Giant Robot Store and GR2 News
In Japan, Obon is a day to remember the dead.
As a youth, the Obon festival or “carnival” was something I looked forward to every year. It took place at my local Buddhist Temple in West Los Angeles every summer in July. The side street gets blocked off and lined with lit chochin (paper lanterns) that would sway in the western breeze at magic hour. There were no carnival rides, but the festiveness made you feel like there was a lot going on. This was a local event and the attendees were mostly Japanese Americans. I’d go and see my world – J.A. kids from both of my schools, the daily American, and my saturday Japanese school. There was nothing like eating chicken teriyaki, then holding a snow cone, and playing the vendor games like throwing a softball into tic tac toe, “dough ball”, or tossing metal rings to win coins. Then doing it all over again. Life was great on that day.