NEW HOME WANTED for HELP JAPAN birds!!

This post is now information only. All birds happily found their new homes to fly next week. Thank you so much for your quick responce. (updated at 22:15)

Unfortunately, (or fortunately for some?) I had to decline some pending payments from on line orders for HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds earlier today as it passed the noticed deadline. Without completing this I cannot proceed my donation project forward. This cancelation made 4 birds available again. I have decided to look for two new homes for two pairs of birds. 

£7.00 for a pair of birds with extra P&P charge. 

If you would like to order, please email me your name and full postal address to makikohastings@gmail.com as soon as possible so that I can send you paypal invoice. Once you received the invoice, please complete the payment soon for the same reason as above. 

First comes first for two kind people. Hope someone can help this project to complete! Thank you so much xm

HELP JAPAN Handmade Art Sale - result

The fair on Saturday was fantastic turn out. Beautiful sunshine brought us lots of visitors. Many came after seeing the newspaper article, too. I met lots of wonderful visitors from the local areas and beyond, including those who shared the deep thoughts to Japan by having lived there before and studying their languages. 

The last batch of birds had gone within 2 hours. My original fear at the beginning of this project of not being able to sell them all had unexpectedly gone out of the windows. Many gave us encouraging feedback to the project and art sale, which was very supportive to myself and people in Japan. We also sold 106 pieces of my work in total. I am grateful to have received many positive feedback to my work. And must not forget, a big thank you to my husband running a wonderful children’s workshop making origami Easter Bunny! All in all we had such a wonderful day. Here are some images from the stall. 

Including kind donations, we raised £1188 from the stall (including bird sale on the day). This will be added to the sales from HELP JAPAN 1000 BIRDS PROJECT and will be sending to Japanese Red Cross via the Japanese Embassy. When I have done all of the process, I will inform you once again here to share the outcome. 


Thank you so much everyone for your support. xm

Missed out the bird? You may get a last chance!

Some birds still left at newly opened gallery & deli, The Pantry, in North Yorkshire. I am not sure if they could do oversea postal service, but if you like to contact them, please email: thepantrylockton@aol.com 

This is a polite and urgent reminder for those who placed on line order and pending the payment. Please do check your Email and complete the payment, so that the project can move forward and the donation into the action. Due to the unexpected situation of rapid 1000 birds sales, I’m afraid I have set a deadline as 30th April 18:00 (in UK time). I could only think this is fare. Hope you would understand. 

1000 hopes

me and my birds on today’s local newspaper.

see you tomorrow at the fair! xm

HELP JAPAN Handmade Art Sale

What are you up to on this Easter break? Why not visiting Knaresborough, our beautiful historic town in North Yorkshire? This coming Saturday 23rd April, there will be Knaresborough Easter Fayre. Why not have a look around the stalls at the market place, children’s entertainment at 11th century Castle, take a walk by the river, pop around our local deli and cafe and much more. 

At Knaresborough Easter Fayre, I will be holding a stall (only Saturday) to raise money for Japan Earthquake Appeal. I will be selling my ceramic work, brooches, prints, postcards, stationaries and many more and all proceeds will go to the appeal. There will also be the last stock of birds from HELP JAPAN 1000 BIRDS PROJECT, which is currently running worldwide from this blog. Everything on the stall are handmade. This will be the one off chance for you to get my work at the very special price and YOU will be helping Japan! 

Have got kids? Why not come and join the ‘Making Your Easter Bunny’ origami workshop, which will be held by my husband (the origami master!)? It’s going to be fun! This activity is free, but voluntary donations are welcome to ‘Easter Bunny Donation Box’ at the stall. Every little does help and can make a difference.


The direction to Knaresborough and more information about the fayre, please click here. 

Looking forward to seeing you there! xm

MUST NOT FORGET

One month has passed since Japan’s Earthquake. It is ironically amazing how quickly the news has disappeared from TV. Life goes on around me. As if there were nothing happened. Being a Japanese living in a foreign country has put me in a strange position that I have never felt. 

The truth is that Japan’s recovery has only just begun. They have a long way to go. Still tons of worries and uncertainties. Their future path is unclear. My parents say they still have shakes every hour. I hear someone I know who works for Tokyo Electric Power, has not been back home since. I hear those who evacuated 20km from Fukushima Power Plant were told that they would not be able to return home for at least a year. I hear it takes decade to clean the radioactivity. I hear about contaminated vegetables and water. I hear Red Cross has not been able to divert the donation for the use as there are too many affected areas. I hear there are not enough land to build temporary housings for people who have lost their homes. I hear lots of things. None of them seem to be enlightening the hope. 

