| Tsumaikichi, a talented geisha of Osaka's Horie district, lost her ams at the age of seventeen when the propietor of the house she belonged to went on a murderous rampage and attacked six geishas, five of them fatally. She overcame her condition, became a comic storyteller and singer and then, in her twenties, began to do calligraphy and painting with her mouth. After her marriage and the birth of two children, Junkyo supported herself painting kimono and obi. Eventually, she became a Buddhist nun, devoting her life to the copying of sutras, calligraphy, writing books, memorializing the victims and helping the physically handicapped. In April 1951 she founded the Bukkoin, a temple in southeast Kyoto. She passed away at the age of 81 in April 1968. |
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