Silk tree flowers in bloom at garden related to Empress Michiko’s lullaby

June 26, 2009

Silk tree flowers in bloom at garden related to Empress Michiko’s lullaby


A silk tree, or nemu-no-ki in Japanese, blooms from late June to July at the small Tokyo garden named after a lullaby written by Empress Michiko. This overlaps the tsuyu rainy season in Japan. The silk tree, with filament-like pink and white flowers, was on hand to receive a group of about 10 tourists on an occasionally sunny day in late June. (Readers may be advised to see the April 28 post on this blog site.)
The garden was opened at a site formerly occupied by the residence of the parents of Empress Michiko in 2004. “You can see the silk tree right up there. Tha tree is the same as the tree which was sung in Nemu-No-Ki-No-Komoriuta (Silk Tree Lullaby), the song based on the lyrics written by Her Majesty.” the guide of the group said. Silk tree flowers have a good fragrance. “The flowers lie scattered there. You can pick up some,” the guide said.
The lyrics of the lullaby were written by the Empress when she was a high school student. The song was published after she got married to Emperor Akihito, then the crown prince, in 1959. The song was quite different from old Japanese lullabies, and its warm melody and words quickly became popular.
Most of the famous old Japanese lullabies were songs sung by baby sitters in dialect. Baby sitting used to be a job mainly for small girls from poor villages. Separated from their families, they sang of their loneliness and the hardness of their jobs.
The Lullaby of Itsuki, one of the best known lullabies in Japan, was originally sung in a certain area in Kumamoto Prefecture, southwestern Japan. The song was collected by a local school teacher in the 1930s and became widely known in the 1950s. The most commonly heard version of the song follows:

/I’ll have to be here until the Bon, but no more after the Bon.
If the Bon comes early, I can be home early.
/I’m a poor person, but they’re rich.
Rich people with good sash and good clothes.
/If I died, who would cry for me?
Cicadas in a pine tree mountain in the back would cry for me.
/If I died, bury me by the roadside.
Passers-by would serve flowers for me.
/What flower to serve? Camellias readily available there.
Water would be obtained from the heaven.
(A personal translation)

There exist old lullabies in the true sense of the term, nursery songs sung by mothers, but the baby sitters’ songs are more widely known in Japan. Their sad songs have been seen as a negative trace of the Japanese history and culture and failed to be studied properly. But researchers stress the need to preserve a wide range of indigenous lullabies as part of Japan’s cultural assets before they disappear.
An NPO calls for taking a fresh look at the importance and effectiveness of lullabies for child-raising. It is said that Japanese mothers sing lullabies for their kids less frequently than ever and some mothers know few to sing.
Japanese mothers should not be totally accused for their unwillingness to sing lullabies. The situation is becoming harder for families with small children in Japan. Their income is on the decline amid the current global economic plight. The situation is even worse for fatherless families. A bill for reinstating a special welfare benefit for single-parent households is before the parliament, but it is far from certain if it will be enacted.
Mothers who raise their children singlehandedly are apparently too busy and tired to sing songs for their children. Their situation must be improved to give them a solid base for living and time to sing lullabies for their kids.

An author’s note: The Bon summer festival, usually observed in mid-August, is one of the happiest holiday seasons in Japan, especially for people like boys and girls sent as servants for unpaid domestic service, a practice seen until early last century. Servants were allowed to return home on a once-a-year leave in the Bon season.

Father’s Day in Japan and changing roles for Japanese fathers

June 20, 2009

Father’s Day in Japan and changing roles for Japanese fathers


Father’s Day is less recognized and observed in Japan despite increasing awareness about fathers’ important roles. The day honoring fathers has not officially been designated as a holiday in Japan, though various organizations are promoting related activities, including an anti-prostate cancer campaign. Japan was largely a male-oriented society until a few decades ago, but Japanese fathers are trying to find their desired positions in the family following changes in people’s social behaviors.
Japanese men are asked to do more for child care, education for children and housekeeping as a whole. Many young fathers are aware of such requests and ready to cooperate with their spouses. But there are actually a number of barriers for them to clear. In 2002, the government introduced targets for increasing the percentage of workers taking child care leave, 80 pct for women and 10 pct for men. The figure for females has already been met, but that for males remains far below the target. The percentage for male workers rose to a record high in 2008, but only to a meager 1.56 pct, according to a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry survey.
Labor affairs researchers cite various reasons for the slow progress, including employers’ lack of knowledge or reluctance about using the child care leave system for male workers and fears about declines in income on the part of employees.
The situation is not necessarily pessimistic for Japanese fathers as a whole. “Men! Do not enter the kitchen,” once a frequently uttered word, is almost dead now. Many cooking books written for men are available at bookstores. Japanese fathers feel free about working in the kitchen now. Whether they can cooperate in housekeeping is becoming a requirement for good fathers.
Father’s Day events form part of the gift-giving season in Japan. This is a happy season especially for elderly fathers. An eighth century waka poem made by a young “sakimori” soldier sent to a remote area goes:

