Blizzardboy | A Kiwi in Japan

Japan’s Festival of the Dead, more commonly known as obon, has drawn to a close once again. Held in Akita from the 13th of August through to the 15th (some other areas of Japan hold the festival during July), the obon festival has its roots in Japan’s Buddhist past. The festival originated about 500 years ago, and has grown to be one of the big three holiday breaks in the Japanese calendar (the other two being New Years and Golden Week in March).

In my wife’s parents household obon is celebrated by visiting the household grave, where the grave is cleaned, and flowers and traditional foods like red sticky rice, cakes are left on the grave. These gifts depend on the likes and dislikes of the family’s ancestors. For example, some people leave cigarettes, or Japanese rice wine on the grave. Once the gifts have been offered a simple prayer is said. At home horses are made from vegetables and placed in front of the family altar so that the returning spirits can travel around freely.

Variants of the festival abound, family by family and area by area. When we visited Atami in Kanagawa (south of Tokyo) we saw people burning little fires on the roadside outside of their homes. At the time we wondered what the meaning of these fires was, but after some searching on the internet, Chooch informs me that this is known as okuribi – okuri meaning send, and bi meaning fire. This ritual acts as a way of sending the returned spirits on their way once more.

Travel during the Obon festival can be a problem as the festival brings families together much in the way that Christmas does in the west. Driving, especially out of Tokyo, one must face long traffic jams, while Japan’s famous bullet trains are often full to 200 percent capacity.

For more information on the obon festival you can read the wikipedia article here.