Hello all!
So, given how good of a response I received on Wednesday's post, I will continue to talk about Japanese Culture in general (which I just realized I should be writing about to begin with on this site)!
So, holidays in Japan have been quite an interesting experience for me. Japan have both many holidays, and very few holidays at the same exact time. Using http://www.timeanddate.com/holidays/japan/, the best list I can find on the internet as reference, Japan has 16 national holidays, and a total of about 25 holidays in the year. In constrast, the United States has 11 national holidays, and an insane amount of holidays based on which state you live in and your religion (I think around 35-40 on average, just an estimation on my part though).
Apart from having a numerically fewer holidays than what others would have in many Western countries, they also celebrate different holidays as well. For instance, Japan does not officially celebrate Western holidays such as Christmas and Easter. Also, Japan has Japanese holidays such as National Foundation Day, Showa Day, Coming of Age Day, and Respect for the Age Day.
What makes holidays Japanese in Japan is how the Japanese observe these holidays. The Japanese takes a day off ONLY on national holidays. To translate that into numbers that people can understand, that means that people in Japan normally only get about 16 days off in a year. Now, that is not entirely true when you include Sundays off and other days off that people take, but it is true that workers in Japan take far fewer days off than many other similarly developed nations.
Spring-boarding off of the previous statement, the Japanese seldom take days off before or before a holiday to connect it to the weekend. They will often go to work on a Monday, take the national holiday on Tuesday, and go back to work on Wednesday if a national holiday falls on Tuesday. The one exception to this trend is Golden Week, which is the name given to the holidays Showa Day, Constitution Memorial Day, Greenery Day, and Children's Day (which also happens to be on of my favorite holidays!!!). These four holidays occur in a seven day period, hence the name Golden Week. Because of how Constitution Memorial Day, Greenery Day, and Children's Day are string up on May 3, 4, and 5 respectively, people usually take a holiday from Showa Day on April 29 to Children's Day on May 5.
As a result, Golden Week is one of the few (and I really mean few) times in the year when people in Japan are able to spend time with family and travel. Train stations and airports in Japan are absolutely packed on Showa Day and Children's Day!!!
Well, I hope that this post gives a good explanation of holidays in Japan. Please ask questions in the comment if there is any other pieces of information about Japan holidays that you might want to know. To end, I will stick a picture of the recent game I picked up to enjoy over Golden Week!
Bravely Second!!!!