April 8 – Hana Matsuri – or Flower Festival – in Japan

 Posted on April 8, 2021

This is an update of my post published on April 8, 2010:

This holiday celebrates the birthday of Buddha. Those who visit a shrine on this day bring offerings of fresh flowers (cherry blossoms), so this is why it is called a flower festival.

Customs vary widely from place to place – and of course were last year (and may be this year), altered because of the pandemic. 

Most years, many people wear kimonos and line up on the decorated streets to watch parades with floats. One float is always a white elephant that carries a small image of a baby Buddha. (There are no elephants in Japan, but there were in India, where Buddha spent most of his life.)

Some children pour tea on the baby statue to represent the story that it rained tea on the day that Buddha was born.

Traditional kimono

Check out some of the colorful pictures of this festival at the Muza-Chan site.

April 8 is the traditional date on which Japanese people celebrate Buddha’s birthday. In actual fact, Prince Siddhartha Gautama (who became “the Buddha”) was surely not born on April 8, 566 B.C. (In similar fashion, December 25, 1 A.D., was probably not the actual birth date of Jesus of Nazareth.) The rest of East Asia uses the Chinese calendar to set the date for his birthday, with this year the date falling on May 26.

Color a picture of a Japanese child in a traditional kimono. (There are more related coloring pages below, as well.)  Some kids will wear these kinds of robes to the festival today!

Springtime is so beautiful in Japan, with so many cherry trees blossoming. You can color pictures of cherry blossoms here.

For instructions on making a traditional Japanese painting of cherry blossoms, check this website. You can substitute materials you have on hand for a less authentic, but still. lovely, painting.

There are loads more Japan-inspired crafts available at The Crafty Classroom. 

Here are some free online puzzles relating to all things Japanese. 

There are a million things to read and do and explore on Kids Web Japan.