Ben's Amazing Back Piece

With the Tattooed Poets Series under way last month, I was a bit remiss in posting about the "regular" tattoo encounters.

With apologies to the following volunteer, I am presenting some amazing work on a gentleman named Ben, who I spotted back on April 2 while walking through Penn Station.

Ben was wearing a short-sleeve shirt and had tattoos covering his arms. When I approached him and explained Tattoosday, he enthusiastically agreed to participate. In fact, he removed his shirt to reveal an incredible back piece:



The one problem with featuring huge tattoos like this is not getting all the details in. What follows are some of the finer points of the tattoo.

At the bottom of the back is an hourglass design, within which is, Ben said, kanji representing the word "redemption":


The piece represents that he has "only so much time to redeem himself".

The main set of Chinese text in the center of the back was loosely translated by Ben as "I have trust in no man except for the trust I save for myself":


Also of note on the back are the two kanji representing "father" (the right side) and "forgive me" (the left side). These characters are in disks on either side at the top of the back.

The back was done by an artist no longer practicing at Skin Deep Tattoo on Long Island.

Imagine busy Penn Station, a guy standing there talking to a bespectacled blogger, camera in hand, beholding a subject covered in ink. Where to even begin?

It's like taking someone to the world's largest buffet and telling them they can only fill one small plate with food.

The back as a whole was impressive, but Ben was willing to share more, and we settled on this view, with a dragon and a geisha:


Ben credits this part of his body's tapestry to an artist named Loco working out of Dharma Tattoo in Miami Springs, Florida.

Thanks to Ben for sharing his amazing tattoos with us here on Tattoosday!

Tattoo Posts That Go Bad: Peeping Kanji

Last October, I posted a a tattoo belonging to a guy named John here. His friend Donna also had tattoos and tried to show them to me on her lower back/waistline, but she understandably couldn't successfully reveal them fully without lowering her pants to an uncomfortable level. She said she would send me better pictures. She never did. But I kept the post in my drafts folder under the title "Peeping Kanji". Unfortunately, the Kilroy-was-here-esque tattoos could not be deciphered by Kwok, my subject matter expert on the Chinese language.

So is there any value to these pictures? Maybe, maybe not. But I want to wish them adieu and maybe their inclusion here will prompt Donna to finally getting around to send me the photos.




I'd love to know what these kanji mean. Guesses anyone?

Jackie Wears Words of Wisdom

Last week I had just left the house when a woman passed me on the street. She had the words "live & learn" tattooed on her left right foot. I caught up to her and introduced myself. Jackie had just moved into the building on the corner two days earlier, and I wished her a Tattoosday welcome to the neighborhood.

She explained her tattoo by acknowledging that, like most people, she makes mistakes in life and that the motto "live and learn" are words to help guide her through life. Being on her foot is significant, as she believes that the lessons she has learned have helped her understand the importance of taking life "one step at a time".

Jackie, in fact, has five tattoos, including one on her waistline and on her inner right arm, but she has this pair on the back of her neck:


The kanji is the word for beauty and, unlike many unfortunate folks who don't research their tattoos properly, it is correct.

The popular proverb "All is fair in Love and War" dates back to John Lyly's 'Euphues' (1578). The original quote was "The rules of fair play do not apply in love and war. " John Lyly was a Renaissance English poet and playwright.

Jackie likes this quote because, as she said, "I'm a very passionate about things and if I believe in it, I will fight until the end".

All of Jackie's tattoos were inked at Bodytech Tattoo & Piercing in Gainesville, Florida. Jackie went to college at the University of Florida.

Thanks to Jackie for sharing her tattoos here with us on Tattoosday!

Crys Shares His Colorful Arm

When I passed Crys on Seventh Avenue last Friday, I knew I had to stop and ask about his arm.

Aside from the matching ohms-within-nautical stars on both elbows, Crys has two main pieces on his left arm.

Chronologically, the dragon came first:

He got it basically because he liked the design. It was inked by Nick at True Blue Tattoo in Austin, Texas.

The kanji surrounding the dragon were added later at Atomic Tattoo & Body Piercing, also in Austin. These were gifts from Crys' girlfriend. According to Chrys, going clockwise from the top, the kanji represnt love, honor, peace and life.

