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Archive for the 'Hina Matsuri - Doll Festival - Girls' Day' Category
Contents
Posts
Doll Festival in Japan – Displays, Origami and Special Food
Saturday, February 27th, 2010Ayako Egawa wrote to me from Japan about the Doll Festival. It’s called Hina Matsuri in Japanese…
Hi Lisa,
March 3rd is the Doll Festival that families with daughters express wishes for their daughters’ good health and growth by displaying hina dolls as you know.
Hina dolls are traditionally displayed on stepped shelves, but I found hina dolls lined flat. These are smaller than usual too.
The other day my friend taught me how to make hina dolls with Origami. It is so complicated that it took me about an hour to make them, but I think they are pretty! They are a prince and princess.
I offer peach flowers and Hishimochi, diamond-shaped rice cake to hina dolls. That is the Japanese tradition.
Hishimochi consists of pink, white and green rice cakes. The pink tastes sweet, the green smells good.
The pink represents peach flowers, the white means snow, and the green means Yomogi, a Japanese green of early spring. [Yomogi is Japanese Mugwort.]So it means: Under the snow, the green comes into bud, and over the snow, the peach flowers are in bloom. It shows an image of early spring in Japan.
Also the pink means charm, the white means purification, and the green means to drive away bad spirits.
Hope you enjoy our tradition!
Ayako
Thanks so much for sharing that with us Ayako! I love how you made your Hina Matsuri display and the origami of the prince and princess. What a lovely saying: "Under the snow, the green comes into bud, and over the snow, the peach flowers are in bloom."
I found a page of Recipes for Traditional Food for the Dolls Festival, including one for Hishimochi in case anyone would like to try making food for the Dolls Festival.
Here are links to all our posts about the Japanese Doll Festival if anyone would like to learn more about it…
Enjoy! Happy Hina Matsuri!
Mama Lisa
UPDATE: Some people were looking for instructions to make Origami Hina Dolls. You can click the link for a visual guide and/or watch the YouTube below…
You can draw a face on the head at the end if you’d like (some people do this)! Good luck and enjoy!
The Japanese Dolls Festival: Unchanged in a Century
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010Dolls Festival is coming up on March 4th in Japan. I found this description of an experience of the Festival from 1919. What’s interesting is that it sounds like the Festival hasn’t changed much to this day…
Tokyo, Tuesday, March 4.
…Yesterday, to begin, was spent thus: It was the famous festival of dolls… (A family) invited me in to see their exhibition. Some of their dolls are two hundred years old from their mothers’ family… But it is true that one begins immediately to get the passion for dolls; they are not dead things like ours, but works of art symbolic of all the different phases of national life. The little girls were delighted with their possessions…
In the afternoon I was invited to go to the best or one of the best collections in the country and that was a great experience… The family that owns this famous collection is very old and the wife is the daughter of a Daimyo, hence the dolls are very old. And they are wonderful, and more wonderful still their housekeeping equipment of old lacquer and porcelain and glass. The doll refreshments are served in tiny dishes on tiny tables while the guests sit on the floor, the hostess and her family doing all the serving. We had the thick white wine made from rice poured out of wonderful little decanters into tiny glasses. We drank to the health of the family and the stuff is delicious, with an aroma such as no honey can excel. After these refreshments we were shown the room for the tea ceremony and then taken back into the foreign part of the house for real refreshments, which consisted of many and wonderful varieties of cakes. The tea was served in cups with saucers decorated with plum blossoms, this being the time of plum blossoms. Then tea cups taken away and cups of rich chocolate placed on the tables. These tables were high enough for the ordinary chairs… The Baroness urged us to eat special cakes and we left stuffed. One kind is in the form of a beautiful pink leaf wrapped in a cherry leaf which has been preserved from last year. The leaf gives the cake a delicious flavor and also a cover to protect the fingers from its stickiness. Then three little round brown cakes looking some like chocolate-on a skewer. You bite off the first one whole, then slip the other two as you eat them. Those alone are enough for a meal and very nourishing. All cakes are made from bean paste or like our richest pastries. When that second meal was finished, we said good-bye. The Baroness and her three pretty daughters and her sister all followed us to the outer door and when our auto drove off the last thing we saw were the bows of the butlers and these pretty ladies, all saying one more harmonious good-bye. The young girls dress in kimonos of wool muslin…
The garden is indescribable. I had some fancy of what a Japanese garden would look like, but find it is nothing at all beside the reality. This place is big and the grass is now brown. Most of the grass is covered with a thick carpet of pine needles and at the edge of the pine needle carpet a rope of twisted straw outlines graceful curves. The use of the big stones is the most surprising part of the whole. They are very old and weather-stained, of many shades of gray and blue-gray, with the short shrubs for a background, and the severity and simplicity of the result has a classic beauty which we may attain in centuries, and only after we have consumed our abundance of things material.
