Hanasaku Iroha aka The ABC's of Flower Blooming

Hanasaku Iroha is an anime about revolving around Ohana Matsumae, hence the name, the flower that is blooming throughout the show is Ohana.  She through some rather odd circumstances ends up living with her grandmother.  Her grandmother runs a ryokan or a traditional Japanese inn.  Ohana is expected to work at the Inn while she lives there and attends the local high school. At this point she meets all of the quirky, fun people working at Kissuisou.  Minko and Nako both attend her high school and she rooms with Minko at the inn.  Not everything goes well for our main character, but that's good because it makes her story real and interesting.  This is a fantastic story about a girl growing up and coming into herself.  This anime does not stick solidly to one theme.  There's crushes, parental issues, budding friendships and fights.  Not to mention the ongoing issues with Kissuisou's finances.

I loved this anime.  I liked the art style and the characters.  Ohana is not just some vapid character with few emotions nor is she just a pretty face.  She is a whole person, we learn this in the very first episode, she too screws up.  Too often I can't watch anime where women are the main characters.  They don't have personality and they get dragged around by the male characters.  Not so with Hanasaku Iroha.  Ohana, Minko and Nako, the three main characters, don't let anyone drag them around.  They work hard and have their own aspirations.  There are very few things I didn't like in this anime and I can't talk about them without giving anything away.  Most of the time the anime focuses on the internal struggles of the characters or on their interpersonal relationships.
On a different note, because this anime focuses on a traditional Japanese inn there are some cultural things that may be difficult for newbies to understand.  In fact even if you aren't a new anime watcher but don't know much about Japanese or Japanese culture, there may be things that aren't super easy to understand.  Knowing about bathing culture, keigo (ultra-polite Japanese) and Japanese standards of service.  It isn't necessary, but I do think that knowing these things can aid in the understanding of the overall show.

Ratings: Overall 4.5/5 Art 4/5 Characters 5/5 Character development 4.5/5 Newbies 3/5 Japanese language learning: 5/5

I watched Hanasaku Iroha on crunchyroll (not sponsered) and you can too, for free! -> LINK

How to watch Anime for free online

Here are a few tips and tricks I've learned over the years watching anime online.

1. Search anime using their title.  Their romaji version (English characters but Japanese language) rather than the English version is best.

Example: 'Gin no Saji' instead of Silver Spoon

2. Looking for a specific episode?  Search with the title and 'episode 1' or 12 or 132 ect.  using 'ep' as a shorthand for episode can sometimes garner more results.

3. Don't speak Japanese?  Not to worry!  You can easily search for subtitled or dubbed videos.  

3a. For subtitled videos in English usually you can just add 'sub' to your search, if you're looking for another language you can use 'sub xlanguage'.  Unfortunately there aren't nearly as many subtitled anime in languages other than English.  Spanish is fairly popular.  German comes up occasionally along with Russian.

3b. For dubbed videos simply add 'dub' to your search. Be aware that dubbed versions of anime are more difficult to find than subbed versions.  It costs significantly more money and takes much more time to dub an anime.  Also, many anime are not dubbed because whichever company owns the anime does not think it will do well enough to make the cost worth it in English speaking countries.  If you can't find a dubbed version, it probably doesn't exist.  Dubbed versions of anime can mostly be found in English and occasionally in other languages if it is very popular.

Now that I have imparted these tips for searching I want to make a note about licensing.  When an anime is licensed in the United States or other country that means that it is protected under copy write law.  Not all anime are licensed and many are licensed in the U.S. significantly after they come out in Japan. This can result in fan-subs or fan made subtitles. These are in a legal grey area under current U.S. and Japanese laws. However, note that even if fansubs have ads on them the revenue from those ads is likely going to the web host rather than to the anime content creators or the translators.

Since Crunchyroll.com came into existence more anime are now licensed, but still available online for free, legally.  Crunchyroll works with Japanese anime companies to license their content and provide it to U.S. and Canadian audiences.  You can watch anime on Crunchyroll for free with ads. You can get a paid subscription on a monthly basis where you have no ads.  I have used both of these services and my viewing experience on Crunchyroll was great. (Anyone want me to review Crunchyroll?) Another legal site is Funimation.com which also has free and subscription options, but I haven't really used it much. However sometimes there are anime that I want to watch that aren't on Crunchyroll or Funimation and I do generally watch a fansub when that happens.

A note on fansubs: generally after an anime is licensed fansub translators will ask you to obtain a legal version of the content.  If we would like to continue to get anime in English-speaking countries, especially dubbed versions it would be best to heed this plea. 

However some fansubs are made not because people are unable to obtain English versions of anime but because the English versions of the anime they want to watch have been translated or made to look different for an American audience (think 4kidstv).  These fansubs are providing a more accurate translation of the anime because they feel it has been misrepresented for American audiences or children.  There are some shows where I don't like the official translation, I can speak enough Japanese that I can tell when things have been left out.  Things like specific Japanese words or customs many times are left out of official translations, which is frustrating and can make things confusing. The main reason I like fansubs is because many times they will make a translator's note when something can't be directly translated, leave in name endings, and tell you about Japanese customs.  

Now go forth knowing that you have all you need to make informed decisions about the anime you are searching for and watching!

(This post is not sponsored by crunchyroll or funimation.)