Title:

金の字やじろべー (kin no ji yajirobee)
“kin” character balancing toy

=====================

This top is a a yajirobee, a kind of balancing toy. Hiroi-sensei uses the natural shape of yajirobee toys to cleverly form the shape of the character 金 (kin), meaning “gold” or “money.”

***

***

Mrs. Hiroi: Mm. This is a kin character balancing toy.

Hiroi Michiaki: This is called a kin character balancing toy. If you look at this, it [appears in the shape of] kin, the kin character in kanji. [Meaning] gold.

Janell Landis: Gold.

Hiroi: Yeah. It looks like the kin kanji. There’s a reason for it. Because [the balancing toy already] looks like the character kin.

Mrs. Hiroi: That…

Hiroi: [You write it like] this, this, this, this, this, this, this [demonstrating strokes of the character]. The kin character balancing toy.