This description comes from Letters from China and Japan by John Dewey and Alice Chipman Dewey. I edited it down from the original longer version.
Teaching Kids about Japanese Festivals
Thursday, February 4th, 2010I’m going into my daughter’s class this week to talk about some Japanese Festivals. It may be helpful to other people who are also covering this topic for me to outline what I’m covering with links to more material.
1) Hina Matsuri – Doll Festival – March 3rd – people pray for their daughters’ future happiness, health and growth.
The hina (dolls) used for this festival are called hina ningyo. These are a set of dolls that are handed down from generation to generation which are specially taken out for this festival. The dolls are displayed on a special stand that has tiers which are covered in red cloth.
It’s also called Peach Blossom Festival, because it’s around the time the peach blossoms bloom. Peach blossoms are a symbol for a happy marriage.
Girls dress up specially on this day in their best kimonos. Some girls will dress up like the dolls and have little parties.
Here’s an old traditional song that’s sung for the Festival with the transliterated Japanese, and with a loose English translation.
Hina Matsuri Song
Transliterated JapaneseAkari o tsukema sho bon bori ni
O hana o agemasyo momo no hana
Gonin – bayashi no fue daiko
Kyoo wa tanoshii Hina MatsuriLoose English Translation
Let’s light the lanterns on the tiered stand
Let’s put peach blossoms on the tiered stand
Five court musicians are playing flutes and drums
Today is a happy Dolls’ Festival.MP3 of the Hina Matsuri Song
The girl below is singing the song in her special kimono in front of her dolls…Right after the festival, the dolls are supposed to be put away. If not, it’s thought that the daughter will be slow to marry.
You can learn more about Hina Matsuri on previous blog posts.
2) Tango no Sekku – Boys’ Festival - officially called Children’s Day or Kodomo no hi - May 5th
It’s been celebrated for over 1000 years. Originally it was celebrated in the houses of warriors. It celebrated boys’ courage and determination. Many of the symbols of this day are about having the character of a warrior. Eventually this day became important to all households in Japan with boys.
Print by famous artist Hiroshige (1797 – 1858)
Large carp windsocks, called koinobori, are displayed outside houses of families with boys. There’s one windsock for each boy in the house. The largest windsock is for the oldest son of the house. The carp is a symbol of Tango no Sekku, because carp are considered strong and determined.
Here’s a traditional song for Tango no Sekku called Koinoburi or Carp Windsocks.
Koinobori
(Japanese Transliteration)Yane yori takai koinobori.
Okii magoi wa otoosan.
Chisai higoi wa kodomotachi.
Omoshiro soni oyideru.Carp Windsocks
(English)Carp windsocks are above the roof.
The biggest carp is the father,
The smaller carp are children,
They’re enjoying swimming in the sky.You can read more about Tango no Sekku on previous blog posts.
3) Tanabata – The Star Festival – July 7th
Tanabata celebrates the meeting of a husband and wife. They are Orihime (the star Vega) and Hikoboshi (the star Altair). to meet they must cross the river Amanogawa (the Milky Way). They can only meet once a year on this night. it’s the one time they can cross the river. The story is that a flock of magpies help Orihime cross the river on this day only. If it’s a cloudy night, that means the river was too high and Orihame and Hikoboshi couldn’t meet. So in Japan everyone wishes for a clear night full of stars on July 7th.
Ayako Egawa in Japan wrote to me about one fun tradition on this day: “Children write their wishes on strips of fancy paper and put them on displays made of the branches of bamboo trees.”
Here’s a song for Tanabata…
Sasa no ha sara-sara
In Japanese Romaji:
Sasa no ha sara-sara
Nokiba ni yureru
Ohoshi-sama kira-kira
Kingin sunagoEnglish Translation:
Bamboo leaves are rustling, rustling,
Swaying close to the roof’s edge,
Oh, how the stars are twinkling, twinkling,
Gold and silver grains of sand.Midi Tune of Sasa no ha sara-sara
You can read more about Tanabata on previous blog posts..
Check out our Japanese Song Pages for many other Japanese kids songs and Holiday Songs. You can find out more info about other Japanese festivals in the blog side column under Holidays Around the World (once you click it on, you’ll see the different holidays listed in the left-hand column).
Hope this helps!
Mama Lisa
Note: If you’re doing a presentation in a school, you should check if YouTube videos are blocked – if they are, make sure you can play mp3’s and midi tunes.
Hina Matsuri – Doll Festival in Japan
Thursday, March 19th, 2009Hina Matsuri or “Doll Festival”, is celebrated in Japan on March 3rd every year.
Ayako Egawa wrote to me from Japan about the holiday:
“Families with daughters celebrate March 3 by displaying Hina-dolls on a stepped shelf to express the wish for their daughters’ good health and growth. I posted a photo of ‘Hina-dolls’ (below). They are pretty.”
