Tanabata Festival

Tanabata, or the Star Festival, is a Chinese legend about two stars, Altair and Vega, who are able to meet one day out of the year. The rest of the year they are separated across the milky way. Tanabata is celebrated on the 7th day of the 7th month, so today being July 7th, we celebrated Tanabata. A popular custom is to write your wishes on a piece of colored paper and hang that wish from a piece of a bamboo tree in hope that the wish will come true.

I had noticed with our friends last week lots of colorful papers being hung around the city in parks or at shrines but had no idea what it was in relation to. I figured it was some kind of wish or something of that nature. Today, Miyako and I went to our local indoor play area and it was unusually crowded. There were probably 50 kids plus their moms in the small little room. Come to find out, the play area was celebrating Tanabata. We sang songs (and I got many compliments on my jouzu (skillful) Japanese - YAY, I can read enough characters to sing some kiddie songs) and made a craft with the male and female people who plan to meet today. A friend compared it to the Asian version of Romeo and Juliet. Nobody dies, but the couple can only unite one day out of the year. We were also given a piece of paper to write wishes for Miyako on. I did not know enough Japanese to know I was supposed to write a wish on it. Instead, I wrote her name in English and Japanese and she partially colored the paper while fully coloring her hand in the process...with marker! When Kan came home, he found the Tanabata branch on his desk as a "welcome home from work" gift. What I thought would just be a typical day at the indoor play area, turned into a fun craft time, and I learned something cultural in the process.