Kiyoshi Hikawa -- Ojii-chan Chi e Ikou (おじいちゃんちへいこう)

Well that's a cute drawing.

musicman-net.com/artist/59488.html

Well, would'ya look at that, Kiyoshi Hikawa's (氷川きよし) now on NHK's "Minna no Uta" (みんなのうた) too. His first ever contribution to this 5 minute music program that's directed at the kids is "Ojii-chan no Chi e Ikou", which translates to something like "going to grandpa's house", and it's being featured from August to September. It will also be coupled with Hikawa's earlier single, "Miren Gokoro" (みれん心) to form the F-type of said single - yes, F-type - which will be released on 27th September 2016.

"Ojii-chan no Chi e Ikou" is supposed to be about how a young Hikawa would spend his summer vacations at his grandfather's place in the Fukuoka countryside town of Yame. Putting that into simple but cute lyrics was Koyu Kure (暮醐遊). The activities the singer did with his grandfather included hunting for giant stag beetles in the nearby forest and munching on watermelon, as seen in the bright, colour pencil art animated short, and the sunny melody - brought to you by Kyogo Kawauchi and Natsumi Hirai (川口京吾 . 平井夏美) - that accompanies it aptly represents the fun little Hikawa must've had. According to this interview with Hikawa on the Oricon site, he was close to his grandfather, whom he would introduce to his audience during promotional campaigns in Yame when he had debuted. Unfortunately, his grandfather had passed away three years into his music career. So "Oji-chan no Chi e Ikou" is sort of a tribute to his grandfather.

It's been a really long time since I had spent time with my grandfather and I can't remember much of what I used to do with him. However, one thing that I can't forget is a tiny me plucking tiny purple flowers from this small shrub from his house garden and putting them in his palm. The flowers even had a little surprise: ants - panicking ants. Then when it was time to go back into the house, I asked him why he washed his hands, to which he simply replied, "Because it's dirty." (or something like that). After that I begrudgingly washed my hands too. Ah, it's been twelve years... ...

Those were the same type of flowers, but till this day I have no idea what it's called. I took the picture when in Taiwan last year.