Tetsunori Koizumi, Director
“Ame nimo makezu kaze nimo makezu (Neither rain nor wind will dampen my spirit)” is a well-known poem by Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933), a Japanese novelist and poet from Hanamaki, Iwate Prefecture in Northern Japan. Having expressed his resolve to develop a healthy body so that he would not be bothered by snow in winter and summer heat, Kenji inserts a line later in the poem, which goes: samusano natsu wa orooro aruki (On cold summer days, I get upset and walk in worry).
Why would Kenji Miyazawa get upset and walk in worry on cold summer days? Although he was not a farmer himself, Kenji knew very well what cold summer days would mean for agricultural crops as a teacher in agricultural science at Hanamaki Agricultural High School. As a region known for rice, fruits and other agricultural products, the weather was a big worry for farmers in Hanamaki, and cold summer days would have been a bad news for their crops.
That was how it was back in the twentieth century. Today, farmers are more worried about hot summer days rather than cold summer days, for Hanamaki in Northern Japan is not spared from the phenomenon of global warming that affects every region of our planet, and is getting worse year after year.
A decade or so ago, we used to be shocked with the news headline that goes: “The city of … sets a new high temperature record.” But not anymore, for a new high temperature is recorded in so many places of the world year after year, the news about the record high temperature tends to be pushed aside by other breaking news. For those of us who are going through another brutish summer heat this year, we are tempted to rephrase a line, “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows,” which Bob Dylan incorporated into his Subterranean Homesick Blues, as: “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the temperature goes.”
Of course, we will have to wait and see how 2022 will match up against another hot year like 2007, when 15 countries set the record for high temperatures. But many places in the world are reporting record high temperatures. United Kingdom, for example, has been hit by a number of heat waves this summer. On July 17, Coningsby, Lincoinshire recorded the temperature of 40.3˚C, the highest temperature ever recorded in UK history.
How is it in Iwate Prefecture in Northern Japan? According to the Japanese calendar, August 23 is designated as shosho, or the 14th of the 24 indicators of seasonal change, when the summer heat starts to subside as an indication of seasonal change from summer to autumn. Yet, on that day, Kamaishi, a coastal city in Iwate Prefecture, recorded the high temperature of 35.4˚C. The temperature exceeding 35˚C belongs to the category of “Extremely Hot Summer Days,” according to the definition introduced by the Japan Meteorological Agency back in 2007, as the previous categories of “Summer Days” (25~29˚C) and “Hot Summer Days” (30-34˚C) were not enough to cover the frequent occurrence of the high temperatures exceeding 35˚C all over Japan. As for Tokyo located in the central region of Japan, this summer has already exceeded the previous high in terms of the number of “Extremely Hot Summer Days.”
One consequence of the increased frequency of “Extreme Hot Summer Days” observed all over Japan is the loss of interest in Haiku-composition. “Cicadas’ chorus” used to be one of kigo, or seasonal terms, for summer often employed by Haiku enthusiasts. However, since it is so frequently used by so many people this summer, “cicadas chorus” does not appeal to the poetic sensibility of the Japanese as much as it used to. A new, more appealing kigo is needed if Haiku-composition is to continue as one of the favorite cultural activities for the Japanese.
What about walking, then? If Kenji Miyazawa used to get upset and walk in worry on cold summer days, how would he walk on hot summer days, or extremely hot summer days? There is no question that he would continue to get upset and walk in worry on hot summer days, especially on extremely hot summer days, for “Extremely Hot Summer Days” are bad news for farmers as well as for others. Would we ever return to “Normal Summer Days” when farmers walk in satisfaction watching their crops grow as they should, and hikers walk in exhilaration watching passing clouds without the fear of heat strokes? The answer would be in the negative unless all of us in the world wake up to the reality of global warming and make concerted effort to reverse it.