May 5th is Children’s Day. It used to be Boy’s Day, but in 1948 when the government made it an official holiday, they changed the day to be for both boys and girls. A little unfair, don’t you think? Girl’s already have their own festival on March 3rd!
In the photo below you can see some fish! These carp streamers, called koinobori (鯉幟/こいのぼり) are put up in honor of sons and in the hope they will grown up strong.
There are usually at least 3. The black biggest one is for dad, the red one for mom, and the blue one for the boy1. If there are additional boys in the house, more are added as in the photo above.
Why carp? Carp swim upstream to become dragons! And of course every parent wants their boys to do the same. My photo above is a bit lifeless, but when the wind is blowing those carp streamers really swim along!
Now many houses these days have no yard, and many more people live in small cramped apartments. Lucky, there are small carp streamers available at stores everywhere.
As usual, click on each photo to get a bigger version, or head to my flickr page to grab the full-size one.
Want more? Wikipedia has you covered!
- Seems to be a bit of confusion on this point. Some folks I talk to say the red carp is mom, others say the red carp is the first son. Even wikipedia gives us these two different versions in various articles they have on the subject. I suppose it doesn’t much matter, so pick the one you like. ↩
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