After that, he went back later to Atomic Tattoo and added the fire around the dragon to give his arm more color.

Finally, he added the Buddha at a shop in Houston:

Actually, a friend of his, Corey, from Austin, designed and drew up the initial sketch. Crys doesn't remember where it was inked.

Thanks to Crys for sharing his arm with us here on Tattoosday!

Erica's Ink: A Tale of Two Tattoos

Last Saturday I was riding my bike on a gorgeous day (see this post here) when I passed Erica who was sitting on a bench along the Shore Promenade.

I spotted a tattoo on her back as I rode by, so I circled around for a closer look:


It seemed interesting so I asked her about it. She said there really wasn't anything interesting about it but I told her to try me. Sometimes when you've lived with a tattoo for a while, the circumstances surrounding the piece seem ordinary. But to a fresh set of ears (and a blogosphere full of eyes), the story can be fascinating.

About 12 years ago, and a year or two out of high school, Erica was dating a gang member. (See? Interesting already!) She was born in 1976, the Year of the Dragon in the Chinese Zodiac. Her boyfriend's gang nickname was "Big Dog," and not wanting to have that written in English in the tattoo, she had the Chinese translation inked in the piece.

When people asked, she would just tell them in stood for "Year of the Dragon". She notes, however, that she has received a negative reaction from the Chinese women who work at the nail salon. So, she acknowledges, the inscription probably isn't very nice.

I showed the picture to my local Chinese language expert, Kwok, who has helped me translate kanji before, and he shook his head and said that, technically, the characters are correct, but a person well-versed in Chinese would not have selected those characters to represent the name of
“Big Dog”. He acknowledged that the reaction that Erica has experienced is probably due to the elementary nature of the words. As written, it is a literal interpretation of the meanings, and not necessarily in a flattering way.

To make this piece even more interesting, the tattoo was done at a defunct Bay Ridge shop called Ink Masters (their work has appeared previously here). She noted that the guy that tattooed her was named Eric and that she knew he had been "featured" in a film called "Erica" (same spelling as her name, incidentally), which was, in fact, an adult film. Erica wanted me to reiterate, the tattoo artist had been the adult film star, not her.

Finally, to make this tattoo's tale complete, two years after she had broken up with "Big Dog," she regretted the youthful folly that had caused her to get the tattoo. Rather than laser it off, or cover it up, she chose instead to improve it by adding flames to it to represent her anger over getting it in the first place.


Erica then offered up a bonus: a tattoo that, to her, meant much more:


Often, asking someone about a visible tattoo is rewarded by the unveiling of a much more significant piece (see here and here for two of the best examples on Tattoosday).

The new piece above, a pattern of fifteen dots, was inked by Erick Diaz at Asylum Studios in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn.

Erica entered the shop not with the intention to get tattooed, but to accompany her cousin Samantha when she went in for a tattoo.

Samantha has an interesting story. Many years ago, she had been a passenger in a vehicle that was involved in a drunk driving accident. She was ejected from the vehicle and hospitalized in critical condition. In a coma, Samantha faced life-threatening circumstances when her brain underwent significant swelling, so much that part of her skull needed to be removed to accommodate the condition. Ultimately though, Samantha recovered and was none the worse for wear. She currently is residing in South Africa and working as a photographer.

So Samantha was visiting her cousin Erica who took her to get a tattoo. When Samantha was getting the phrase “the sky is my only witness” inked, Erica was watching, knowing that she needed to get a new tattoo that honored her cousin’s miraculous recovery.

Which brings us back to the fifteen dots. Erica explained the code to me. She used dice as a metaphor and four rolls run together. A four and a three, along with a two and a six. The pattern is symmetrical and if you add the four and three, you get a value for 7. The two and six represent
the number 26. Erica wanted a representation of a magical date, July 26, the day when Samantha opened her eyes and emerged from her coma.

The piece is inked on the lower right side of Erica’s stomach, along the waistline. It serves to remind her about the value of life and mark the date that is so important in the lives of her family.

