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Comment by meristohm | Hacker News Reader

Title a play on Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower?[0]

Other cultures don't use sofas, and I'm curious if they were originally a thing for royalty (like flat green lawns and white bread and so many other "luxuries" we royal Americans went in for), and I would vote for leaving ours (IKEA, so not the worst in terms of PFAS coating and other toxins, but also not great) with the house when/if we move, and sitting on the floor again, which my spouse and I did early on, influenced by our time in Japan (and our relative lack of money).

I appreciate this article about valuing local repair shops. I did the same with a pair of boots, and will continue to pay for such service, not least because I like getting to know craftsmen.

[0] https://worldcat.org/title/parable-of-the-sower/oclc/2825552...

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I'm not sure if by other culture you mean Japan, but relatively Japanese definitely use sofa nowadays. Certainly, in the past they did not, but if you go back to the 19th centuries you could probably say the same about western countries (being "for the royalty" seems like a stretch, but they were certainly too expensive for commoners).

Old, tatami-only houses generally won't have heavy legged furniture at all, but tatami-only houses are rarely being built. It used to be come to have a single tatami room in most homes, but that is also becoming more uncommon for new houses nowadays. In modern houses, you'd usually have sofa. I don't remember if I've ever seen a multi-room Japanese house without one, but one-room apartments can be really small, and if the owner doesn't host people often (or ever) they won't have a sofa.

What is very common in Japan (especially in small apartments and one room apartments) is a low-sofa (basically a low profile sofa, often without a base or legs) and zaisu[1] - originally a fancier sitting pillow with back for tatami floors, but nowadays it's mostly low-profile sofa chair or more often just a sofa chair without legs. These things are more flexible and portable and allow you to sit closer to the floor.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zaisu

Wait, if other cultures don't use sofas, what do they sit on? Are their houses all full of single chairs?

In the floor or a mat.

Or wood stools/benches/chairs. Fabric was very expensive until relatively recently. A modern sofa would presumably have been an extreme luxury item not that long ago in historical terms.

You're right, but I didn't realize that till later. Except for the original "Parable of the Sower" was from Jesus not Olivia. But I also thought of Olivia's first.

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