When I travel, I want to bring memories back home with me.
I know that this goes against the “traveller” ethos, but screw it. If I’m going to Japan, I’m going to bring me back some knives. And here they are.
We sent two boxes of “stuff” (excess clothing, souvenirs, trinkets) home from Japan, one from Kyoto and another from Tokyo. (Finding the Post Office near Shibuya Station was quite the chore.) Abotu 12 kilos altogether.
We’ve been doing this – sending stuff home from abroad – for all of our trips. Out of maybe ten boxes, only one has not arrived safely. That one package from Turkey, with a beautiful lamp and required carpet and many other things we’ve since long forgotten about, somehow didn’t materialize.
And so it was with no little trepidation that we sent, and anxiously awaited the arrival of, five packages in total from our recent Le Grand Voyage II; two from Indonesia, two from Japan, and one from Hong Kong.
Of all of of these, it was the Japanese boxes I was especially anxious about, because it contained these beauties. From top to bottom:
- • Kikuichi (Nara) 140 cm petty – this is Elliotte’s knife, a first of her very own for a budding chef.
- • Kikuichi 240 mm Gyutu – hammered 20 layer Damascus style
- • Kikuichi 140 mm Santoku, Aogami (blue steel) No. 2
- • Kamata 235 mm, single bevel Yanagiba – think… SUSHI!
These join my current stable of four other Japanese, and four German knives. I pretty much have a full barn now.
And they are some of my most cherished souvenirs from our recent trip.