The feeling of a blank notebook, the smell of fresh clean paper, and dreaming about all the things you’ll write with your freshly sharpened new pencils and ink pens.  That is the glory of back to school supplies.  The rush is everything you could ever want or imagine…. That is until you’ve been to Japan.

Allow me to open your imagination to a world of school supplies on crack, welcome to Japan.

It starts with a pencil pouch.  Since birth (I’m assuming), these children have a pencil pouch filled with all the supplies needed to write, draft, draw, cut or glue a masterpiece.  Universally, they go out and buy new supplies each year as last year’s utensils have been honorifically used to propel them into their next grade or stage of life.  Even adults have pencil pouches.  EVERYONE in Japan has a pencil pouch.  Let’s see what’s inside, shall we:

Feast your eyes on these goodies!!!  Glue sticks with jewels on the top, erasers covered in bright graphics, pencils with colored lead, and NO eraser… Obviously you would pull out your separate (and equally decorated) eraser for those specific tasks. Pencils also come with pencil caps so that your led doesn’t cover the inside of your adorable pencil pouch.  Take a look at these delicious pencil toppers.

You will also ALWAYS find a ruler in their pencil pouches.  If you need to draw a line of any kind, it will be straight because a ruler will be used without exception.  Their pencil pouches will also be chalk full of something called tegami (tay-gah-me).  We calls these notes!  But their notes aren’t written on just any white sheet of ruled paper… Who does that? No one in Japan, that’s for certain. Here they are written on paper smeared with graphics of teddy bears, small white children with blond hair and hearts and bows.  Then they are meticulously and creatively folded in a way that only a student can.

Shockingly (but only to me) they also sport the cannabis leaf on many of their back to school accessories– they love to rock the Jamaican rasta style, so strange.

Since being in Japan, I have found these back to school supplies to be a black hole for my money.  It’s impossible to walk past these stores without finding something CUTE to stick in my purse. The experience to use these supplies is a thrill. It is the root of all cuteness in this country.

As many of you are preparing to go back to school, and sit through many a class, listening and learning, I ask you, how much more excited would you be to interact with your fellow students and faculty with a bag full of these?  Note the dangly bits that spin about as you effortlessly write your name at the top of your assignment.

When you go back to school shopping, please enjoy yourself, but remember when it comes to flare in Japan you can never have enough.

Hearts and stars,

Kawaii Kid

Looking to buy Japanese school supplies online, head over to www.Phoophie.com or www.From-Japan-with-Love.com