April is supposed to be the month of new start in Japan. Children enter schools. New class mates. New uniform. Graduates start new work. It is supposed to be exciting time of year. But this year, it turned out to be a different story. Many have lost work and schools to go to. Lost friends and families to celebrate together. Many of those school children who survived from the Tsunami in Minami Sanriku (the town that was completely wiped off) for school being on higher ground, have lost their parents and homes at lower ground in front of their eyes. I cannot even begin to imagine how their life from now are going to be...

Yet, they are a humble nation. Fighting for the recovery. Trying to reach out to a tiny hope they can possibly have. 

Must not forget. What they are going through. 

Must not forget. Our continuous prayers. 

Must not forget. This is why I am doing what I am doing now. 

Here is NY times link that you could see in English. I feel the importance of not forgetting those images. I hope you would share the prayers for Japan from now on too. 

My current project HELP JAPAN 1000 BIRDS PROJECT is to encourage people in Japan. I could have not done it myself but with YOUR support I have managed to foresee the hope. Thank you so much for your contribution. Crazy busy two weeks have passed since it started. My birds are still an on going process (sorry for being slow but almost the last batch!) so I only sent out 380 birds. For that, we have raised £1550. Up until yesterday, I have received 713 birds orders in total! This is absolutely amazing! 1000 birds were supposed to be a long term goal, but it may not be? Thank you so so so much for your support. We are certainly cheering the nation. I will send the donation together with the proceeds from the forth-coming fair. I will keep you posted the details. 

By the way, this is SHIN SHIN 100th Post! I would like to say a big thank you for everyone who visited me here. Your feedback and suggestion to my blog are more than welcome! xm

BCTF

What a week it has been! Before I knew it, spring has come, summer time has started and British Craft Trade Fair has been and gone! It’s been crazy busy but all in good cause. 

Before I share about BCTF, I just wanted to say a huge thank you for everyone, for your support on HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds Project. Thank you so much for spreading the word. It all started with the first batch of 100 birds on Sunday before and since it opened I had received enormous orders from all over the world! My first batch of 100 birds has immediately gone on the day one, so I was actually back-logged with orders. Thank you for being patient with me and the process being slow. I have been working sock off since, making more birds and catching up with mid-night administration. I am doing this in my spear time in between my work and degree study, so I could physically built certain amount at night, then it takes a week to complete. I don’t send you a payment request until I have actual stock here, so please do not panic if you haven’t received it yet. I am checking email orders and log in everyday. So far, I have received over 100 on line orders including from affected country Japan, and nearly 300 birds have already flown to new homes. Of course more to fly, just waiting in a kiln in my studio. I am on 600th birds at the moment. (They could be yours soon :) I will post more details of the donation on next post, so please do pop back. 

me glazing more birds, making more birds, talking to more birds than to my husband lately....

If you are local or wondering what you can do during the Easter holiday, why not visiting us in a beautiful historic town in North Yorkshire? My birds will be available directly from Knaresborough Easter Fayre on Saturday 23rd April.

More details will be posted soon so please stay tuned. 

Right, back to BCTF. I have missed out showing the preparation process, so here it was. Making display boxes was fun! I used all recycled and found items to put them together. Soldered my logo and a bit of DIY. Combined with my screen prints of Rakugaki on the back drop. Hope you like them. 

A series of Hanetsubo gold and Rakugaki went on the display. The show went very lively and I have met many nice people. (Very nice meeting you Adam, Catherine and Corinne!) I have also received some positive feedback from galleries luckily so must follow up with them. Hopefully a chance for some orders? Fingers crossed! 

Good news! Those Hanetsubo and Rakugaki will be showcasing on the opening exhibition at Rapture Galley from 15th April. The gallery will be holding some batch of my birds too! How exciting! More news to follow so see you here again soon. xm 

HELP JAPAN 1000 BIRDS PROJECT

(Information only. This post is updated on 12th May 2011, following the completion of the project.)

What is it?

This project was set up by Makiko Hastings, Japanese ceramicist who currently lives in North Yorkshire, U.K. , aiming to raise money to help Japan for their recovery from the devastating Earthquake and Tsunami on 11th March 2011. Makiko has family and friends in Japan, where many others are affected by the Earthquake. As you can imagine, Japan’s recovery will take a long time, it can be decades for people to get back their lives. They need help more than ever. Makiko believes every little helps and can make a difference, which lead her to the idea of selling1000 handmade ceramic birds. All sales of the birds went to Japan Earthquake appeal. 

Why 1000 birds?

The idea was influenced by the Japanese story of 1000 paper cranes. Please click here for the information.

What does the bird look like? 

(click to view larger images)

The original design of bird came from her work, bird and building box, which she has been making since 2009. Each bird is handmade and individually decorated by Makiko from her home studio. The birds on this project have no wings, instead ‘HELP JAPAN’ logo were embossed on its body, which emphasising the wish that with YOUR HELP they can hopefully fly for their life once again. Red chest is a symbol of Japan. Individual birds are numbered from 0001 to 1000. Makiko’s signature is embossed on the tail. Birds are small enough to hold in your palm, in a shape of a chopstick rest. You can also keep it as a lucky charm, which is a tradition in Japan. (e.g. to wish for your child’s growth and good health) 

A short documentary film of making birds can be seen here. 

