Today’s Honbazuke

Today, I honbaduke-finished a 300mm Suisin Hayate yanagiba. It turned out beautifully, with an ideal thinness for use—yet, somehow, I wasn’t fully satisfied. So, I decided to start another new Hayate honbaduke. But for some reason, the first knife still bugged me.

After scrutinizing it carefully, I finally realized what was wrong: I needed to tackle a specific area—so of course, I gave it a try. The result? I lost this little ‘battle’ (＞＜). The main issues were tackling the wrong sequence and working on a spot I shouldn’t have touched. Luckily, there’s still room for corrections, so I’ll try again when I get the chance.

On a side note, I’ve been using my natural whetstone (Suita) quite a bit lately. Seeing it slowly wear down makes me want a backup, but high-quality Suita stones are hard to come by. Maybe I’ll get lucky with a natural whetstone miner! I’d love a pure white, softer stone—though, that’s a bit of a dream.

• 2014-02-24