Scarecrows in Japan
♫Do you wanna build a … scarecrow!? “They” say that you should delete or unpublish blog posts that aren’t performing because they drag your website ranking down. But this is one post I can’t bring myself to remove from my blog even though it gets very little traffic. Because I like scarecrows! And in Japan there is such a great selection of scarecrows its a shame not to have at least a few photos of them out there. Did you know, here in Saitama there’s even a whole village of scarecrows? Its on my bucket list to visit, but I haven’t got there yet.
Scarecrows in Japan
Every September, for as long as I’ve been living in Saitama (7 years), the rice fields behind the Kawagoe Toys-r-us on Route 254, have a fine display of scarecrows. This is the first year I’ve managed to do more than view from a distance and drove through the small rice field roads to get a few photos. I had a sleeping baby in the car so we didn’t get out of the car to see them up close and personal. You might get some ideas for Halloween Costumes…
The kids favourite was this friendly demon, called an oni in Japan, 鬼さん. Many children in Japan are terrified of this type of demon, which is usually depicted angry and menancing. They liked that he was smiling and waving. They also appreciated the Shaun the Sheep Scarecrow. It looks like an easy enough Halloween costume too. Pity I didn’t bring an Aran Sweater from Ireland! The Monsters Inc costumes look a little more time consuming.
After seeing this Samurai Scarecrow I am inspired to make a samurai costume. It doesn’t look too hard.
I love the grey hair on the Obachan (granny)!
Good idea to make a skirt out of crisp packets, just not very practical!
Spiderman isn’t the easiest costume to make, top points for effort on this one.
School girl costumes were very popular in Ireland when I was growing up. They are easy to make if you have a high school student in the house.
This scarecrow is bent over, so son remarked how it was like he was leaning in the window to give us directions. Maybe that was the aim!
This is my personal favourite. From a distance it looked like a group of Obachans and Ojichans taking a break from a hard day in the rice fields.
Incidentally, the scarecrows weren’t doing much scaring. There were blackbirds everywhere. I wish I’d thought to take a photo of them! A few more photos hereafter;
From another year:
Do you like scarecrows? Do you have any in your city / town / village?
I love this! It’s like a little showcase of local artistry.
In my hometown, there was always the giant rolled bale of hay with “legs” sticking out of it.
Haha! That sounds fun. I think its lovely the locals take the time to make and display the scarecrows.
Thanks for the follow and the comment. 😀