198. What is Red squirrel hair?

Hi Everyone,

I am impressed that brush lovers outside Japan have a huge amount of knowledge.

Today, I learned one thing about brushes.

I talked to Takeda brush.

Takeda naming is quite difficult for me, and I asked several questions.

‘E’ means European way of cleaning hair.

EPSQU is European way cleaning of Pine squirrel.

The European way takes water out of hair but oil remains. With oil, it feels  more moist than the case in which both oil and water are taken out.

Well, that is what Takeda calls ‘European way.’

I asked one more question which was not clear to me.

What is red squirrel? It is not a kind of squirrel.

Red squirrel hair is red hair chosen and taken from grey squirrels.

Red part is more fine and soft, thus more expensive than grey squirrels.

It is one of rare hairs.

Since it is not a kind of animal, the quality might be different from a company to company.

The same applies to Saibikoho and Saikoho, which are chosen from goat hair.

Takeda has good reputations, as far as feedback from my clients goes.

Takeda says:

Red squirrel hair is limited. 

this is No.19SQU[R] ; R means red squirrel.

Hakuhodo doesn’t call ‘red’ squirrel.

I cannot recall if Chikuhodo sold ‘red squirrel.’

Each company has own way of selecting hair.

Maybe you know more.

Today I learned one more thing – new English vocabulary.

‘Bucket list’

One youtuber (Japanese ) talked about it though it is not a common phrase here.

Bucket list is, as you may know,

a list of goals people want to accomplish before they “kick the bucket= die”

I did not know ‘kick the bucket’ phrase….

Then, I googled it and came across the movie, ‘The Bucket List.’

I will write more about it tomorrow.

Thank you for reading.

Toshiya