Planet Japan Podcast

Over the Obon holiday, I went to Shiraishi Island where the Lady of Japan Podcasts, Amy Chavez (columnist for The Japan Times), resides and tends the Mooo! Bar. She is also one half of the Planet Japan podcast cohosted with Doug DeLong. In an ealier podcast they invited any of their listeners to come to their first ever Planet Japan Beach Party and I took them up on their invite.

I encourage any of my readers of this blog to go over, right now, and start downloading past episodes of the podcast. The show is a real treat: a fun, often funny, and informative look at life in Japan for those of us trying to make heads or tails of the place. It also helps that I am also in one of the episodes (episode #11), you can even see pictures at the Planet Japan blog page. You get to hear me in all my drunken and exhausted glory. Of the several non-native speakers interviewed for that episode, I was the one with the most foreign accent and disjointed sentence structure. I blame the Moo Margaritas. Dang you, Amy, dang you for your delicious boozy beach drinks!

Anyway, the podcast was recently given minor celebrity status when the creator of podcasting himself, Adam Curry, gave the show a thumbs up. So hop on over to the podcast, grab yourself your favorite Japanese oriented libation, settle yourself into your favorite comfy chair and listen to the happenest podcast about Japan on the Internets. Final note: you will have to go to the podcast page itself for the URL needed to subscribe to the show; but you'll be able to listen to the streaming audio from the front page itself.

Obon Holiday

The Obon Holiday in Japan roughly coincides with the third week in August every year. The holiday is not unlike the Christian Easter Holiday with some Halloween sprinkled in.

The Japanese believe the spirits of their ancestors return from the realm of the dead this time of year to visit the family. On the first day of Obon, families will place two small spinning lanterns near their windows or the family shrine to guide the spirits home. On this or the next day, families will go to their family graves and clean them, replace incense sticks and pray.

In Kyoto, on the last day of Obon, fire symbols burn on the mountain tops for the ghosts to use to find their way back to the afterlife. On many islands along the Inland Sea, families make small paper boats and set them afire and afloat out to the night sea, burning into bright specks on the dark horizon.

Obon is not a flamboyant holiday, like Halloween is in America, nor is there a sacred custom, such as Easter. There aren't special meals prepared though individual family traditions may determine this. The tradition of cleaning the graves is more of an annual obligation and an opportunity for the family to come together. And while many Japanese still feel the spirits come to visit the household shrine, the majority use the time as a way of bonding with the grown children who may have moved away, with school aged youngsters on Summer break or with their neighbors. It seems every community has their own way of honoring the dead but during this holiday, all of Japan shares in an intimate and solemn exercise that also allows them to show their affection to their family.

Old school finding new rythms

Japan's youth generation has gained infamy for ripping through fads and trends at lightspeed. Whatever is hip this week in Harajuku isn't going to be The Thing next week. Popular culture in Japan appears to ride swells of trends, even generating the waves of what's fresh and the withdrawing tide with the same motion last season's clothes are pulled off hangars.

At the same time, Japan also maintains customs that are centuries old, honoring the ancient traditions in small ways: festivals, visits to the local shrine, kimonos. The hipster kid in the Mura (Osaka) in his newest Hawaiian shirt and chinos may pause at a shrine before pushing on, oblivious to the contradictions. A girl who is a habitual consumer of the latest fashions may also look at the latest kimonos with the same eye and on the same whim.

But sometimes old traditions come creeping back into society to become trendy again. I noticed this when I was walking through Ebisubashi in Osaka the other day, looking for some sweet arcade game action. I was drawn to a crowd outside one of the arcades in the area. Of all the machines in the place, racing games, shooting games, fighting games, there was just one game outside the place: a taiko drum game. Take Dance Dance Revolution, change the music to taiko drum beats and stick two traditional-looking drums in front of the machine and you have The Taiko Drum Game(tm). In and of itself, I wouldn't normally think this would appeal to the generation that is always looking for the latest version of The Thing or the newest moment on the horizon, but here was a young man just wailing on the fake drums to the beats in the game like a real taiko drummer! And he had a huge audience! And did I mention this was a videogame?

While I was standing there, the crowd got bigger. The guy was obviously good. He also added embellishments to his style, looking no less the part of the taiko drummer. I also saw a couple other guys on the side, I guess waiting their turn, and they had their own taiko drum sticks.They were the model taiko drum game otaku, there is a devoted following of the game complete with their own sticks and their posse.

So just when I think that Japanese culture has two completely divergent aspects of itself, and the nationalists would have you think that the New Japanese are destroying the traditional way of life, here comes a temporary integration of the two faces of Japan. One final note: You can't really see it in my picture (crappy 1 megapixel cellphone camera), the little girl in front is bouncing to the beat. Kawaii!