＜prologue＞
I started a blog called “The Baby Boomer Generation’s Miscellaneous Blog”（Dankai-sedai no garakutatyou:団塊世代の我楽多（がらくた）帳） in July 2018, about a year before I fully retired. More than six years have passed since then, and the number of articles has increased considerably.
So, in order to make them accessible to people who don’t understand Japanese, I decided to translate my past articles into English and publish them.
It may sound a bit exaggerated, but I would like to make this my life’s work.
It should be noted that haiku and waka （Japanese short fixed form poems） are quite difficult to translate into English, so some parts are written in Japanese.
If you are interested in haiku or waka and would like to know more, please read introductory or specialized books on haiku or waka written in English.
I also write many articles about the Japanese language. I would be happy if these inspire more people to want to learn Japanese.
my blog’s URL:https://skawa68.com/
my X’s URL:団塊世代の我楽多帳（@historia49）さん / X
<Added 10/11/2021> Kazuko Hosoki passed away on November 8th from respiratory failure. She was 83 years old.
I pray for her soul to rest in peace.
When it comes to Kazuko Hosoki (1938-2021), there is surely no one who doesn’t know her, as her books are piled high in bookstores along with terms such as “Rokusei astrology(「六星占術」)” and “Daisakkai(「大殺界」),” and she was also frequently featured on television at one time.
It must have been more than 15 years ago, but there was a “fortune-telling boom” similar to life consultation, and Kazuko Hosoki, who provided “Rokusei Fortune-telling,” was in high demand on TV variety shows.
The reason I remember this person’s name so well is because of the “marriage scandal” she had with the well-known Yangming scholar Masahiro Yasuoka (1898-1983).
I wrote about Masahiro Yasuoka in detail in a previous article, but we cannot talk about Kazuko Hosoki without mentioning him.
＜What kind of person is Masahiro Yasuoka, the originator of the “Heisei” era?＞
１．Who is Kazuko Hosoki?
Her father, Yukitomo Hosoki (1875-1945), was friends with Banboku Ono and others and was active as a “Minseito Extra-Parliamentary Group Hero(「民政党院外団の壮士」)”. At one point he hung a sign for the “Takashima Ekidan Branch(「高島占断支部」)”, but stopped after complaints from the headquarters.
However, when the Pacific War began, he withdrew from political activities and opened a “cafe” called “Romance Club”, but died of illness when she was 7 years old.
Her father ran a cafe, so she was familiar with the food and beverage industry from an early age.
In 1955, at the age of 17, she opened a coffee stand called “Pony” under the elevated tracks of Tokyo Station. While in high school, she passed the entrance exam for the Takarazuka Music School, but declined admission and dropped out of high school to focus on running the store.
She sold “Pony” six months after it opened, and used the money to open a club called “Jun” near the Shinbashi guardrail, but sold this one the following year. Then, in 1958, at the age of 20, she opened a club called Kazusa in Ginza.
In 1982, she published a book on fortune-telling called “Rokusei Fortune-telling,” which she claimed to have developed as a result of “many years of independent study of the ancient Chinese sciences of universalism, numerology, and I Ching.” In 1985, she published a book called “An Introduction to Rokusei Fortune-telling: Reading Your Destiny,” which became a best-seller, sparking a “Rokusei Fortune-telling boom” and making her a “popular fortune-teller.”
On TV variety shows such as “I’ll tell you straight away!”, “What is Happiness? Kazukazu’s Treasured Stories”, and “Hosoki Kazuko’s Emergency Big Prophecy Series”, she used her skillful speaking skills to act as a fortune teller, life counselor, and prophet.
She sometimes frightened people with her catchphrases like, “You’re going to die” or “You’re going to hell.” She has also been sued all over the country for damages for “gravestone sales scams” when she recommended to buy a gravestone as a way to honor her ancestors.
As for her “prophecies,” some have come true and some have not.
One example of one that came true was when she told music producer Yasushi Akimoto that “you will make a huge amount of money over the next 10 years,” but this was probably because she had connections with Yasushi Akimoto and knew of his talent.
On the other hand, as an example of a prediction that was not accurate, she predicted that the couple Kurokawa Kisho and Wakao Fumiko would “get divorced soon” when they first got married, but she was wrong.
She also predicted that comedian “Osaru” would “become popular and have his own TV show named after him within 1-2 years” if he changed his stage name to “Monkiki” following her advice, but he did not become more popular and did not get a TV show named after him. Regarding this, she said, “It is foolish to change your name just because someone tells you to.”
She was born before the war, so I can appreciate the fact that she expresses sound moral opinions and is a good cook, but there’s something fishy about her fortune-telling.
In her book, she writes that she was “greatly influenced by Masahiro Yasuoka , a master of Yangmingism,” and she still uses his name. In her book profile, she writes, “After meeting Masahiro Yasuoka, Rokusei Divination was elevated to the level of ‘human studies(『人間学』)’ beyond the realm of simple fortune-telling. He is constantly pursuing a way of life for humans that is in line with the rhythms of the natural world, and always provides appropriate guidance to people struggling in rough seas.”
These explanations seem like she is either using Masahiro Yasuoka‘s authority to “appear to have authority” or “taking advantage of the tiger’s authority”…
Regarding her “Rokusei Divination”, Atsushi Mizoguchi states in his book “Witch’s Resume” that “it is plagiarized from Shen Xiling’s Roku Dai Tenchusatsu.(「神煕玲の六大天沖殺からの盗作である」)”
Also, according to one fortune teller, “Rokusei astrology is a copy of a fortune telling method called ‘0 (zero) astrology.'” He said, “In 0 astrology, fortune telling is done by dividing people into 12 star types such as Saturn and Venus, but in Rokusei astrology, fortune telling is done with half the number of stars, 6 stars. This is just halving the number of stars in 0 astrology and adding pluses and minuses.”
２．Who is Kaori Hosoki
Kaori Hosoki (1978-) is the eldest daughter of Kazuko Hosoki’s younger sister. She lived with her mother until she was three years old.
Kazuko Hosoki adopted her three years ago because she wanted her to inherit her grave.
Currently, as the “de facto successor” to Kazuko Hosoki, she works as a manager and also provides “appraisals” as a fortune teller.
She will be making her first television appearance on Monday, February 4th, on Nippon Television’s “Shabekuri 007” (9pm-11pm).
I think whether or not Kaori Hosoki will be able to create a “boom” like Kazuko Hosoki in the future will depend on whether her stories (speaking skills) are persuasive when she appears on television and whether she has charisma.
I have a negative prediction. This is also a case of “whatever happens, happens”…