Yushima Tenjin
March 8, 2007 on 10:13 pm | In Culture, Tokyo | | Email This PostI happened to be in Tokyo today and passed by Yushima Tenjin, a shrine in Tokyo which is said to enshrine a god of learning.
Since it’s March now, it’s test season for the kids (poor souls…) of Japan, so there were lots (read tons) of prayer blocks (called 絵馬 ema in Japanese) with the message 合格 (goukaku) which basically means “pass the exam!” written on them.
Interesting random tidbit… You know why they’re called 絵馬？
The Chinese characters literally mean “picture” “horse”.
Apparently, back in the day… The rich who wanted their wishes granted would literally give horses to the shrine in exchange for good luck.
Eventually, it became too difficult to manage, you know, the horses and all… So the switched to these blocks instead.
Any history buffs know the full story of the 絵馬？
By the way, the Tokyo run last weekend went well! I’ll get the pics and stories up eventually. Thanks for all your advice!
- Harvey
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If you tied one of the blocks there, and failed your exam - it would be mightily tempting to go back and set fire to the whole lot of them. Although I’m sure that kind of thing doesn’t happen in Japan. ;)
Comment by Rich — March 9, 2007 #
Haha, especially considering you have to pay for the block! Not sure how much they go for these days, but I would guess around 500 yen, which would be about 5 bucks.
Comment by harvey — March 9, 2007 #