Japan

“Japanese people feel relieved once you put a name to something,” said Mitsuo Takeda, a judge of the Shodoshima contest and an artist who designed a large installation featuring a bug-eyed yokai large enough to walk through. “If you are pulling grass and you get a cut and you wonder what happened,” he said, “if you think, ‘Oh, it is just a yokai,’

sick on my journey ,

my dreams go wandering

on this withered field

Matsuo Basho, Death Haiku, 1694

If your life, or mine, for that matter, were to come to an end here and now, it would not do to refer to either of them as unhappy. The life that ends at the age of twenty and the life that ends at ninety are both complete lives, and lives of happiness.

We should never forget that everything we have and all the people we love will disappear at some point. This is something we should keep in mind, but without giving in to pessimism. Being aware of the impermanence of things does not have to make us sad; it should help us love the present moment and those who surround us.