The Carps Streamers, Koinobori

Koinobori, (鯉のぼり) carp streamers or carp banners, decorate the landscape of Japan from April through early May, in celebration of Tango no Sekku (端午の節句), a calendrical event which is now designated a national holiday, Children's Day (子供の日) on May 5.

Also known as the Boys' Festival traditionally, it is an event expressing hope that each boy in the family will grow up healthy and strong like carps. Carp symbolizes courage and strength because of its ability to swim up a waterfall. During this festival, families with boys, like the doll festivals for girls, set up a warrior doll or a yoroi armor set in the house and raise the Koinobori outside the house, allowing it to flutter in the wind

Originally, the banners were used by samurai warriors on the battlefield. Whenever the warriors were on the battlefield, they wore full yoroi armor and flew banners. The banners were painted in various colors and shapes. Some of them had carp pictures on them. Then they became carp banners at the beginning of the modern age.

A typical koinobori set consists of, from the top of the pole down, a pair of arrow-spoked wheels (yaguruma) with a ball-shaped spinning vane followed by streamers (fukinagashi) down the pole that look like windsocks, with a black koinobori and a red koinobori representing the father and mother. If more children are in the household, an additional blue, green and then purple or orange koinobori are added. Traditionally, the set would contain a black koinobori representing the father, followed by a smaller, red koinobori representing his eldest son. (This is why the mother is not present in the children’s song, See below.) After the government's decree that converted Boy's Day into the present Children's Day, the holiday came to celebrate the happiness of both boys and girls.
 

 

Japanese iris bloom in spring and are especially associated with the month of May for Children’s Day. An alternate name for Japanese iris is shōbu (菖蒲 ) which is a homophone for martial spirit (尚武 ). During the Edo period Edo, it was celebrated with mock duels between boys using shōbu in place of swords. In some families, boys take iris-power water bath in the hope that they would grow up healthy and strong enough to survive through the summer heat.

Today, along with the raising of Koinobori carp streamers, children also eat kashiwa-mochi, sticky rice cakes wrapped in oak leaves, and other sweets and thank and show respect for relatives, parents, and teachers for support throughout their life.

 
Children’s Song, Koinobori, (鯉のぼりの歌)

 

やねより　たかい　こいのぼり        Higher than the roof-tops are the carp-streamers
おおきい　まごいは　おとうさん      The large carp is the father
ちいさい　ひごいは　こどもたち      The smaller carp are the children
おもしろそうに　およいでる            They seem to be having fun swimming.