One Bite Slope / Hitokuchi Saka一口坂 (Patreon)

There is an area in Tokyo Chiyoda-ku, near Yasukuni Street, called Hitokuchi Saka or One Bite Slope. It's a bit of a mystery for many. What does it mean?!?!Well, even though the kanji are literally 一口坂 One Mouth (or one bite) Slope, it's actually pronounced Imoarai-zaka. "Imo" (or "Hemo) referred to smallpox and arai meant to wash or heal. Evidently there used to be an Imoarai Inari Shrine that was very famous for being able to heal people afflicted with smallpox. Sadly, it's gone now.

So the episode that is going up as soon as Richard gets around to it (Tomorrow, promise!) is all about making listeners dig kanji characters. It's fun!But I'm going down the rabbit hole of two simple characters One and Mouth , hitokuchi, together meaning one bite and I'm losing my mind. There's the above: imoarai. Which sounds to me like "washing a potato". Then there's this!

An absolutely delicious looking manju cake that's been made for over 170 years down in Nagasaki. Note: that's not filled with anything, it's EMPTY! They originally came from China and were eaten by monks who were sailing back and forth between China and Japan. They kept well and were delicious. They're made from sweet syrup (mizu ame), wheat flour, brown sugar, honey and sesame seeds. Before baked, they are filled with brown sugar, sweet syrup, and sugar, but while cooking the inside boils into the sides of outside dough and disappears. Empty.

The name is drum roll : 一口香.

Yes, that's one mouth or one bite and the last character is for fragrance. That's a nice name, one bite of fragrance. But again the pronunciation is waaay out there: Ikkokkou. <-- that's how it's pronounced.

A note about one bite ( 一口 ), hitokuchi. If you ever see that written on something -- except the above examples -- it usually means "bite-sized".

Bite-sized green tea cakes.

Bite-sized gyoza!

I got some exciting news to share with you very soon. I need to get the contract signed and then I'll spill. It's something I've been wanting to do, but it was just such a huge endeavor to take on by myself. I wasn't sure where to start. But now it looks like it's going to happen!

*･゜ﾟ･*:.｡..｡.:*･'(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)'･*:.｡. .｡.:･゜ﾟ･

Stay super safe and well, all the love, much more to share soon, XOXOXO,

t

P.S. Totally forgot to add, I'm over on Bluesky. It feels like early Twitter. I put all my news/journalists/lawyers on one list, then made another list for Creatives which is basically everyone else. This way I can go, click on my Creatives list and not see news. I'm basically using it as a way to share little bits of joy or peace or whatever. Not thinking much about it, but enjoying interacting with people. If you're there, this is me (below). DO let me know you're there and a patron, I will definitely follow you back! I don't have time to look through the follows right now, so I might miss you. Message me in any way to let me know who you are because I also remember people by their online names a lot of times and see a different name and don't make the connection. I confuse easily...

https://bsky.app/profile/uncannyjapan.bsky.social