It's Golden Week, it's Golden Week, it's Golden Week!

Now the question on your mind is probably, "What the heck is Golden Week?" Well, young grasshopper, sit down and let me tell you. Let's dive into...

Golden Week is a week-long national holiday, basically. Usually more like 9 or 10 days depending on the year when we add in weekends. Much of the country basically shuts down for this period, as everyone takes vacations to go sightseeing, visit family, or other vacation activities. It's a magical time full of no worries and fun! For Japanese anyway. I've heard it can be frustrating for business partners in other countries as they have to put all business on pause for a week. But for the people lucky enough to live here, it is great!

Well... unless you are traveling by car, which a lot of people are. Since most of the country has the week off and most of them are traveling, traffic jams on the highways are a nightmare. Every year the news will show us video of how far the line stretches in every direction. We're talking hours. If waiting in traffic is your idea of a good vacation, Golden Week is for you! For people who are driving to the airport for a vacation abroad, they also have another fun wait at the airport.

Luckily we have a great train system here. Extra trains with extra cars will be run during Golden Week, so the congestion isn't too bad. Not too good, mind you, but much better than the alternative travel methods.

Golden Week is made of 4 national holidays: Shōwa Day (April 29), Constitution Memorial Day (May 3), Greenery Day (May 4), and Children's Day (May 5). Because they are so close together, many to most companies will give the in between days off, giving us Golden Week.

It all started in 1948 when the government set most of the national holidays that are still followed today. Three years later, a popular film at the time received record ticket sales during this week. The director called the series of holidays "Golden Week" and the name stuck.

Let's look at each of those.

• Shōwa Day was the birthday of the Shōwa Era emperor, Hirohito, and is maintained as a day of celebration for his life and reign. Well... the post-war good parts of his life and reign anyway.
• Constitution Memorial Day is, as you might imagine, a celebration of the Japanese constitution, written in 1947 by MacArthur's crew with input from some of the more liberal Japanese scholars of the day, and various figures in the Japanese government.
• Greenery Day which is in for celebrating and being thankful for nature.
• Children's Day, which was traditionally Boy's Day and has all kinds of fun events for kids.

Out of all of those, Children's Day is probably the only one most people care about and actually celebrate as intended. The rest are just days off. The sign of Children's Day, by the way, is carp streamers. These things are everywhere! Very fun to see.

^{Photo by 5th Luna}

Just for trivia, let's briefly look at another long holiday.

Some years there is a companion long holiday in September called Silver Week. Sometimes a weekend in Sept will be followed by three holidays. Respect for the Aged Day is always the third Monday in Sept. Occasionally Equinox Day will be in the Wednesday of the same week. When that happens, there is a Japanese law that is triggered that says that when there is only one day between two holidays, it also becomes a holiday. Boom—five days off. It doesn't happen every year, but when the Equinox falls on the right day, we are all lucky. The next time this will happen will be 2026

Anyway, there you go. Now you know all about Japan's long spring holiday. I haven't really done much for it ever since my kids were born. Usually just enjoying kid's events with them around town, which is a great fun.

Does your country have any long holiday around this time? If so, tell me about it in the comments.

❦

David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku.