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Saturday, October 31 (archive)

Today in Japan

Watercolor of a Halloween pumpkin lantern, a Japanese teapot and cups of green tea, and ginkgo nuts, with costumed adults walking along an autumn gaslit street suggesting Yokohama

What day is it?

  1. Halloweenハロウィン

    Halloween in Japan is less about kids going door to door and more about dressing up. Young adults put on costumes and gather in busy areas, and theme parks and shops hold events for weeks. Trick-or-treating does happen, but usually as a planned event in a neighborhood or shopping street, not by knocking on random doors.

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  2. 1972年制定Gas Dayガス記念日

    On this day in 1872, by today's calendar, gas street lamps were lit along Bashamichi, a street in Yokohama. Crowds came to see them, because they were a symbol of the new, modern Japan. The Japan Gas Association made this date Gas Day in 1972, a hundred years later. Bashamichi still has gas lamps today.

  3. Japanese Tea Day日本茶の日

    October 31st is sometimes called Japanese Tea Day. It is said that on this day in 1191, the monk Eisai brought tea seeds back from China. Who first named the day is not clear, and October 1st is also known as Japanese Tea Day. Either way, Eisai is often credited with spreading the habit of drinking tea in Japan.

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If someone asks you

Q

Do kids go trick-or-treating in Japan?

A

Not really in the way you might be used to. Kids don't usually knock on strangers' doors. Instead, some neighborhoods and shopping streets plan an event where kids in costumes visit houses or shops that have signed up. For most people here, Halloween is more about dressing up and going out with friends.

In season Ginkgo nuts ぎんなん This is the season for ginnan, or ginkgo nuts. The trees drop them in fall, and the fleshy outer part smells terrible, so people collect them carefully. Inside the smelly flesh is a hard white shell, and inside that is a green nut, which is roasted with salt or put in chawanmushi, a savory egg custard. People are told not to eat too many at once, especially children. Micro-season 53 of 72 霎時施こさめときどきふる Light Rain Comes and Goes Short showers pass through and stop again. Japanese has a special word, shigure, for this late-autumn rain that never settles into a real downpour.

Phrase of the day

Are you dressing up for Halloween?

Sentence of the day

In Japan, Halloween is mostly a night for young adults to dress up and go out, not for kids to collect candy. It's also Gas Day, marking the gas lamps lit in Yokohama in 1872.

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Sources

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