When you just look back

A while ago, I read about a knife, which does not need to be sharpened for a long time. A Japanese company called IHI, which is famous for producing aerospace related products (such as rocket), developed a technology that could be applied to daily life, such as in the kitchen.

Of course, I became interested. Maintenance-free knife? But as I read the article further, I realized the user would still have to sharpen the knife once in a while, it’s only the TBTF (or Time Between the Maintenance?) would be much longer than normal knives.

There are also other (semi-) professional knifes available in the market. But what I was interested more was the knife sharpener. I do have a knife, which I brought from Japan. I am happy with its size and shape, but it beca,e less and less sharpened, as I kept using without any sort of maintenance. Rather than purchasing a new knife, I thought I should go for a knife sharpener (at least it seemed to be more necessary than yet another knife).

A couple of weeks later, a stone-shaped sharpener has arrived. It’s more traditional one, compared to the easy-to-use knife sharpener. Since I’d be using it only once in a while (once a month, maximum), I told myself having something simple (though it may take more effort to use) would be worth-off. This stone-shape sharpener was something I saw in my parents’ house, so I might have had a sympathy as well.

Reading the instructions came with the stone, it took me about 15 minutes in total to sharpen my knife. The surprise came to me when I cut a tomato. It was much easier to cut! Living in Vienna, people sometimes tell me that they’re interested in Japanese cultures, such as “Samurai” or “Ninja” (yes, it’s arguable what “culture” actually is..). When I cut those tomatoes, the first word came to my mind was “Samurai Sword” (although I’m aware how funny it sounds in Japanese).

The stone is in my kitchen, waiting for next sharpening occasion.