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It's August in Japan, and to millions of Japanese
sports fans that means -- high school baseball! High school
baseball is really big in Japan, and teams from each of Japan's
47 prefectures try all season long to win the right to go to
Koshien (koh-SHE-en) Stadium near Osaka, where the national
championships are being held right now. To go to Koshien is the
dream of every young ball player, and it has a positive effect
on the future careers of thousands of young men every year,
whether they go on to play professional baseball or not. The
drama of a Koshien race is captured in manga and anime such as
the classic Touch, a comic I used to study Japanese with while
at college. By an amazing coincidence, J-List is based in the
city where Touch creator Mitsuru Adachi was born, and this year
our prefecture is represented at Koshien by Maebashi Commercial
High School, Mr. Adachi's old alma mater (and also the school
that our own Yasu graduated from). We'll be rooting for them
this year!
August is also the season of matsuri, or
festivals, and each town in Japan hosts at least one wild
festival, closing off streets to allow its citizens to dance
through the town in celebration of summer. I went down to check
out our city's festival, which was on last night, and had a
great time. There were a dozen floats filled with children
playing taiko drums and banging on gongs, and groups of men
carrying omikoshi, which are portable Shinto shrines that you
parade around on your shoulders while shouting washoi, washoi,
washoi. All around us were young people wearing new yukata,
cotton kimonos for summer, while they enjoyed the chaos all
around them. Beer flows quite freely at these festivals, and
more than once we were approached by inebriated Japanese men who
wanted to practice their English with us. Although I could do
without the heat, I sure like summer in Japan because of the
festivals.
On a sadder note, Saturday was the 60th
anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, and
a very solemn ceremony was held in the city to honor those
killed on August 6, 1945. In April, I took my mother and kids to
Hiroshima to see the city and experience the Peace Park, the
area above ground zero that has been converted into a beautiful
place to reflect on the past. The museum was especially moving,
filled with displays of objects recovered after the blast, such
as melted glass bottles, children's tricycles, and the famous
Hiroshima Watch, stopped forever at 8:15 am. Since my children
are part of both Japan and America, I wanted them to see the
images or Hiroshima and know how different things had been
during that terrible time. Despite being completely destroyed,
the city of Hiroshima has been rebuilt into an amazing and
vibrant city that all Japan can be proud of.
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