Japan's Geisha stage a Revival

choi

In print, the sentence is "While interest overseas in geisha culture has grown, the business itself has been in declining health for decades." There is no mention of Chinese tourists/


Miho Inada, Japan's Geisha stage a Revival; Entainers try to lift fading art with shows, tote bags. Wall Street Journal, Apr 23, 2022, at page A1.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/jap ... dernize-11650300861
https://heromag.net/japans-geish ... e-a-declining-art-2

Note:
(a)
(i) Miho INADA 稲田 美穂 (The ina and ho are both Japanese pronunciations of kanji and 穂. The latter has Chinese proninciation su-i.)
(ii) Mizuho Financial Group, formed in 2000 through merger, spells its name in hiragana rather than kanji in its Japanese-language website, which would be 瑞穂 (defined as "fresh, young ears of rice" whereas one of many nicknames of Japan is 瑞穂の国 the Land of Abundant Rice).
(iii) Mizu being its Japanese pronunciation, kanji 瑞 can mean "youth" (as here) or good omen (as in 祥瑞). In Japan 瑞典 is Sweden and 瑞西, Switzerland (from pronunciation of Swiss).
(b) Geisha, like samura-i, has the same form for both singular and plural.

(b) "On Christmas Day last year, three dozen geisha danced, sang and talked before several hundred guests at a luxury hotel in Japan's ancient capital [Kyoto]. * * * Yet, here they were under spotlights onstage at a hotel dinner show that was open to attendees who paid the yen equivalent of $ 200 upfront. Some fans traveled from as far away as Tokyo."

The article in print has two photos: geishas on a stage, and a maiko.
(c) "Kimiko Takeyoshi 竹由 喜美子 [ki is Chinese pronunciation of kanji 喜], a 48-year-old former geisha who has written books on the business."

(d) "Netflix is ​​part of that new picture. The streaming giant is working on a nine-episode drama about apprentice geisha directed by Cannes Palme d'Or winner Hirokazu Kore-eda. The Kyoto foundation is not directly involved, but some teahouses in Gion, the largest of Kyoto's five geisha districts, helped with the shooting of the series, which is set for release this year."
(i) An "apprentice geisha" is ma-i-ko 舞子. Remember that Japanese does not have diphthongs.
(ii) Hirokazu KORE-EDA  是枝 裕和
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hirokazu_Kore-eda

Japanese does not use 是 as a verb, but as a demonstrative to mean this. So 是枝 means this branch or twig.
(iii) The print does not spell out the name of the foundation, as it should, which is "Kyoto Traditional Musical Art Public Foundation" according to ONLINE credit of the maiko photo (print does not credit this photo). But the foundation's website says "Kyoto Traditional Musical Art Public Foundation 公益財団法人京都市音楽芸術文化振興財団" -- a civilian, not governmental, organization.
(iv) Gion  祇園
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gion
("The geisha in Kyoto do not refer to themselves as geisha, instead using the local term 'geiko [芸子].' While the term geisha means 'artist' or 'person of the arts,' the more direct term geiko means essentially 'a woman of art' ")
(A) Per ja.wikipedia.org 祇園 is derived from 祇園精舎 Jetavana
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jetavana
(the place where the Buddha gave the majority of his teachings and discourses; section 1 Donation of Jetavana)
(B) 精舎
https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/精舎   
(Sanskrit: vihāra; "仏教の比丘 [Sanskrit: bhiksu] （出家修行者）が住する修道施設、寺院、僧院")
(C) In Sanskrit, vana and vihāra are two different things, so the full name of the place is Jetavanavihāra or Jetavana-vihāra.

(e) "The city is dotted with establishments known as okiya 置屋, or maiko houses, which bring teenage girls from across the country to train as maiko."