February 23 is Fuji Day in Japan. It’s an optional holiday, so some schools have the day off and some don’t. My school was open and decided to throw a school-wide haiku contest and drawing contest. They had to write about Fuji and draw about Fuji. Not surprising, some students used it as an opportunity to simply draw triangles with smiley faces with charcoal. Some were creative with cloud placements and drew phallic Mt. Fujis. I just stared at it — the mountain, not the phallic drawings.
Shizuoka apparently ruffled some feathers when it first proposed Fuji Day. Yes, it’s great to have a day to celebrate one of Japan’s most iconic symbols, but they chose the date because it’s very punny.
February 23 can be simply broken down to these numbers: 2 23
The kanji for the number two has two pronunciations: fu and ji.
The kanji for the number three is more known for this pronunciation: san.
Basically, the date February 23 spells out fuji-san which is how they call Mt. Fuji. Clever, eh?
at 7:49 am
fuji day antics
no backpack, blisters, sunburn
when you have Ana
at 8:48 am
It’s good to know that puns know no cultural boundaries.
Oh, wait, did I say “good”? I meant HORRIFYING.
…there is no escape from the puns. D:
at 9:40 pm
A friend of mine is working in a school where the the farewell theme for the grade 9 graduate students is “Thank you”. In Japanese, they sometimes say “san-kyuu” to say “Thank you”. However, “san-kyuu” are also the pronunciations for the numbers “3″ and “9″, so on the third month (March) and on the ninth day, they will hold their graduation ceremony on March 9th.
at 10:50 pm
I suppose it’s not that much worse than PI day.