I want to thank Erica for her taking the time to talk with me, and for sharing her interesting stories about her ink here on Tattoosday.

Tattoos I Know: Rob's Traditional Japanese Dragons

"The only things I'm going to regret are the things I don't do" --Rob

Rob doesn't show off his ink like a lot of people do. Granted, sharing one's tattoos with the public is part of the appeal for many people. But other folks get tattooed for more personal, private reasons. Many people feel that having a tattoo is in itself, fulfilling. They don't seek recognition to validate their body art. Others do.

That's one of the fun things about Tattoosday- when someone shares the personal in this public venue, it is often a fulfillment that has come to fruition. Other times, it's just fun.

I recently learned that the husband of one of my wife's old school mates, someone with whom I've talked football and who I see from time to time, is inked.

So the e-mails flew and the dinner date was set. My wife and I met up with the couple earlier in the month and went out for Vietnamese food. But before we left their place, Rob let me see his ink:










Unfortunately, my camera didn't like the light in the apartment, and I ended up with a lot of blurred or washed out photos. The above two were the best of the bunch. That's part of the reason it took me so long to post.

My camera really didn't do justice to the color and craftsmanship of the work. But, as luck would have it, the artist, Horisei, of Chelsea Tattoo Company, had clearer and much better pictures on the shop site.


When these were inked, Horisei was part of the staff at Rising Dragon Tattoos. Rising Dragon work has appeared previously here and here. However, Rising Dragon moved to new digs just recently and Horisei stayed in the old location at the new shop, renamed Chelsea Tattoo Company.

What Rob has are traditional Japanese panels that cover the upper arms, shoulders, and the connecting canvas of the chest corners.


Rob's work was done over approximately forty (40!) cumulative hours between March and June of 2007. The only thing that remains to be done is the coloring of the eyes.

If you look at the right piece, you'll see a kanji character representing the word "wolf".

That part was tattooed 15 years ago, in celebration of Rob's 30th birthday when he was living in San Francisco. And yes, it's an accurate representation of the proper kanji for "wolf".

Horisei, a master artist from Yokohama, Japan, was able to incorporate the "wolf" into the design, as it manifests itself in a new context, on a pearl clutched in the grip of a dragon.

These two dragons don't "mean" anything, in the traditional sense. A common misconception that people have is that tattoos must mean something. Rather, in Rob's case, they represent an inner appreciation for not just the art of the tattoo, but for traditional Japanese body art.

Tattoos don't have to be visible to have purpose. These two dragons reside on Rob's chest and feed his inner strength.

Rob even lent me his copy of A History of Japanese Body Suit Tattooing for further reference on the subject matter:


It is an honor to have them posted here for the world to see. Thanks to Rob for sharing, and thanks to Horisei and Chelsea Tattoo for the use of their better pictures that allow us here at Tattoosday to fully appreciate the craftsmanship that went into these pieces.

John's Other Three Tattoos

Last week, I posted the "after" version of a tattoo I spotted early last Fall. The host, John, e-mailed me the updated photos after I spotted him in at the grocery store.

He also sent me shots of his three other pieces, posted above and below.

Via e-mail, John gave me the run-down on the tattoos, all inked at Body Art Studios in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

"The tattoo with the knife through the heart is a memorial tattoo for my grandmother who passed away in 2000. I drew it and Peter [Cavorsi] tattooed it. It took me a few years to get it because I wanted to get the tattoo done on her birthday... October 13, but I wanted to wait for a Friday the 13th 'cause that was her lucky day."

"As for 'Cheech,' it is another memorial tattoo for my Uncle Patty, my grandmother's brother. That is why it is in red, so it looks like the blood dripping from the knife [that] wrote out his name. He got the name 'Cheech' in World War II. It was his nickname, which is weird, because we are Italian and 'Cheech' in Italian is a nickname for Frank. Both of the tattoos are on my left forearm...".

The black and gray piece is a Chinese character [kanji] with ... fire. The symbol means 'art as a skill' and the fire around it represents my passion for the art, as I am practicing to be a tattoo artist myself. It was...my first tattoo, inked by Peter in 2002/2003".

