In Japan instead of signatures for important documents, they use personal seals. Called hanko (HAHN-KOW) or inkan (EEN-KAHN), these are stamps with your name, but don’t compare them to rubber stamps or you are likely to offend
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Dave– When I saw the first picture I thought perhaps you had taken up cigar smoking
I is very cool to have a seal but does that mean if it were to be stolen than someone else could enter contacts legally in your name and you would have a hard time proving otherwise? Could you give it to someone else to “sign” something for you, wiht the giving being the same as implied permission? Do teens steal their dad’s hanko in order to get things they would not be able to otherwise? Or is all this just too “western” of my thought process?
Also, I saw a thing on gizmodo (I think) about how it is the rage in Japan right now to own a Subway handle so that you are not accused of unwanted touching. Have you bought yours yet?
http://gizmodo.com/344791/portable-subway-strap-prevents-false-groping-accusations
BTW, on Saturday we are going to have a high of 10 F (-12 C) … I bet you wish you were back home now!
Dave– When I saw the first picture I thought perhaps you had taken up cigar smoking
I is very cool to have a seal but does that mean if it were to be stolen than someone else could enter contacts legally in your name and you would have a hard time proving otherwise? Could you give it to someone else to “sign” something for you, wiht the giving being the same as implied permission? Do teens steal their dad’s hanko in order to get things they would not be able to otherwise? Or is all this just too “western” of my thought process?
Also, I saw a thing on gizmodo (I think) about how it is the rage in Japan right now to own a Subway handle so that you are not accused of unwanted touching. Have you bought yours yet?
http://gizmodo.com/344791/portable-subway-strap-prevents-false-groping-accusations
BTW, on Saturday we are going to have a high of 10 F (-12 C) … I bet you wish you were back home now!
Good questions… I don’t know the answers. If someone uses your hanko, I imagine it would be the same as someone forging your signature in the States, but I haven’t read anything about that happening. People generally don’t think like that. This is the place where you can leave a wallet filled with lots of money on the train and it will be returned to your house the next day with all the money still in there. (I haven’t had that experience, but I have talked to people who have. The closest I’ve gotten was leaving my cell on the train once, only to have it hand delivered to my classroom while I was teaching about 30 mins later
Good questions… I don’t know the answers. If someone uses your hanko, I imagine it would be the same as someone forging your signature in the States, but I haven’t read anything about that happening. People generally don’t think like that. This is the place where you can leave a wallet filled with lots of money on the train and it will be returned to your house the next day with all the money still in there. (I haven’t had that experience, but I have talked to people who have. The closest I’ve gotten was leaving my cell on the train once, only to have it hand delivered to my classroom while I was teaching about 30 mins later
What sort of ink do you use, and do you carry the ink with you?
What sort of ink do you use, and do you carry the ink with you?
Yeah, I carry it around in a case only slightly larger than it is, so about 8x1.5x1.5cms. The case is about a cm longer than the hanko because it includes a small ink pad at the end. As with my hanko itself, my case was a rather cheap deal. Of course the more you pay, the better you get. A recent fad is to buy cases that rests the ink pad near the tip of the hanko, then you press a button and it automatically applies ink and swings the end off so you can stamp it quickly, without actually taking the hanko out.
As to the ink… whew, that’s a tough one. There are a few different shades of red, tho as far as I can tell the shade you pick is more personal preference than anything. Black was used at one time, but now red is the only common one, perhaps because it resists fading.
I looked around the net for awhile but couldn’t find what the ink was made of. My guess would be some type of soy ink. Here’s an interesting link for more that I just found:
http://www.dallasbudokai.com/artseds/Art_hankoEssay.htm
Yeah, I carry it around in a case only slightly larger than it is, so about 8x1.5x1.5cms. The case is about a cm longer than the hanko because it includes a small ink pad at the end. As with my hanko itself, my case was a rather cheap deal. Of course the more you pay, the better you get. A recent fad is to buy cases that rests the ink pad near the tip of the hanko, then you press a button and it automatically applies ink and swings the end off so you can stamp it quickly, without actually taking the hanko out.
As to the ink… whew, that’s a tough one. There are a few different shades of red, tho as far as I can tell the shade you pick is more personal preference than anything. Black was used at one time, but now red is the only common one, perhaps because it resists fading.
I looked around the net for awhile but couldn’t find what the ink was made of. My guess would be some type of soy ink. Here’s an interesting link for more that I just found:
http://www.dallasbudokai.com/artseds/Art_hankoEssay.htm