When I lived in Japan Tanabata was my favorite time of year.

[kristopher]

From wiki:
Tanabata (七夕?, meaning "Evening of the seventh") is a Japanese star festival, originating from the Chinese Qixi Festival. It celebrates the meeting of the deities Orihime and Hikoboshi (represented by the stars Vega and Altair respectively). According to legend, the Milky Way separates these lovers, and they are allowed to meet only once a year on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month of the lunisolar calendar. The date of Tanabata varies by region of the country, but the first festivities begin on July 7 of the Gregorian calendar. The celebration is held at night."


Tanabata star festival observed in Fukushima

Children in Fukushima city celebrated the annual Tanabata star festival on Thursday, replacing natural bamboo leaves normally used with polyethylene alternatives because of radiation fears.

A nursery school in the northeastern Japanese city has decided not to use locally grown bamboo as the decoration, and abandoned a tradition of putting it outside the building.

The children decorated the plastic leaves with fancy paper and strips bearing their wishes. Some wrote that they want to play outdoors.

The nursery school chief said all the windows are closed to keep out radiation and lamented that the children cannot play in the open air.

At Osaka's airport...

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/07_30.html

[xchrom]

1. Recommend

[chillspike]

2. What a sad and great legend

But I'm glad to learn things about Japan I didn't know. However, I thought seven was pronounced nana or shichi in Japanese? Perhaps there are exceptions? Did you live in the city or countryside?

[kristopher]

3. I lived in central Tokyo and then on the outskirts just into Saitama.

When practices like this instance with the children start to emerge I take it as a strong reflection of the larger public sentiment.

Yes, seven is shichi or nana; I've never thought about the pronunciation in this case but I'd guess that it is a dialect or a hold-over of an older pronunciation for what is an older custom even by their standards. There is a stong history of some pretty divergent speech patterns in both idioms and pronunciation.

Have you lived there or studied the language?

[chillspike]

6. I have been studying on my own about six months

and really enjoy the language. Never had the opportunity to visit but might finally have the chance in the near future. I have been searching for Japanese grade school books in an attempt to learn Japanese.

[pscot]

4. The summer triangle

Deneb, Altair and Vega. Deneb is also the head of Cygnet, the Swan, which lies along the milky way. One of life's great pleasures is lying outdoors on a warm summer night, looking up. That's a such a sad story. What the fuck have we done to ourselves.

[kristopher]

5. +1