“We decorate Hina-dolls with flowers of peach and field mascard (canola) on ‘Hina Matsuri’. These below are flowers of peach.” The peach blossoms are thought to repel evil.
Ayako makes flower arrangements. She wrote, “This is a ‘Hinamatsuri’ arrangement I made. It has in it flowers of peach, field mustard (canola – the small yellow flower), gerbera, roses, persion buttercup (the big yellow flower) and lemon leaf. The point of this arrangement is arrange the flowers of peach vertically going higher. The pink tone of the flowers create an elegant mood.”
Here’s the Hina Matsuri Song that’s sung all over Japan for the holiday. You can hear it being sung below by Sakura and Hatsami. The recording is followed by the transliterated lyrics, an English translation and the Japanese text…
Hina Matsuri Song
Transliterated Japanese
Akari o tsukema sho bon bori ni
O hana o agemasyo momo no hana
Gonin – bayashi no fue daiko
Kyoo wa tanoshii Hina MatsuriLoose English Translation
Let’s light the lanterns on the tiered stand
Let’s put peach blossoms on the tiered stand
Five court musicians are playing flutes and drums
Today is a Happy Dolls’ Festival.Japanese Text for the Hina Matsuri Song
うれしいひなまつり
You can read more about Hina Matsuri in a previous posts I’ve written about it by clicking on the links below.
You can visit the Mama Lisa’s World Hina Matsuri Song Page for sheet music to this song.
Many thanks Ayako Egawa for sharing her photos with us about Hinamatsuri and for commenting on them, to Sakura and Hatsami for singing the Hina Matsuri Song and to Peter Galante of Learn Japanese with JapanesePod101.com for allowing us to use this wonderful recording! The recording is from their podcast about the Hina Matsuri Festival (it’s mainly in English).
Happy Hina Matsuri!
Mama Lisa
Hina Matsuri 雛祭り – The Doll Festival in Japan – Has its Roots in an Old Chinese Purification Ceremony
Friday, March 2nd, 2007Tomorrow, March 3rd, is the Hina Matsuri 雛祭り or Doll Festival in Japan.
The Japanese celebration seems to have originated in China, where there was a festival called Shang-suu that had also been celebrated on March 3rd, at least since the 3rd century AD. Shang-suu may go back before that time but the date may have shifted. (It looks like Shang-suu eventually merged with the Ching Ming Festival – Remembrance of Ancestors Day – which is still celebrated today in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. Now it takes place on April 4th or 5th.)
Shang-suu was a day of purification. Suu stands for snake, so for convenience, I’ll translate it here as the Day of the Snake (as it came to be called later in Japan). In China, Shamans were considered people who could see evil spirits. On Shang-suu, the shamans gave people baths using herbs in rivers to wash away the evil spirits.
We know that by the 11th century in Japan, the nobles had adapted a similar ceremony. This was called Mi-no-hi or jō-shi. We can date it because it’s mentioned in a book of the times called the Tales of Genji. By that time, it wasn’t the actual person who was cleansed in the river, but a doll who represented him or her.
In the Tales of Genji it says, “It was the day of the serpent, the first such day in the Third Month. ‘The day when a man who has worries goes down and washes them away,’ said one of his (Genji’s) men, admirably informed, it would seem, in all the annual observances. Genji thought he could see something of himself in the rather large doll being cast off to sea, bearing away sins and tribulations. ‘Cast away to drift on an alien vastness, I grieve for more than a doll cast out to sea.’”
Today, in parts of Japan, some people still load boats with dolls and send them off to sea. Now, though, the festival is mostly for girls. It’s called Hina Nagashi Matsuri or Floating Dolls Festival. Traditionally, people first rub the dolls to pass any bad luck onto the doll. Then they let the doll float down the river in a little boat and then out to sea to cast off all evilness and bad spirits.
In some towns they load up big boats and many people cast their old dolls in them. In the photo below, the dolls are actually made with fish food!
Between the 11th century and today, the tradition of Hina Nagashi Matsuri went from being mainly for the nobility to spreading to the whole population. Part of the reason for this was that merchants wanted to sell their paper dolls at this time of year. So they encouraged more of the population to buy them. By the 18th century, the dolls became more intricate and expensive. People no longer wanted to float them out to sea. So they started bringing them to temples to get rid of the evil.
Eventually, people started buying alters for their dolls called hina dan (doll alter) on which to display them in their own homes. These became like shrines. They made offerings of shirosake (sweet sake made from fermented rice) and hishi mochi (diamond-shaped rice cakes with three to five layers). The alters are decorated with peach blossoms which is thought to repel evilness.
The hina matsuri dolls are now called hina ningyo. They’re often passed down from mother to daughter from generation to generation. The hope behind celebrating the Hina Matsuri is that the daughter will live a long, healthy and happy life.
