Do Japanese People Know Of A Western Custom, June Bride?

Japan has a rainy season between June and the middle of July. Thus typical Japanese people's image of June would be "wet", "lots of rain", and "humid". None of them sounds fun. Then June had been one of the most unpopular months to get married. 

In old days, during the rainy season marrying couples had to worry about their wedding clothes getting dirty, guests getting wet, and no wedding photos outside. Moreover having a comfortable reception in a wedding hall would be out of the question since air-conditioning in wedding halls were not common. So it was natural for people to avoid June for wedding ceremonies.

Traditionally June had been a hard time for wedding service industry. However, Japanese wedding industry had an idea to remedy the situation. In late 1960s, they started to advertise the Western custom, "June Bride" and said "Women who get married in June will be happy because June is the month of Juno, the goddess who was considered to be a guardian of women's married life!"

It spread quickly all over the country and especially women started to say "Wow, you will get married in June? You are a "June Bride", fantastic!". Now almost everybody knows "June Bride" custom in Japan although it was a completely foreign custom. 

Have You Ever Heard Of 'Yuyake-koyake', A famous Japanese Children's Song?

I introduced a local park named "Yuyake-koyake Fureai-no-sato Park" in my other blog on June 16th. Actually the park was named after a famous children's song "Yuyake-koyake", and the meaning of the whole park name is "Yuyake-koyake Friendship village".

The song "Yuyake-koyake" was written by Uko Noguchi (1897-1972). He was a school teacher lived in Kamiongata town, Hachioji city. He started writing stories and songs for children while he was teaching at school because he believed they would be good for children's education. The song "Yuyake-koyake" is one of his works and widely known today. Therefore "Yuyake-koyake Fureai-no-sato Park"was established right beside his house as a memorial park for this song. 

He was teaching at a school in the center of Tokyo, thus he had a long commute everyday and watched sunsets on the way to home. Apparently he got the idea for this song from the beautiful sunsets viewed from Hachioji city.

"Yuyake" is a Japanese word meaning "a sunset glow", but "Koyake" was a word created by Uko Noguchi. From the Chinese characters used for the word, "Koyake", we can guess it would mean "a small glow", so the title can be "A Sunset Glow, And A Small Glow" as a direct translation.

A rough translation of the song is...
♪A sunset glow and a small glow, it'll be dark soon.
  A temple bell on the mountain is ringing to tell the time.
  Now let's hold hands and go back home.
  Look at the sky, crows are also flying back to their nest with us.
  
The sunset photos were taken from Hachioji city, so they may be similar to the views Uko Noguchi saw on his way to home.  You can listen to the song (in Japanese) from here (link to Youtube).

Japanese Firefly Culture, ♪Ho-Ho Hotaru(Fireflies) Come-on!

What I wrote in the title above is the first line of an old Japanese children's song. As I introduced in my other blog, "Yuko Takayama" on June 16th, since old times Japanese people have been fond of Hotaru (fireflies) , those fantastic glowing creatures.  People enjoy "Hotaru (fireflies) Viewing" as a seasonal summer activity.

Apparently there are 40 kinds of Hotaru (fireflies) in Japan. However, two kinds of Hotaru are best known and people in Japan can identify them easily. In fact, most Japanese know them without looking up in Google. 

One is called "Genji Botaru (Genji Firefly)" and the other is called "Heike Botaru" (Heike Firefly). Genji Botaru is bigger and brighter than Heike Botaru, and they only hatch and live around clear creeks. So they can be an indicator of well-preserved nature. On the other hand, Heike Botaru can hatch and live in ponds as well as rice paddies. 

Actually their names have a contrast and probably the fact made people remember the names more easily. Genji and Heike are both famous historical family names going back to the 8-9 century. The two families were both relatives of the emperor family and later became upper military families. There was a long history of rivalry between the two families and therefore the two family names were always mentioned as a set. Perhaps, in a sense, it can be said that they were like Capulets and the Montagues in the Shakespeare play Romeo and Juliet. You can see now why most people in Japan can say both names without looking them up.

