The eggplant 'oxen' is known as 'shōryō-ushi' (精霊牛 'spirit ox') and the cucumber 'horse' is known as 'shōryō-uma' (精霊馬 'spirit horse').
🥒🍆

Here is a great video about the 'spirit vegetables'
⬇️
https://youtu.be/0FoxADMvjBQ?si=Zya9sLAYvl1aYGOw

#Obon #お盆#Japan

The times are changing, and some ancestors will be traveling home in style at the end of Obon🤖🍆

#Japan#Obon #お盆

So why a horse and ox?

Well it’s all to do with speed.

At the beginning of Obon ancestral spirits long to return as quickly as possible after a year's absence, so they travel by horse.
When Obon is over they are reluctant to depart, so they take the slower ox.

#Obon #お盆 #京都

The eggplant 'oxen' is known as 'shōryō-ushi' (精霊牛 'spirit ox') and the cucumber 'horse' is known as 'shōryō-uma' (精霊馬 'spirit horse').
🥒🍆

Here is a great video about the 'spirit vegetables'
⬇️
https://youtu.be/0FoxADMvjBQ?si=Zya9sLAYvl1aYGOw

#Obon #お盆#Japan

At Obon cucumbers and eggplants, given small wooden legs, begin to appear at family altars and graves.

It is said the cucumber is a horse, racing the dead quickly back to this world.
The eggplant is an oxen, slowly but reliably carrying spirits back home.

#cucumber #eggplant#Obon #お盆

🥒AN UNUSUAL FORM OF TRANSPORTATION🍆

Invited by bells and flames, the spirits of the dead are currently holidaying in this world.

But how do ancestral spirits travel between realms?
Probably not how you imagine😂...

🥒 🐎 (arriving by 'spirit horse' 精霊馬)
🍆 🐂 (returning via 'spirit ox' 精霊牛)

#obon #お盆 #summer #eggplant #cucumber