Dad and Mom!
Momoyo-gusa (a hundred years flower) in the backyard of your residence.
Please be alive for a hundred years just like them, until I return home.
(A personal translation)

Japan’s oldest waka poem anthology, Manyoshu (ten thousand leaves), devotes one of its 20 volumes to a series of poems composed by sakimori soldiers. These soldiers, mainly farmers from Eastern Japan areas, were drafted into armies in regions facing Korea from the seventh to eighth centuries. After finishing a three-year term, they were allowed to return home, but on their own expense. Some of them could safely return home, but others perished on their way home. It is unknown actually how the sakimori poems were collected for the anthology. It is unseen, either, whether the poem of the young soldier reached his parents.
A poem made by a different sakimori soldier follows:

I have come over here after leaving my kids who cried while clinging to the hem of my trousers, the children who are motherless.
(A personal translation)

A Happy Father’s Day Card came from my daughter staying in California, almost a week before the actual Father’s Day, June 21 this year. “It’s arrived so early. She is always smart and attentive to anyone.” my wife said. She has found not only a job but also a partner-to-be there. The card came with a message from the man. The addressee read it with a mixed but slightly happy feeling, while recalling a waka poem composed by Yamanoue Okura, an eighth century court official, about his kids. His poem follows:

There were no ways at all.
I felt distressed, so I tried to rush out of the house and leave quickly,
but my children were an obstacle.
(A personal translation)

Death of charismatic rock musician and “Saint” of Japan’s ancient poetry

June 13, 2009

Death of charismatic rock musician and “Saint” of Japan’s ancient poetry

The funeral of the 58-year-old rock singer and song writer has attracted more than 40,000 fans from across Japan. Many celebrities extended words of condolences on his death. Some of his books were reprinted after his death. And NHK, Japan’s public TV network, aired a memorial program for him featuring his pet phrase “Loving each other?” Kiyoshiro Imawano (born Kiyoshi Kurihara) was dubbed Japan’s king of rock and the living icon of Japan’s rock n’ roll music. He died of cancer on May 2 after three years of attempt for life.
Imawano continued to write songs in his mother tongue while keeping the linguistic characters of the Japanese language. He inspired the Japanese language by giving a new dimension to commonly used words in today’s Japan. Nobody dares to say that his achievement compares with that of Kakinomoto Hitomaro, the Saint of Japan’s ancient waka poetry. But he may be called a remote “disciple” of the legendary poet beyond many centuries.
Hitomaro was active in the late seventh century, composing waka poems mainly for Imperial family members. He also sang of the solitude and the sorrow of parting for himself. Waka poems before his age had been archaic. The poet played an immeasurable role in refining the rhetoric and knack of waka poems. A poem composed by Hitomaro when he saw the deserted capital of Shiga follows:

On the Sea of Omi,
plovers are playing with the waves in the twilight.
When you, the plovers, cry,
my heart languishes with the past things recalled.
(A personal translation)

The poem is a highlight of Japan’s oldest waka anthology Manyoshu (ten thousand leaves), which was compiled in the eighth century. The regime in Shiga, facing the Sea of Omi, actually a lake, had been toppled in a civil war decades before Hitomaro visited there.
Kiyoshiro wrote many anti-Establishment songs when he was young, but he also made songs with fine, warm melody lines. His 1980 hit song, “Transistor Radio,” says in part:

Woo, I was at a sunny place after skipping the class, lying on the rooftop.
The smoke of my cigarette was so blue.
My transistor radio was always in my inner pocket.
When she was opening her textbook,
the hot number came from the radio and melted into the sky.
Ah, no way to tell a feeling like this. No, no, no.
(A personal translation)

Kiyoshiro’s songs were loved by Japanese from various walks of life, but he always stressed the rock music must be “poisonous.” His cancer started with the throat and spread to other parts. He declined to receive an operation, however, because he did not want to lose his voice.
He was much happier than Hitomaro, who lived a mysterious life. The years when Hitomaro was born and dead are unknown. Researchers are still having difficulty clarifying actually what he was. One opinion says he was dead from penalty.
Imawano was survived by his wife and two children. Up-and-coming young musicians are seen performing at public places like parks and station squares. Their songs are expected to help evolve the Japanese language as young people are curious about speaking for themselves amid a host of economic and social difficulties facing Japan.