"...Last is the one on my left calf, which in Chinese means "fear no evil". I got that in 2002-2003, as well. It was tattooed in Body Art, but was done by someone who worked for Peter at the time. I think his name was Sig or Zig...".

On a side note, the guy who worked for Peter did my first tattoo, and he went by the name of "Sickie". I think we're talking about the same guy.

Thanks again to John for coming through and sending me the photos and the back stories on his tattoos!

Editor's note: John's comments are 99% verbatim. I took a little editorial liberty with some punctuation and spelling, along with an occasional edit, for the sake of clarity.

Tattoos I Know: Erika's Ink (Part 2)

This is part 2 of Erika's ink (part 1 here). Erika has a lot of tattoos, so I had to split the post, since she generously offered them all up for Tattoosday.

Tattoo #7 is actually #7 and #13, as one element was added eight years later. We'll focus on #7 now, which is the flower on the inside of Erika's left wrist.


Erika, in her own words, went through what she calls "an experimental phase" in her life, during which she began dating women. To show her "true colors" at the time, Erika and her cousin, who was also dating women, got the same tattoo...a rainbow-petaled flower above a doubled female sign, to proudly display her alternate lifestyle.

The flower was inked at a shop called Murda Ink Tattoos, in Jamaica, New York.

Flashing forward to the Summer of 2006, Erika was having a cover-up done (see #8 and #12 below) and asked, as an afterthought, if the artist could cover the interlocking female insignia, as well. Erika's fiancee (now husband) didn't like the "advertisement" of the prior lifestyle. The leaves were added under the flower at Triple X Tattoo, now known as Red Rocket Tattoo on 46 West 36th Street in Manhattan.

Tattoo #8 was a boyfriend's name, inked along the front of her waistline, by Joe at Between the Lines. This name was covered up (see below) in 2007.

Tattoo #9 is a Chinese dragon on the middle of Erika's back. Her dress at the company holiday party afforded me a great opportunity to photograph it without her having to remove any clothing.


Joe at Between the Lines did this piece as well. Erika recalls just hanging out at Joe's shop and talking about how she wanted a big piece for her back. Joe was happy to oblige, and drew up the dragon free-hand.

She said that it took about ten weeks and three sittings to complete. The reason for the multiple sittings? The pain. To quote Erika, "I'll never forget how much that shit hurt."

The other elements of the tattoo are the kanji. When I asked Erika what they meant, she said, "Well, one of them is supposed to mean "to love life":

and the other is supposed to acknowledge that former lifestyle and say "to love women":

Erika, when she told me this, seemed to have her doubts, and was receptive to the idea of me looking into their actual meanings.

I went to my resident Chinese language expert, who quickly debunked their meanings. They do not mean what she thinks they do, he said. Because they don't make much sense. The best translation he could give was "good girl" for the top and "born/appear" for the bottom.

If you look at the kanji for "love,"


you'll notice it's not similar to any of the kanji in the tattoo.

Tattoo #10 may look familiar, as it is the first one I noticed on Erika which started out this whole business. Despite "never being crazy about tattoos on arms," Erika inked this in the Summer of 2003, while on a date. She doesn't recall the name of the shop, just that it was somewhere in the East Village. Of course, the East Village is likely one of the few places in the U.S. where tattoo/piercing shops outnumber Starbucks.

So, Erika still had a soft spot for little girl things, unicorns and fairies and such, so she designed this fairy, using several different drawings to create a composite she liked.


She designed the wings and changed the outfit color to red. Why red? As a tribute to her younger brother, who was in the Bloods, a gang whose colors are red. I, for one, appreciate the irony of a pixie sporting gang colors. This is definitely a tough, New York fairy, not some wimpy woodland nymph!

Tattoo #11 also has a pretty interesting story. Erika got married in the Spring of 2007, but she met Lance, her husband-to-be in February 2004.

They dated for a couple of weeks, but she knew he was still dating another woman. Erika thought that this other woman, who had been seeing the guy first, was going to be a problem and that, as long as she was still in the picture, their relationship wouldn't go anywhere.

