In most western countries, people greatly celebrate Christmas. Christmas is the biggest holiday for them, and it means much for them due to religious reasons. But, in Japan, people recognize this special day in different way. Most people in Japan are not Christian, so it seems that they don’t have to celebrate it. They, however, do celebrate it. This is one interesting example.
Colonel Sanders put on red Santa Claus costume in front of all of the Kentucky Fried Chicken shop in whole Japan. Surprisingly, this costume party for Christmas starts from the end of October, before the genuine Christmas mood comes up in Western.
Santa costume sold in LOFT store at Tennoji.
I took this photo on the next day of Halloween. Needless to say, Halloween costumes were sold there until the previous day. Halloween is, off course, irrelevant to Japanese as well.
This is Christmas illumination at Tennoji HOOP.
In western culture, people basically have Christmas with their family. In contrast, people tend to have time with their lover in Japan. Christmas seems to Japanese people as just like festival of love.
These facts really represent Japanese mind. People in Japan tend to be easily influenced by other things. This characteristic could be both good and bad. After World War Ⅱ, Japanese greatly influenced by better country, and absorbed technology and learned a lot. But nowadays, the situation of influence from other has been changing. Among young Japanese people, western things have particular status somehow, so they often imitate western ways.
This Japanese Christmas imply that Japanese are getting lose own identity gradually.
Good topic! Christmas is a great example of globalization/glocalization similar to examplers from The Japanese Version. These Christmas traditions in Japan you write about and worry about in terms of destroying Japanese identity have indeed been in Japan longer than you have... Like one of the Japanese quoted in the film, Japan borrows what it wants from the rest, adding to Japanese culture rather than harming it. Remember, culture is not static - it is always changing.
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