Ocean Day

this is NOT Japan, it was taken on an island off the coast of
Georgia, but it's the last time I was at the ocean

Today we're celebrating Ocean Day, also known as Marine Day, which is one of Japan's national holidays.  The purpose of the holiday is to have "a day of gratitude for the blessings of the oceans and to hope for the economic prosperity of maritime Japan". A little bit about the history of Ocean Day......

Disclaimer: Most of what I know about Japan's history comes from Wikipedia and James Clavell's Shogun.

First some background.....in ancient Japan, the only boats that were built were small and made for fishing in fairly shallow waters.  Japanese people didn't build big ships made for long ocean voyages.  That's why you never hear about Japan colonizing far off lands.  They sat on these islands and waited for the world to come to them.  Long story short, eventually the English, Portuguese and Dutch showed up with their big fancy ships.  The Japanese were intrigued (and also figured they should get a navy what with all these foreigners showing up all the time) so deals were struck and Japan learned about ship-building and navigation.

In 1876 the Emperor took a ride around Japan in an iron steamship that was built in England.  He didn't go too far, but it was still a pretty big deal.  In 1941 July 20th--the day he safely landed in Yokohama-- was designated Marine Memorial Day.  In 1996 it was declared a national holiday (Chad has the day off!) and a few years later it was moved to the third Monday in July. 

There aren't too many actual celebrations that go on, seems like most people just take a small vacation that often involves going to the beach, or a lake/river.  We will be doing nothing (barring some laundry and grocery shopping) but we have an adventure planned for next weekend so check back!