Erika made a conscious decision to "steal him away" once and for all. Because he had kids from a previous relationship, she plotted to surprise him on Father's Day with a surprise trip to Florida. He had never been to South Beach in Miami and she wanted him to experience it. And so she did.

The day before they were set to return to New York, they were walking around South Beach and they stumbled upon a tattoo shop. Lance already had one small tattoo with some kanji, so Erika suggested that he go in and get a new one. The subject of tattoos had come up before (how could it not when you already had 10 pieces?), so they went in and he got a new piece on his
arm, a huge lion with a crown, representing his last name in Hindi.

It's incredibly hard to be an inked person and watch someone get a tattoo and not want one for oneself. Therefore, Erika found a piece on the wall that she liked and had it done on her back, below the bluebird, above the dragon.


Sorry, the name of the shop and the artist are not recalled.

Tattoo #12 came in the early Summer of 2006, around late June/early July. She and Lance were engaged, and she wanted to cover up the name of an ex-boyfriend tattooed across her lower abdomen.

A co-worker recommended Red Rocket Tattoo, and it was there that she had this lotus inked on her waistline:


Yep, no name anymore!

Now, for some disclosure. Erika is the first Inked Person to let me photograph her stomach for Tattoosday. I did have a mutual friend present, Sephora, who was the first person who hosted a tattoo here.

Erika wanted the lotus for two reasons. In addition to wanting something pretty to cover up an old name, she had heard that the lotus was a symbol of fertility, and she hopes to have kids some day. She hopes the lotus will be lend good luck for future procreative purposes.


There are over one hundred various types of lotus, so I can't pinpoint the exact one this is modeled after.

Once this cover-up was done, Erika asked for the leaves on the flower mentioned above to cover up the double female insignia.

Well. a hearty thanks to Erika for her participation here! She definitely holds the record for most tattoos offered up to the Tattoosday masses. Her ink is closing out the year for Tattoosday. Here's hoping that her lotus will spawn a healthy blossoming of tattoo posts here in 2008!

Tattoos I Know: Brooke's Courage

Here's another piece from a co-worker:

Brooke Goetz moved to the New York City/New Jersey area a couple years back, transplanting herself from Salt Lake City, Utah.

Earlier this year, in May, she was hanging out with some friends at a bar in Hoboken called Mikie Squared. One of her friends, Christian, was talking about tattoos. Brooke has two koi on her back (subject for a later post, hopefully) and another friend at the bar, Bill, admitted he did not have any tattoos. One thing led to another, and Bill posed the question to Brooke, "If I pay for it, will you go get a tattoo right now?" Brooke was game and agreed, without hesitation.

They called around but couldn't find any shops that were open. So the proposition died. Or so Brooke thought.

The next day, Bill called her and asked her if she was still up for the tattoo. "Sure," she said, and the rest is history.

The funniest part of the story, in my opinion, is that, on occasion, if Brooke's out with Bill and other friends at a bar, Bill will ask people, "You wanna see my tattoo?" When they say okay, Bill grabs Brooke's arm and shows them the tattoo.

The tattoo was inked by Robbie at Hoboken Body Art.
This kanji cost $75 and Brooke actually went back a few months later because she wanted it darkened. They re-inked it for free, an impressive pro-customer move.

Brooke chose the kanji for "courage" to represent the courageous act of leaving the relative "safety" of Utah for the faster-paced and exciting life of the Tri-State area. She likes having it on her inner wrist because she sees it all the time and it is a constant reminder to her to always be courageous in life.

Of course, Tattoosday has had its share of kanji tattoos in our short existence. The problem with kanji tattoos are that they are prone to errors and misinterpretation. It's hard to throw a cyber-rock on the web and not hit a story about an ill-inked kanji tattoo.

This one, however, seems correct, much to my relief. It would suck to have to tell Brooke her tattoo doesn't mean "courage" but "angry goat" or something silly.

Take a closer look:

Which is pretty close to this piece on the web:



Still, I like to get a second validation, which I found here:

Below are some of the characters styles you can choose for your "Courage / Bravery (alternate)" calligraphy when you select this option...

Xing-Kai
Shu

Xing
Shu

Kai
Shu

Li
Shu

Zhuan
Shu

You can see from the above selection the differences in the same character, done in the different kanji styles (each labeled ____ Shu).