Of course the two kinds of Hotarus (fireflies) do not have any rivalry and people enjoy seeing both types of fireflies for their beautiful lights in summer evenings. The continuation of the old children's song in the beginning is 
♪The water is sweeter here! Over there the water must be bitter. Ho-ho Hotaru (fireflies) come-on!♪

A Historical Romantic Episode Relating To Japanese Hydrangeas

As I introduced previously on June 6th, Ajisai(Hydrangea) is a native plant in Japan. There are varied flower shapes/colors even among the wild types. Also this plant has been improved as a popular gardening flower since old times and got farther more variety as in the photos.

Historically, Japanese Ajisai(Hydrangea) was introduced to Europe in 19th century by a German medical doctor, Philipp Franz Balthasar von Siebold, and There is a well-known episode relating to him and Japanese Ajisai(Hydrangea).

Apparently Dr. Siebold was very interested in the Oriental countries and botany and he wanted to visit to Japan. However, there was a serious obstacle at that time because it was during Tokugawa Shogunate era and  Japan closed the country to outsiders. Japanese Shogunate government strictly shut out all foreigners except Chinese and Dutch people. Therefore when he arrived at Japan in 1823 he pretended to be a Dutchman. 

Although Japanese immigration control officers had suspicion about his nationality, he somehow succeeded to land Japan safely. It didn't take long until his medical knowledge attracted Japanese doctors and scholars, and many people asked him to teach his Western science knowledge. Eventually he was exceptionally allowed to open a private school in Nagasaki prefecture. 

Old records tells he was loved by his students and he blended very well into Japanese community. After a while he fell in love with a Japanese woman named Otaki. They couldn't get married formally but they had a baby girl and lived happily. Of course he didn't forget his initial interest in Japanese nature, and he was studying and collecting Japanese plants, animals and geographical information as he was teaching his students sincerely.

  

However, his study about Japan caused a serious problem when he tried to go back his country just for a while. He was arrested because he was carrying a detailed map of whole Japanese islands, which was a top secret of Japanese Shogunate government at that time. He got an expulsion order immediately and had to abandon Otaki and his daughter. 

After he went back to Europe he stayed in the Netherlands and published books about Japan and reported many of Japanese plants and animals as new species. Thus many of those study names have sieboldi or sieboldii to tell his contribution. He reported Japanese Hydrangea as a new plant, too, and named it "Hydrangea Otaksa".

Today, people are guessing it was named after his beloved woman, Otaki-san ("san" is a Japanese general honorific). Unfortunately the name wasn’t accepted as the study name since the same family plant was already reported. Perhaps he tried to keep her name someway in history with his memory. Although he couldn't make it, his daughter became the first woman gynecologist in Japan and her name was engraved into Japanese history as their daughter.

Flower Forecast Started Talking About Hydrangeas, The Season Has Started!

Hydrangea is one of the most common flowers in residences’ gardens in Japan since it is native to Japan. Japanese people have been fond of this flower since ancient times and improved many kinds from the wild type thus various types can be seen in towns. Now it is in full bloom in Tokyo area.

Since it is a popular seasonal flower in June, there are many famous flower-viewing spots for it, then every year TV weather forecast tells about the date of the flowering as you can see in the photo at the upper left.

The flowers started blooming beautifully in Tokyo area. We can enjoy them for a while since Hydrangea is one of the long lasting flowers, moreover many of them would change the color, from whitish light green/pink/blue to violet/bluish violet, after each rain. Actually this plant doesn't last long when cut because it needs lots of water.  During June, usually the rainy season starts on Japanese islands from south part to north, then the timing of Hydrangea flowering is perfectly match with it. So I think it is one of the flowers which can be seen most beautifully especially in Japan and the flowers help Japanese feel refreshed under gloomy weather during the rainy season!