Greetings yokai lovers!

August is here, and boy am I feeling it! Most of Japan has been having a prolonged heat wave, and it is unbearably hot and humid. Although ghost and yokai stories are supposed to help people keep cool in the summer, it’s hard to imagine how people lived before air conditioning.

Despite the heat, August is a great time to be in Japan. It’s a month filled with festivals, and most areas will have fireworks, folk dances, foot and games stalls, and so on. There’s a general carnival atmosphere going on all month.

The largest of these summer festivals is Obon. Obon is a Buddhist holiday and is Japan’s festival of the dead. During Obon, the boiling cauldrons of hell are opened up, the souls there are given a 3-day reprieve from torture, and allowed to visit their loved ones on Earth. Obon is the reason that so many ghost stories take place in the summer, and it is why summer is yokai season in Japan.

This year, I am preparing for Fukui’s “Yokai Fes,” which takes place over Obon. I am having a large art exhibit in the center of town, with costumes, contests, games, and the Mononoke Ichi yokai art market coming to Fukui. This is the 2nd year of Yokai Fes, and I hope there will be many more.

Despite all the things going on, I am still excited to share more yokai with you all! So stay tuned, and I will have news about this month’s first yokai very soon!