Kanji tattoos continue to simultaneously intrigue and befuddle me. Thanks to Brooke for sharing her courage with me.

Tattoos I Know: Jeff's Lifelong Long Life

Tattoosday is back after a November hiatus. If you want a further explanation, check out BillyBlog. Pickings have been slim, but I still hope to present a tattoo or two through the winter months. I have a few posts stored up to carry us through December......

Today's tattoo is from a co-worker named Jeff.


This piece is on his upper right arm. He got this at a tattoo shop in Rhode Island about a dozen years ago when he was 19. He'd always wanted one and designed this "under the influence of narcotics".

He thought it had meant "life-long" but found out later that it meant "long life". I have neither the time nor the wherewithal to fully research kanji mysteries like this. Here's one example of a stock "long life" kanji:


I don't see the similarities, but at least it doesn't mean "cow," like previous tattoos I have featured.

Either way, thanks to Jeff for sharing his tattoo!

Buddhist Regret: A Follow-Up

This is a follow-up to this post regarding Vicki's tattoo:

Vicki was under the impression that this meant "the Path to Enlightenment". She also told me that the tattoo meant nothing to her and that she was considering having it removed.

If she reads this post, her feelings may become even stronger.

I hesitated before posting this, but because she was so down on this piece, I figured, if anything, I'd be doing her a favor.

This Chinese characters do not reflect what she understands the tattoo to mean. From the top down, the first element is the triad of dashes on the upper right. These three strokes represent the number three. The large character at the top of the tattoo caused some consternation among my co-workers who are fluent in Chinese that I showed this to. One couldn't identify it at all and the other said that it most closely resembles the kanji meaning "look" or "see".

The bottom character was easily identified by those I showed the picture to.

The character on the right in the illustration above matches the bottom character in the tattoo. It is the character for "cow". I am now theorizing that the top character is a distortion of the word "year" and that Vicki's tattoo represents the astrological year of the cow, or the ox, denoting people born in 1997, 1985, 1973, 1961, 1949, 1937, 1925, 1913, or 1901. Although she mentioned she was 27, which would have put her birthday in 1980. Hmmm.

The alternative, that it is just gibberish, "three look cow," is also a possibility. She did say that she found the kanji in a cartoon in a philosophy textbook.

Regardless, it certainly makes the tattoo more interesting. Vicki, if you wish me to remove this post, please e-mail me. I did not create this follow-up mean-spiritedly, but merely as a further exploration of your tattoo.

There's a whole site called Hanzi Smatter that analyzes "the misuse of Chinese characters in Western culture." They display some tattoo examples that illustrate that bad ink happens quite often, especially when tattooing using foreign words and characters.

My advice, when getting a tattoo of this nature, would be to go to at least two, if not three, opinions from independent, unrelated authorities of the language, before permanently inking a non-English piece. Hell, some people have a hard time with English! Check out this story from earlier this year in Chicago. Or this story from 6 years ago.

Anger Management

It is my practice, when someone is heavily inked, and they've agreed to let me take a picture, to ask them to offer up the piece that means the most to them.

Last week I approached a guy named John in front of Madison Square Garden. He had numerous tattoos on his arms and looked like an excellent Tattoosday candidate. However, when I asked him what tattoo was the most special, he raised his right pant leg to show me this interesting design on his calf:

John described this "biomechanical" design as a shield that keeps his demons locked inside. The tribal symbol is an anchor that keeps him grounded. He was very open and acknowledged that he had anger management issues. The tattoo gives him strength to control those issues.

This tattoo is one of 15 that John has. It was inked by High Roller Tattoo, in Hicksville on Long Island, NY.

After thanking John, I asked the woman standing next to him if she had any tattoos she wanted to share. She did. Donna has two kanji characters on her lower back that I wasn't able to get complete photographs of. I asked her to, at her convenience, send me better pictures, if she was interested in joining these pages. She said the kanji meant a lot to her, so I am interested in finding out why.

Thanks John, again, for your participation. Here's hoping Donna will e-mail me about her tattoos.