Who and how helped on this project? 

The project was opened to the public via this blog SHIN SHIN, so anyone who could access to the blog could offer help. The method of order was used Email and pay pal payment system. 

Makiko received 176 online orders in total from all round the world, including the U.K., Northern Ireland, U.S.A., Canada, New Zealand, Australia, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Belgium, Norway, Denmark, Slovenia, Israel, South Africa, Singapore, Malaysia and affected county Japan. Birds were carefully and individually wrapped by Makiko along with her hand written message to the participants and posted by Royal Mail. 

For online orders, 730 birds in total have flown to the new homes. The rest of 270 birds were by direct purchase from Makiko’s studio and the local event on the 23rd April.

How much was it? 

The bird was sold £3.50 each with additional charge of P&P. Extra donation was voluntary.  

How long this project lasted? 

The project opened to the public on the 27th March. It was originally set up as an on-going project to help Japan long term, until the sales reach 1000 birds. Due to the huge response from all round the world, the project completed on 30th April when received all payment toward the bird order. 

Makiko thanks to all people who spread the word through their blogs and social network sites, which resulted this project so successful. 

How much did the project raise? 

Total donation on the project was £3975. Donation from HELP JAPAN HANDMADE ART SALE was added on to this, and we have raised £4933.20 in total.

Where did money go?

All donation was sent to Japanese Red Cross via the Japanese Embassy. This has been forwarded to the Donation Allocation Committees of the relevant local governments in the affected areas to be dispensed to the people affected by this disaster.

What else could we do now? 

Your thoughts and prayers for people in Japan would be great support for their on-going recovery. If you would like to continue any donation, you can visit Japanese red cross site, which currently accepts donation until September 2011. 

Thank you so much for your support on this project. 

© makikohastings all copyright reserved

HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds Project - prep.2

Thank you so so much everyone for replying to my previous post for HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds Project! Thank you for speading the word via your blog site and facebook pages. Your support is grately appreciated and so encouraging for people in Japan today. Many of my friends who live in Japan are already spreading YOUR positive energy to help people over there, so thank you!

Sorry for keeping you waited, but finally my paypal account is now confirmed. (I’ve never expected it to be so complicated...) The first batch of 100 birds will be out of the glaze firing tomorrow so that I could check out all postal costs and everything else accordingly. Hopefully the project will be open on my next post. Please keep your anticipation and do come back. 

In the meantime, I would like to show you some images of the first batch of 100 birds on day 2 & 3. I can only do so much at once and have been working in the studio after work till midnight so far. Bisque fired birdies are carefully hand-decorated one by one, wiped, waxed and glazed. Every pieces are unique, just like our characters. They don’t have wings to fly, that’s why they need YOUR HELP so that they could fly for their life again. During this process, I was thinking of all people who needs help in Japan and those who are supporting in this project. You are the one who helping me do this, too :) 

Before I go (am off to the studio again to continue another 50 to be finished before going to bed tonight), I will share one video that I found via Japanese site. There are no English translation, but you can see what they are helping each other TODAY in Japan. What you can do individually may be small but that little help will be big if many people do. 1000 birds project is the same idea. In UK where I live, Japan related news has already started to disappear from TV. That does not mean that they are fine. They are facing a very long term recovery. Please don’t forget they are STILL suffering and fighting for thier life. Please do come back. Every Little Helps. xm

HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds Project - prep.1

HELP JAPAN 1000 Birds Project 

Day 1

The first batch of 100 birds is now ‘baking’.

I am waiting for my paypal account to be confirmed. 

Hopefully these can be yours via on line soon.

Please spread the word. Every Little Helps.

YOU CAN HELP JAPAN

xm

Every Little Helps

A week has passed since the devastation in Japan. Here in the UK where I live today, although people care and give me thoughts and prayers, life just goes on.  At college, we are counting down for the biggest show in April. I’m supposed to be super busy, but my mind hasn’t been functioning. Looking at a pile of to do list, I am trying to keep as occupied as possible, which temporarily helps me getting by each day. It has become my routine to check the news as soon as I get back home instead of going to the studio. This lasts almost all evening. I’d better avoid watching the news so long, you may suggest, but I need to know about them, I feel the need, so I continue to look for Japanese news on line, as BBC doesn’t show everything. Each day, things are getting worse. Hundreds of thousands people are now homeless. Not enough food is getting to them. Blackout and severe weather hits many. People are starving and suffering from hypothermia, within the evacuated places and even in the hospitals. 

