Now I have to try it. Dammit.
I have similar stuff at home, which I bought at an art supply store. I have an ink stick which is scented, for some reason. Not much to add, except you only need a few drops of water, don’t apply force when grinding, and you had better have a lot of patience 
I had a grinding stone, an ink stick, and a special brush back when I was studying Japanese in college. I had (and still have) a love of calligraphy and enjoyed practicing my hiragana, katakana, and kanji using my ink setup.
My wife studies East Asian ink sticks, from both a cultural heritage and chemistry standpoint. She says “ The design is strongly reminiscent of Kobaien inksticks, although they (now) have a different inscription on their standard inksticks. The blue color just is decorative, doesn’t imply that it makes blue ink. My image search skills are weak, so can’t find some of the same photos that Dr SL did, but looking at the hosting sites for those may be more informative. Sometimes inscriptions are meaningful, but sometimes just poetic.”
Well, now that I know what the heck it is, I tried it, and it works.
It’s almost like water colors. Well, just black though.
@abcdefghij if your wife would be interested in this, I could UPS it to you. PM me. If, though, this is just sending a pencil through the mail, it’s really not worth the bother.
She says thank you, but she has several examples already. This is one of the oldest manufacturers of ink sticks in Japan; still active after several hundred years. They’re very popular, which may be why your aunt bought it.
According to the video China_Guy linked, sticks improve as they age. So it might be more valuable just for being more than 50 years old.
I was browsing this site last night–there is a bit of a price range.
I wonder how much of that price gap is real quality difference and how much is “you need these $1,000 gold audio cables to enjoy your sound system”?
My cousin is going to take another look at it. Her mom gave this to my mom (that’s really the only explanation). Value is not always in dollars.
It is an interesting piece though. It sure confused me, but it does work as intended.
Thanks everyone for sorting this out.
I had one of those ink blocks when I was a kid. A present from someone. Don’t know what happened to it, I assume my mother disposed of it to prevent some kind of mess.
different characters though.