea of another hankie finding its home.

I told Jackie I would remove the hankies I had sewn to the one from Japan and send it to her.  I won’t sell it, I said.  Some gave it to me, and now I’ll give it to you.

When the hankie arrived Jackie sent me an email thanking me.  With is was the photo of her and the Kabuki dancer.

The photo was taken at her best friends home “attached to her father’s Shinto temple.”   She wrote that there was a performance going on that night.  The man was dressed like a woman, because at the time, women weren’t allowed to be in Kabuki.

And it turns out that Jackie knew exactly where the hankie had come from. She wrote….

“In the bottom corner it says ‘Ginza, Tokyo’ When I was there in the 50’s(yes a long time ago) the ginza was outside and comprised of many many vendors selling things in makeshift stalls which were probably fairly portable…It is now housed in enormous buildings in downtown Tokyo.”

I don’t remember who sent me the hankie, but I’ve had it a long time.  I hadn’t used it in a scarf because it was silk and the hankies I make scarves from are cotton or cotton mixes.   It was special, I’d never received another like it, so I was saving it for just the right piece.

I feel like once again the circle is complete, with the hankie finding it’s home with Jackie. It has lots of meaning for her and as she said, it “brings back so many memories”, some that she shared with us.

The  hankie from Japan when I had the other hankies sewn to it.  I was careful taking out the stitches.