Todo el mundo knows that today is Cinco de Mayo. I can practically hear the mariachis from my living room here in Silicon Valley. Although only parte del mundo knows the holiday commemorates the Battle of Puebla in 1862, part of Mexico’s war against the French.
(This war came about when Napoleon III took advantage of Americans being preoccupied killing one another during the War Between the States to embark in a foreign adventure by placing an Austrian archduke on the previously non-existent throne of Mexico. The French—it was a whole thing.)
What you may not know is that the fifth day of the fifth month is also Boys’ Day, a holiday that comes to us from Japan. Okay, apparently these days it’s known as Children’s Day, but I hold with the Old Ways: 3 March is Girls’ Day, and 5 May is Boys’ Day.
On Girls’ Day you set out these elaborate hierarchical displays of exquisitely-dressed dolls, representing the Emperor and Empress, their court and all accoutrements. Somewhere there is a photo of a red-headed hakujin dressed in a yukata playing girlie games in a flat in a house the Greene brothers built to live in. The focus is interior and refined; I did the best I could.
On Boys’ Day, you hang out carp flags and do guy things. The focus is outward and exuberant. I never got invited to Boys’ Day events.
But in honor of the joint holiday from our siblings in Mexico and Japan, I suggest that we all go out, drink a margarita and fly a kite.
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