The situation at Fukushima has worsened and gets closer to my parents home. My worries translate into the numbers of phone calls I make to my family. A retired couple not picking up the phone at home. That’s odd. My worries accelerate. Eventually I found out that my mother ended up calling for an emergency paramedic at her friend’s house, as she found her on a floor. My mum was concerned as she didn't answer the phone, so went to her house to see if she was ok. She lives on her own and had mentioned before that she had family in Fukushima. She is now in the hospital. More concerns and fatigues spread out to my mum. I tell her sarcastically that she is strong enough as she could walk for 7 hours, trying to give her a little rest. She laughs for a second, then tells me that they are fine, nothing to worry. We pray for her recovery and the rest of Japan. 

Many foreigners are now leaving Japan and people in Tokyo are moving out of the city. Instead, I would rather jump in the airplane now and go to help those who need urgent help. I know this cannot be done, as I just get in a way. Knowing too many people are suffering in Japan, my home country, I feel helpless for not being able to do much, other than praying hard. 

On my arrival to work yesterday, I found many white origami lilies on the workshop table. Caring messages from my students and staff for me and Japan. Opening each pieces and finds their bold writings and drawings. I started to cry. I must carry those prayers with me. For Japan. For people who are suffering. I started to think what I could possibly do more. I must use my brain rather than just watching news and feeling sad. 

Many artists, musicians and professionals are using their work and skills to collect the donation. Having seen them, I feel little discouraged as I am not certain that I could do enough like them. I don’t even know how to start selling things on line either. There’s too little time to start learning such computer tech what not. Yet opening my studio is limited for people’s attention. After squeezing my little brain, I decided to go for the local. It may be small but better than nothing. I applied for the local Easter fair stall next month to sell my stocks of ceramic and print work for Japanese Earthquake appeal, which all proceeds to go to Japanese Charity. 

In order to collect as many casual attentions from the visitors as possible, I have also decided to make 1000 mini birds to sell alongside. I can do them quick enough by Easter and also small enough to be able to post, if anyone interested in contributing on line. Why 1000? The idea came from a Japanese story of 1000 cranes. It may not be going to work, but worth trying. The full recovery of Japan will take a long time, it can take years or even decades. Until those hundreds of thousands people can live under the proper roof, with food and sleep without fear, Japan will continue to need help. 1000 birds may sound silly for someone like me, a small individual, but I believe even little help would make a difference. So I will be continuing to keep this 1000 birds for HELP JAPAN open to anyone who can help via my fair, outlet and hopefully soon in my blog. From tomorrow, I will be starting this as well as preparing for the fair. College work will catch up. I know what my aim is now. I can do this. 

It would be grateful if you could share your thoughts on this. For those who are happy to donate, I will post more information as soon as possible. In the meantime, you can go to;

British Red Cross

Handmade for Japan - This US site will be doing an on line auction shortly. 

Whatever the way you choose to do it and how small it can be, your help is valued for many many people in Japan now and the future.  

PLEASE HELP JAPAN xm

HOPE

After a restless long day of trying to contact my family and friends in Japan, my saddened feeling has never stopped. What nature brought to Japan on Friday has begun to appear far worse. 

Firstly, thank you for those who were concerned about my family and friends via emails, phone and facebook etc. They are all safe, including my close friends who live in Hachijyo island and in Sendai where tsunami hit directly. My parents were trapped in underground at that time but luckily managed to get out and ‘walked’ home for 7 hours from Tokyo in the black out. 

I hear that the energy of this earthquake was 8000 times of recent Christchurch, 22000 times of atomic bomb in Hiroshima. Tsunami was as if dropping a boulder the size of Isle of Wight into the ocean. These are not just numbers and metaphor that scares me but also a horrible reminder of what beautiful nature could do to powerless human. The earthquake has not stopped yet. My family still feels the shakes every minutes today, people in North in particular, in much high level of magnitude. Fear and tsunami warning will continue. 

My heart aches so much for people who lost their life, of loved ones and homes, after seeing devastating scenes. Soon after the earthquake yesterday, I received so many desperate voices via RT twitter from people who were still stuck in cars and buildings, and were unable to escape from tsunami. I could only hope they are now rescued safely. Due to the massive damage of Fukushima nuclear plant, which is supplying major amount of electricity to many areas of Japan, many cities are still shut down. In many areas, including Tokyo, there will be ‘scheduled black out’ again to save energy from this Monday till they don’t know when. In the most effected areas, survivors who lost homes and loved ones have to face the after effect in still dark and snowy-cold weather. In Fukushima, people continued to evacuate from one place to another, each time the radiation warning spread, without getting much information. Hearing what they experienced was terrifying, even though I have ‘grown up’ with earthquakes in my whole life, it was beyond belief. Devastating. 

All my feelings and thoughts are for the people in Japan. 

HOPE is all I can do.

rakugaki

new version of rakugaki (doodle) series. 

this is ladder to the sky. xm