Holy Hanami

Throughout my life I’ve pondered over the question of whether God exists. If God existed, would there be wars? Would there be terrorism? Would there be nuclear warfare? Obesity? Cigarettes? Why would God have created these things in the first place if they are so harmful? I’ve struggled over this question for quite some time now.

And then I did Hanami.

Let’s backtrack a second. What is Hanami? Hanami is literally the direction combination of two Japanese characters “hana”, meaning flower, and “mi” ,meaning to see,. Thus, "to see flowers". Hanami refers to the cherry blossom viewing season in Japan – a time when people from all over Japan flock to parks, rivers, lakes, and shrines to look at the cherry blossoms. And it has evolved into much more than that over the past few decades. Now, it has become a huge social phenomenon. It is now customary to gather friends, family, heck, even strangers can come along, to eat and drink under the cherry blossoms until midnight. Many Japanese companies hold Hanami parties as well, albeit, with a little cruelty involved. In order to reserve the best spot for Hanami, Japanese companies often send their newest employees at 7 (yes, seven) in the morning (yes, morning) to sit around and reserve the spot until 6 (yes, 6) PM or so when the rest of their colleagues come. A Japanese form of hazing, perhaps?

So you must be saying to yourself, “Wow – Dan’s lifelong struggle with the existence of God was decided by a silly flower! What a doofus! What a silly willy! What a dope! What a (insert anachronistic vocabulary word here)!” But only if you yourself do Hanami will you understand. I will try to convey to you the emotions, the feelings, the sights of Hanami in these next few paragraphs, but like a great meal, you’ll only know if you try it.

I first went on Monday to Yasukuni Shrine, one of the top spots for Hanami in Tokyo. The problem is with Hanami is it's quite hard to time it all. The Japanese Meteorological Society issues a “Cherry Blossom Front”, which is basically a map of Japan showing where the flowers will bloom at when. Tokyo was slated to bloom a bit early this year, around March 21^st. The problem is that the peak is not March 21^st, but about a week later. So when I went this Monday (the 26^th), many of the trees at the shrine had not bloomed yet. There were a few that were in full bloom (of course, surrounded by mobs of people) and they were quite beautiful, but the sheer imagery of what the place would look like at peak time made me return today to see what had transpired over the past three days.

And, oh, did things transpire. If there was such a word in the English language that rolled the meanings of beautiful, explosion, sheer brilliance, spectacular, mind-boggling, breathtaking, jaw-dropping, earth-shattering, extraordinary into one word, that’s the word I would choose to describe Hanami at full bloom. Whoa, Dan! Use your adjectives wisely! You can’t possibly be serious! Nothing can be NINE adjectives worth of beautiful. WRONG. Again, see for yourself. I challenge you.

When I got out of the train station today by the shrine, I almost dropped my camera. Flowers were blooming everywhere. And by everywhere I mean hundreds of thousands of flowers everywhere. The walkways up and down the shrines were lined with small pink blossoms. It was like the trees were covered in dripping pink paint. I didn’t even mind the crowds – this was worth it all. What made Yasukuni Shrine special was the juxtaposition (S.A.T. WORD ALERT!!) of the flowers next to the temple buildings. Then again, these flowers could make a gas station toilet look like royalty. One particular favorite sight of mine was a huge branch of blossoms draped in front of the green and gold facade of one of the shrine’s buildings. You really just don’t see that stuff everyday.

And the flowers made the atmosphere that much better. People were not their usual selves. Not to stereotype, but Japanese people rush everywhere – they are an inherently stressed nation and there are times where I just feel like becoming a doctor and prescribing the whole nation a bottle of chill pills, taken twice a day on an empty stomach before meals. But Hanami is different. People laze around in the very sense of the word. Families sit for hours, napping, playing with their children, eating, drinking – Hanami transforms the nation, so to speak. And it was evident everywhere.

After the shrine I went over to the nearby gardens, where I had also heard was a popular viewing spot. I’m really running out of adjectives here, so lets just say that the garden had Yasukuni beat by miles. This was because the garden was surrounded by an enormous lake that was flanked by sheer walls of pink cherry blossom flowers. See the pictures for yourself. There were people boating in the water too, getting up close and personal with the flowers. Of course, the crowds were relentless. The Japanese word ippai would best describe the crowds (ippai is roughly translated to “packed” or “full of” in English). But I didn’t really mind.

The best part about Hanami is that you can’t get too much of it and you can’t get sick of it, much like you can with other good things in life (chocolate, reality television, democracy, Blues Clues, pickles, fondue, did I mention chocolate?, vintage baseball cards – I’m pretty much naming things I like at this point in order to make a point). The reason for this is that Hanami lasts for one week. And that's it. You’ll wake up a week after Hanami begins and its all gone – like a giant hand came through with a sponge a washed the trees clean. And in its wake, the trees sprout their normal green leaves and go on with their lives. The remnants of the flowers line the streets, like little pieces of pink tape, but that’s all.

Looking back at what I’ve written, I’m a bit disappointed because I don’t feel I effectively conveyed what Hanami actually is. But I guess I have to suffice with trusting you, the reader, to see it for yourself. If any of you are planning to go to Japan, have ever thought of going to Japan, or can merely spell Japan correctly, go during Hanami season. Every year, Hanami is around the same time, give or take a week. Check in with meteorological forecasts (japan-guide.com has a good one in English, albeit less detailed than the Japanese one) that show the cherry blossom front starting in late-January.

If you can, definitely check out my pictures on Facebook. There are bunch up there that I didn't have room to put up here. If you can't, certainly look at the enlarged versions of these photographs. Trust me, I'm not trying to flaunt my photography skills here, I just want you see the best pictures possible of the flowers.

Jaa mata ne!