Entering Adulthood

Despite popular opinion, I didn't actually become an adult until today.

In Japan, the official age at which one becomes an adult is 20, and today was Coming of Age Day (成人の日). While obviously not everybody turns 20 on the second Monday in January, that's the day that the hold the celebration. Every city holds its own, government-sponsored festivities, and so I was invited to the seijinshiki (成人式) for Shinjuku Ward (新宿区).

Typically, a seijinshiki involves all of the 20-year-olds gathering in one place, listening to a very long speech, and then being rewarded for their step into adulthood (and resolve for listening to the whole speech) with some sort of very nice gift. However, that ain't exactly Shinjuku style. Shinjuku is one of the biggest commercial areas in Tokyo, it houses the busiest train station in the world, and has the densest population of foreigners in Tokyo. So how does one come of age in Shinjuku fashion?

One has a party.

This afternoon all of the "seijin" (成人) of Shinjuku gathered at the Keio Plaza Hotel to have what was essentially an enormous mingle-party. Registration opened an hour before the actually festivities began, and so of course I arrived their five minutes early for registration. However, the hotel was already absolutely bolstering with activity. As I later discovered, the seijinshiki is quite frequently a huge reunion between individuals and their high school classmates, and so by the time I got there hordes of laughing friend groups had already formed. The hotel was completely overrun with seijin, and the first thing you notice is the sea of girls dressed in kimonos.

Now I'm not quite sure what you think of when you think of Japan, but kimonos are rare to come by these days, particularly in Tokyo. They're incredibly expensive, and typically only worn on special occasions, and a seijinshiki is one of them. Also, the kimono that is worn for seijinshiki usually has incredibly long sleeves (like, almost down to the floor), and apparently once you're married you can't wear a kimono like that. Just another example of how absolutely everything done in Japan has some kind of meaning behind it.

Note that all of the females are wearing kimonos

Once the actual event started all of us made our way into the enormous ballroom. The festivities began almost exactly on time (I'm convinced that this only happens in Japan), and as is typical of pretty much any ceremony it started with a speech or two. I was actually able to understand most of the speeches. The covered your standard topics for such an event: follow your dream, work hard, take responsibility, thank those who have helped you grow. There were also several beautiful spreads of food, tables setup around the area, and probably over 1000 seijin.

The sea of seijin

The food was absolutely delicious, and we had a group of exchange students that had slowly grown throughout the event. At one point I was actually approached by a girl from Denmark who was there alone and asked to join us. And come on, who's gonna deny that? So she joined our motley crew and we all had a great time.

Today also happened to be the first snow of the year in Tokyo. And we aren't talking a flake here or there. It was absolutely pouring snow for the duration of the day, which was great except for the fact that there was a commute to be had to the seijinshiki and back. But hey, it felt homey, and when I got back my host family and I went out and played in the snow, so I've got no complaints.

The (as of today) Winter Wonderland known as the street corner by my apartment.

While I don't necessarily feel any more grown-up, it was great to go see how coming of age is celebrated in Japan, and to get a familiar taste of "real" winter....although just a taste will suffice.