: When I Was a Boy in Japan by Shioya Sakae - Japan Social life and customs

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A JAPANESE HOUSE 22

A JAPANESE SCHOOL SCENE 40

THE JAPANESE "BROADWAY" 56

A TYPICAL JAPANESE STREET 90

A JAPANESE SCHOOL OF THE PRESENT DAY 120

WHEN I WAS A BOY IN JAPAN

MY INFANCY

How I Looked--My Name--Walking--In Tea Season--My Toys--"Kidnapped"--O-dango.

I suppose I don't need to tell you exactly, my little friends, when and where I was born, because Japanese names are rather hard for you to remember, and then I don't want to disclose my age. Suffice it to say that I was once a baby like all of you and my birthplace was about a day's journey from Tokyo, the capital of Japan. I wish I could have observed myself and noted down every funny thing I did when very small, as the guardian angel, who is said to be standing by every cradle, will surely do. But when my memory began to be serviceable, I was well on in my infancy, and if I were to rely on that only, I should have to skip over a considerable length of time. How I should dislike to do this! So, my little friends, let me construct this chapter out of bits of things my mamma used to tell me now and then.

When I was born, my father was away. Grandma was very proud to have a boy for the first-born, and at once wrote him a letter saying that a son was born to him and that he was like--and then she wrote two large circles, meaning that I was very, very plump. Do you know how a plump Japanese baby looks? I have often wondered myself, and have many a time watched a baby taking a bath. Let us suppose him to be one year old and about to be put into warm water in a wooden tub. His chin is dimple-cleft, his cheeks ripe as an apple, and his limbs are but a continuation of his fat trunk. And how jolly the elfin is! After the queer expression he has shown on being dipped has passed away and he realizes what he is about, he will make many quick bows--really, I assure you, to show his thanks for the trouble of washing him. At this, mother, sister, and the maid assisting them give a burst of laughter, when, with a scream of immense delight, he will strike his fists into the water, causing a panic among the well-clad and not-ready-to-get-wet attendants. With royal indifference, however, he will then try to push his fist into his mouth, and not grumbling at all over his ill-success, he will set about telling a story with his everlasting mum-mum. Now he is taken out and laid on a towel. Glowing red, how he will move his arms and legs like an overturned turtle! Well, that is how I looked, I am very sure.

In Japan, in christening a child, we follow the principle of "A good name is better than rich ointment." I was named Sakae, which in the hierographic Chinese characters represents fire burning on a stand. The idea of illumination will perhaps suggest itself to you at once, and indeed, it means glory or thrift. And my well-wishing parents named me so, that I might thrive and be a glory to my family. So I was bound to be good, wasn't I? A bad boy with a good name would be very much like a monkey with a silk hat on.

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