Children’s Day in Japan

Today marks the holiday of Kodomo no Hi (子供の日) or Children’s Day, formerly Boy’s Day. In practice this holiday is the boy’s equivalent of the Hinamatsuri Holiday that girls celebrated two months previous. It also happens to fall during Golden Week too, so it’s quite a nice time to be there especially if you are a boy.

According to my cultural guidebook, the holiday has its roots as the third of five seasonal festivals or sekku (節句), which all had Chinese origin and are still observed in Chinese culture today. Other “sekku” holidays in the year include Nanakusa (Jan. 7 modern calendar), Hinamatsuri (March 3), Tanabata (July 7) and the lesser known Day of the Chrysanthemum (Sept. 9).

Children’s Day was called the Day of the Iris in traditional times. The term for Iris or shōbu (菖蒲) was a homophone of another word that meant warlike spirit, or martial prowess (尚武), which sounded manly and hence it became a festival for boys.

I have no boys myself, so we don’t celebrate it in our home, but my wife’s friend who also married an American has a son of the age, and every year they get out the samurai display:

Even in Ireland, I knew a Polish-Japanese couple who had a little boy and they had the display out this time last year. It’s hoped not that the boy won’t become a samurai of course (no samurai since late 1880′s),¹ but rather embody some of the idealized qualities:

• Self-disciplined
• Able to confront challenges with a cool head
• Leadership
• A team player

In addition to samurai displays one also sees lots of carp streamers called koinobori (鯉幟), which give the appearance of riding the wind, or swimming upstream. My own daughter was able to attend a Children’s Day festival this past weekend here at Seattle’s Japanese Cultural Center, and got to dress up as a pink samurai:

So, it’s not just the boys who can enjoy the good weather and fun!

Happy Children’s Day!

¹ Plenty of grown men around though who have samurai fantasies it seems.