Coming of Age Day

In Japan, becoming an adult happens at the age of 20. Coming of Age Day is a national holiday in Japan, so I’m sure the following happens all over the country, but I can only vouch for Tokigawa.
This year, Coming of Age Day fell on January 14th. Each year on or around Coming of Age Day, Tokigawa holds a Coming of Age Ceremony for all the young men and women of the town who will be turning 20-years-old during the New Year. Quite a cool concept, I think. I was given permission to crash this year’s ceremony so I could see what it was all about. Really, I just wanted to go for the costumes.

The young men and women dress in their finest. Most of the men wear ties and black suits, but a few cool (in my opinion), brave souls wear a type of mens’ kimono. I counted about 9 guys in kimonos at this year’s ceremony. You don’t see guys in kimonos nearly as often as you do women, so the chance to personally witness the male kimono was arguably the primary reason I went to the ceremony. Those 9 individuals definitely made my day. :-)

The young women of course wear traditional silk kimonos complete with the gigantic bow/bubble of extra fabric from their waist-band “obi” done up in the back (none of them could sit with their backs flat against the seatback; they all had to sit on the edge of their seat so they didn’t crush the bow/bubble). A good many of them also wear a white, fur collar accessory that I never see worn with a kimono at any other time (but I don’t know why it’s worn for this ceremony). It would also be my guess that the girls probably spend as much time as a bride or bridesmaid might at the beauty salon on deck-out hair-dos. Some of the hairstyles are amazing, and include things interwoven or stuck into the hair that I’ve ever only imagined using to enhance gift-wrapping or as a table centerpiece. That said, now that I’ve been exposed to such hair-accessory possibilities, I might have to try it myself sometime. ;-)

Come to think of it, a lot of the guys had pretty fantastic hair-dos too. Think Beattles length, but layered, moused and gelled up by Paul Mitchell himself.

The ceremony is definitely a feast for the eyes. The site is simply awash in color and design. It’s really marvelous.

The actual one-hour ceremony is a bit less enthralling than the costumes. About 2 dozen of the town’s top officials also donned their finest black suits and ties (there was only one woman in the group) and sat imposingly on the stage for the duration of the ceremony.

After the ritual introductory greetings and calling the ceremony to order, and singing the national anthem, the names of all the soon-to-be-20-year-olds were read out individually by the emcee, and each person had to stand up to be recognized. There were between 150-200 celebratorees in attendance this year. After that was finished, the Mayor and Vice-mayor made speeches. Respectively, one of the girls and one of the boys in attendance then had some sort of presentation on the stage with the Mayor. Exactly what for, I’m not sure. A lady dressed in an extraordinarily sparkly black evening gown took to the podium and under spotlight, with the auditorium lights dimmed, she performed two readings of poems or stories. Before the end of the ceremony, all the officials present on stage were introduced one-by-one and individually called out their congratulations to the young adults. And that was that.

Of course after the formal ceremony had ended, professional group photographs had to be taken to commemorate the event. After snapping a few photos myself while they were trying to corral the first group together, I had to take off. From what I understand though, after the photos are finished, there is a small party held in separate room to toast the new adults (but of course without alcohol because the majority haven’t actually experienced their 20th birthday yet and 20 is the magic legal-drinking-age number in Japan).

After the town’s ceremony, the story I heard is that the nearly-20-year-olds take off to after-parties with their friends for the rest of the day. Whether or not they run-around in public donned in their regalia like we do for prom in the States, I don’t know, but it does make a funny mental picture…19-year-old Japanese boys and girls in kimonos out bowling and taking over the local McDonalds.