Here’s the Hina Matsuri Song that’s sung all over Japan on this day. You can hear it being sung by Sakura and Hatsami…
Hina Matsuri Song
Transliterated Japanese
Akari o tsukema sho bon bori ni
O hana o agemasyo momo no hana
Gonin – bayashi no fue daiko
Kyoo wa tanoshii Hina MatsuriLoose English Translation
Let’s light the lanterns on the tiered stand
Let’s put peach blossoms on the tiered stand
Five court musicians are playing flutes and drums
Today is a Happy Dolls’ Festival.Japanese Text for the Hina Matsuri Song
うれしいひなまつり
Happy Hina Matsuri!
You can read more about Hina Matsuri in a previous post I wrote about it. It tells more about the hina ningyo dolls.
You can visit the Mama Lisa’s World Hina Matsuri Song Page for sheet music for this song.
Many thanks to Sakura and Hatsami for singing the Hina Matsuri Song and to Peter Galante of Learn Japanese with JapanesePod101.com for allowing us to use this wonderful recording! The recording is from their podcast about the Hina Matsuri Festival (it’s mainly in English).
For anyone interested in reading more about Shang-ssu and Hina Matsuri, I’d recommend an article by Alsace Yen called Shang-ssu Festival and Its Myths in China and Japan
Hina Matsuri, The Doll Festival in Japan is on March 3rd
Thursday, March 2nd, 2006In Japan, on March 3rd, Hina Matsuri, people pray for their daughters’ future happiness, health and growth.
Hina means doll and matsuri means festival, so Hina Matsuri is literally Doll Festival. It’s also Girls’ Day. Yet another name for the day is Momo no Sekku meaning Peach Blossom Festival, because this is around the time the peach blossoms bloom. Peach blossoms also are a symbol for a happy marriage.
The hina used for this festival are called hina ningyo. These are a set of dolls that are handed down from generation to generation which are only taken out for this festival. The hina ningyo are displayed on a special stand that has tiers which are covered in red cloth. The two most important hina are the Emperor and Empress. They sit on the top tier. On the second tier are 3 ladies in waiting. On the third tier sit 5 male musicians. One plays a drum, one plays a flute and the third is a singer. The fourth tier has 2 ministers, followed by 3 servants on the fifth tier. The sets have up to 15 dolls, but not all families have the whole set. Many will just have a couple of dolls, often a man and a lady on one tier. Others will use paper dolls.
The tradition of displaying dolls for Hina Matsuri dates back to the Edo or Tokugawa Period, which was from about 1600 to 1867. It comes from an old custom in China to float paper dolls down the river to take away evil spirits. This is still practiced in some places in Japan and is called Hina Nagashi Matsuri or Floating Dolls Festival. The girls will place two paper dolls in a boat made of wood or straw with rice cakes to take away bad luck, illness and misfortune. In some places they will float paper dolls down the river without a little boat.
Girls dress up specially on this day in their best kimonos. Some girls will dress up like the dolls and have little parties. They will serve hishi mochi which are diamond-shaped rice cakes with three to five layers. They also serve a mild sweet white saki called shirozake.
There’s an old traditional song that’s sung for the Festival. Here it is in transliterated Japanese, and with a loose English translation…
Hina Matsuri Song
Transliterated JapaneseAkari o tsukema sho bon bori ni
O hana o agemasyo momo no hana
Gonin – bayashi no fue daiko
Kyoo wa tanoshii Hina MatsuriLoose English Translation
Let’s light the lanterns on the tiered stand
Let’s put peach blossoms on the tiered stand
Five court musicians are playing flutes and drums
Today is a happy Dolls’ Festival.
Japanese Text for the Hina Matsuri Song
Please see the comments below this post for the other three verses to the Hina Matsuri Song, in Japanese text only.
Here’s another version of the Hina Matsuri Song.
Right after the festival, the dolls are supposed to be put away. If not, it’s thought that the daughter will be slow to marry.
Happy Hina Matsuri!
Lisa
You can read more about the Origin of Hina Matsuri and Hina Nagashi Matsuri in a later blog post.
You can visit the Mama Lisa’s World Hina Matsuri Song Page for sheet music for this song.
Many thanks to Sakura and Hatsami for singing the Hina Matsuri Song and to Peter Galante of Learn Japanese with JapanesePod101.com for allowing us to use this wonderful recording! The recording is from their podcast about the Hina Matsuri Festival (it’s mainly in English).
Many thanks to Devon of Head, Shoulders, Knees and all that and Ayako Egawa for bringing this festival to my attention, and to Devon for sending me the Japanese text.
Check out Origami Instructions to make Hina Dolls
Come visit the Mama Lisa’s World Japan Page for more Japanese Songs with their English translations.
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