Springtime in Japan has long been synonymous with one (very pink) thing: its sakura cherry blossoms, as well as the nation’s near-spiritual appreciation of the delicate pink blooms, writes Danielle Demetriou
They may not be as punctual as Japan’s famed bullet trains – but they are no less iconic. They are swooned over during picnics. They are painstakingly painted. They are obsessed over in poems. They are cited as a symbol of the transient nature of life. And they are diligently sprinkled on Starbucks lattes.
It’s pretty much impossible to think of spring in Japan without an image of a
sea of cherry trees awash with perfect pink blooms instantly coming to mind – be it surrounded by Tokyo’s cloud-brushing concrete skyscrapers, in the foreground of the looming triangular form of Mount Fuji or on the forest-wrapped grounds of a remote mountainside temple.
Every year, under the meticulous gaze of armies of official sakura forecasters, the small buds burst into flowers on trees across the archipelago, starting in Okinawa on the southern tip, before sweeping slowly north across the country and finishing in Hokkaido.
And this year’s pending springtime sakura frenzy is perhaps more special than ever: it is the first cherry blossom season in Japan open to overseas visitors in four years, due to the pandemic shutting the nation’s borders.
Adding an extra layer of post-pandemic poignancy is the rich symbolism of the flowers. Their short-lived existence taps into a long-held appreciation of the beauty of the fleeting nature of life.
The blossoms also, quite literally, symbolise new beginnings, with April 1 being the first day of both the financial and academic year in Japan. In a nutshell? The cherry blossoms are not just pretty pink flowers: they are the floral embodiment of Japan’s most deep-rooted cultural and philosophical beliefs.
Like many things in Japan, its cherry blossoms – and the nation’s unwavering passion for them – smoothly tap into both the ancient and the modern. From as early as the eighth century, elite imperial courtiers paused to appreciate the delicate pink cherry blossoms known as sakura before indulging in picnics and poetry sessions beneath the blooms.
Fast-forward more than a millennium and the flowers that launched a thousand haiku are no less revered in modern-day Japan, with the fevered countdown to sakura season seeping into countless elements of daily life, heightened further by the televised Cherry Blossom Forecast, which offers a petal-by-petal analysis of the advance of the blooms – known as the cherry blossom front – as they sweep from the south to the north of the archipelago.
When the blooms actually arrive (as confirmed by teams of meticulous cherry blossom officials), it is time to indulge in one of the nation’s all-time favourite pastimes – hanami, which literally translates as “looking as flowers” and refers to flower appreciation picnics under the blooms.
