Hokkaido Ainu Village

 Our Hokkaido tour (of my wife and I) led us to the Ainu Village one fine afternoon. The Ainu people were the aboriginals of Japan though an internet finding by me indicated that they obtained their indigenous people status officially only in 1998. I also learnt that the Ainu people were quite conscious of their status as it was deemed not to be as noble as the other tribes of Japan. The Ainu person on Hokkaido would have escaped modernization if not for the Meiji restoration, which saw Hokkaido opened up for development.

History aside, our visit to Ainu Village was to come up, close and personal with the Ainu people though I also came beyond comfort level with somebody there, read on to find out more!

When our tour group descended on Ainu Village, we were awed and intrigued by the gigantic boulder statue of an Ainu man as well as of other strange but interesting structures. We saw 3 to 4 Japanese dressed in Ainu costumes beckoning to our group, and we followed them into a hut for a presentation.

As the presentation commenced, a young lady dressed in Ainu costume popped out and gave us an introduction of what was to follow in Japanese language, translated to us in Mandarin by our local guide. We were taken on a 20 min cultural ride as tribal dances, tribal singing (solo and individual), musical performance and more lectures of the Ainu culture soon ensued. I was invited on stage to sing and dance along with the Ainu people and I went on stage gamely and belted out many of our ethnic songs which amazed the Ainu people!

Sorry, I did not do that and this stint of mine did not materialize! It was just my wishful thinking to be a Japanese (Ainu) idol! I read somewhere before when Singaporeans are invited to sing before a group when they are holidaying overseas, guess what song they sing? The song is “Majulah Singapura” (Singapore’s National Anthem)! Patriotic sia!

The most poignant learning point of the presentation is something disgusting for me (till now). Do not get me wrong at this juncture, I am not belittling the Ainu culture but there was something that could be improved in the Ainu traditional treatment of their women (in the past).

At one instance during the parting shot of the presentation, the male Ainu lecturer brought up a framed colourful watercolor drawing of a man who looked like a highly metrosexual man in this modern era. I almost fell flat on my chair when we were told that this was a picture of the traditional Ainu woman.
“Why are there so many watercolor marks above her mouth, making her look like a man with a beard?” I exclaimed. My query was put to ease or rather should I use the word (unease) when the lecturer continued to explain that it was customary for the Ainu tribe to tattoo its women! (oh, must be painful to these women, I thought). The lecturer then added “These tattoos were normally done on the face of the Ainu ladies, mainly on the flesh above their lips over a period of some years, beginning from the time they hit puberty. It is a painful process, done painstakingly over these years for them to look pretty and attractive to suitors.”

“Bring in the Women’s Charter Act of Singapore to historic Ainu tribes and Save all the sufferings of these poor ladies” I declared, deep in my heart.