This Is Japan
Explore everyday life in Japan
For many people across Japan, April and May bring with them the annual planting of rice, which in Japanese is called Ta-ue: Ta (as in taco) U (as in coo) E (as in sway).
Ta is an abbreviated form of the word tanbo, which means rice paddy in Japanese, and Ue is the base form of the Japanese verb to plant. When combined, these words literally mean rice field planting.
Planting rice in Japan isn’t something that only farmers do. Many families have their own small tanbo (rice field) that they plant from year to year. This means that, for many people, April and May are very busy months. Hobby farmers like this, who grow rice for their family and relatives to eat, must get up early in the morning to prepare and sow their rice fields before work. Sons who live near enough to their family tanbo to return home and help with this work often do. As a result, their Saturdays and Sundays are generally lost until their fields have been planted.
Many elementary and junior high school students also participate in Ta-Ue at some point in their school life. It is very common for schools to coordinate rice planting activities with local farmers and families who have a tanbo near the school so that their students can learn how rice is grown from start to finish. Teaching students about how life has changed in Japan over the years and having them experience and imagine the burdens their ancestors must have borne in daily life is thought to help make students appreciate both the lives they now have access to as a result of technology and the food that is prepared for them on a daily basis.
For those who do not have a family tanbo but want to have an agricultural experience, many farming groups and agricultural centers offer Ta-Ue events that anyone can participate in. This means that if you come to Japan between the end of April and the end of May (depending on where in Japan you are), you may be able to dip your feet in some deep, squishy mud, plant some rice seedlings, ride on a rice planting tractor, and enjoy some very delicious salted rice balls for 1,000 円 or less.
Planting rice by hand isn’t quite for the faint of heart. As you step into the slippery, clay-like mud of the tanbo and sink in over your ankles, leeches can sometimes be seen slithering near your feet. Spiders often run across the surface of the tanbo’s water and sometimes, as one did to my son this year, run right up your legs. As you pull your feet out of the deep muck and try to move, you may lose your balance and fall down, which means your clothes will be soaking wet and you will be covered in mud. Sometimes, as you move slowly across the tanbo pulling four to five seedlings from the clump of sod in your hand and push them one knuckle deep into thetanbo’s soil, slightly foul gassy smells waft up from the deep holes that your feet leave behind you.
It is a very earthy experience, to be sure, and one that is good to bring a change of clothes and a pair of flip-flops to. And after you see how much energy and time it takes to plant one small field of rice by hand, you will truly be mesmerized by the efficiency and ingenuity of the Ta-Ue-Ki (rice planting tractor).
For more pictures of this event and another video of the Ta-Ue-Ki, please have a look at @kafkanarchy84’s Japan Picture Blog.
This is an ongoing series that will explore various aspects of daily life in Japan. My hope is that this series will not only reveal to its followers, image by image, what Japan looks like, but that it will also inform its followers about unique Japanese items and various cultural and societal practices. If you are interested in getting regular updates about life in Japan, please consider following me at @boxcarblue. If you have any questions about life in Japan, please don’t hesitate to ask. I will do my best to answer all of your questions.
Nice pictures.
Farmers work really hard for not much $$, so we can eat.....
You're absolutely right about that. That's why farmers should be telling their stories and sharing their secrets on Steemit
Excellent photos!
Thanks!
Neat project/life - Like the way the first shot is set up - with the long sections of plant with a focal point of people busy in the background slightly blurred. Can't wait tell I get a little slice of land to plant things on for my own family.... Haha doubt my future kids will come back to help though hah.
There is a big cultural difference there. I'm the oldest son in my family, so people here often ask if I will return home to take care of my parents. They're always a little surprised when I tell them that custom isn't a part of my culture.
Sounds fun but I don't like the idea of spiders running up my legs, eek! Love spiders but not on my skin. I read somewhere that sometimes betta fighting fish can be found in puddles in rice fields... ever heard of or seen this? Great photos, very interesting post as usual @boxcarblue!
That's something I've yet to come across or hear of. I wouldn't be too surprised if it were true, though, or a local tradition somewhere. At some point, though, I would think any fish in the fields would die because the water in the fields slowly disappears.
My friend taught Japanese style rice planting in Myanmar and he said they have eels in their rice fields that they catch and eat. So, who knows? I'll ask around.
It would be interesting if someone you know has come across them... I just looked it up and apparently betta fish are often found in rice paddies, flood palins, drainage ditches etc... but like you say I wonder what they do when the water begins to dry up
That is one COOL machine!!!
It is pretty amazing! I don't know how it pulls perfect strands of rice from the sod clumps and plants them upright without mangling everything. I mean, I know how it works, but it's just amazing to me that it does.
I like Japan, very ancient culture, and a little mysterious.
Interesting. Mysterious is a word I wouldn't have associated with Japan, but I guess I can see it.
I did say a little mysterious. it's been closed off to the world for most of history. They also have their own unique ways of doing things.
That's very true. I think mysterious is fitting. It's just not a word that would have come to mind for me without your comment.
Interesting content and nice pics, thanks for share a bit of Japan with us ^_^
It's a work I surely don't want to have to do!
It's a dirty job, for sure:) I enjoy it, though.
If you do it for a month or longer?
That's hard to say. As a novelty, I enjoy it. As a way of life, it would probably be too much. But don't do like working outdoors and doing physical work. Years of hand planting really wears your body down, though. I don't think I valued handle that.
Great post thank you @boxcarblue upvote. Greets
I'm glad you liked it. Thanks for commenting.
Fantastic post, I love Japan
I'm glad to hear it. What do you like best about Japan?