First local Children’s Day honors a Japanese tradition celebrated for more than a thousand years
By Cameron Aalto, Ashland.news
More than 400 community members turned out Sunday afternoon for Ashland Japanese Garden’s first year celebrating Kodomo no Hi, or Children’s Day, a national holiday celebrated in Japan on May 5.
Children’s Day is “a celebration of children’s individuality and strength, and really celebrating children’s identity in Japan,” explained Sulaiman Shelton, volunteer and special event manager for Ashland Parks & Recreation. He said it became a national holiday in Japan in 1948, taking the place of previously separate Boys and Girls Days, and a Girls Day.
Children’s Day has stemmed from a tradition that has been celebrated for over a thousand years, beginning during the Nara Period in 710 C.E., according to the Seattle Japanese Garden website. The holiday functions to, “respect all children’s personalities, celebrate their happiness, and thank their mothers.” The holiday is celebrated by flying koinobori, “or carp-shaped windsocks” to promote the health, wellbeing and strength of children.
This year, the event was made special by traditional materials sourced from Japan, such as the koinobori flying over the koi pond, kamifūsen (paper balloons), koma (wooden spinning tops), and kendama (traditional skill toys). “The hardest part of the event was sourcing all the material equipment and games from Japan,” Shelton said, seeing as the items used and displayed “are very difficult to get in the U.S.”
It is expected that Children’s Day will be celebrated by the Ashland Japanese Garden annually, reusing the equipment from Japan and incorporating more traditional elements based on what community members “want to be represented.”
The event was hosted by the Ashland Japanese Garden and supported by the Garden Management Advisory Committee.
“We have an Ashland Japanese Garden Management Advisory Committe, or MAC, that is a group of community members … they have been working really hard to come up with a series of annual events for the community, here in the garden,” said Interim Parks and Recreation Director Leslie Eldridge. “So we’re moving towards making the garden more accessible and recognizing Japanese holidays and ceremonies here in the garden every year.”
Akemi Ayala has been a volunteer with the Ashland Japanese Garden for a year and a half. During the event, she taught children and adults alike how to fold origami. She learned origami from her grandmother when she was around the age of 2 or 3 and said, “so many famil(ies) in Japan, they always have origami.”
Ayala grew up in Osaka, Japan, and said that she has celebrated Children’s Day annually. On Children’s Day In Osaka, she said that “we can see the koinobori fish … we can see (them) everywhere. Some (people) put koinobori fish in their apartment, their balcony, and (in) the countryside they put the big koinobori on the edge of the river … it’s so beautiful.” Ayala says the holiday symbolizes the hope for children’s health.
Community member Carrie Vath brought her second-grade daughter Vivian Vath-Stirling to the garden to celebrate Children’s Day. Vivian spent time at the origami station and says, “I learned how to make origami” in the shapes of “hearts and fortune tellers.” Along with origami, Vivian drew a koinobori fish to celebrate the holiday.
Ashland.news intern Cameron Aalto is a senior at Southern Oregon University. Email him at aaltoc@sou.edu.
