Today is another one of those Japanese “Happy Monday Holidays”, it is called taiiku no hi, the Health and Sports Day, held every year on the second Monday in October. It originated in 1966, two years after the Summer Olympics took place in Tokyo, and it is meant to promote an active and healthy lifestyle, both physically and mentally, interestingly.
Around this day, many schools have some sort of sports event; I passed by the primary school nearby on Saturday, and indeed, there were lots of kids on their athletic ground, doing gymnastics, and lots of parents standing there watching, with and without cameras and smart phones.
I have to confess that the only type of sport I was doing today was cleaning my room and going shopping for emergency chocolate. There has been a typhoon warning for the east coast of Japan, and it is supposed to hit us tonight – it is raining right now, but still comparatively quiet…