Yurei Attack!: The Japanese Ghost Survival Guide

by Hiroko Yoda

  But this tale is set in the 17th century. Even at the calmest of times it must have been a very isolated place back then. Yet it was fertile ground, home to a small village of people who made their lives by farming and fishing the waters between island and mainland.

  The Story

  A certain forest on Kesennuma Oshima was once home to a statue called the michibiki jizo — the guiding bodhisattva.

  In and of itself, this is hardly noteworthy. Virtually the entirety of Japan is dotted with statues of the diminutive Buddhist deity. Roughly knee-high, they are often found alongside trails and roadways. Jizo are effigies of the patron saint both of travelers and of children who pass away before their parents. (The soul of a child who passes before its parents cannot cross the River Sanzu into the afterlife proper, according to Buddhist tradition, spending its existence instead building towers of stones on its shores that are endlessly kicked over by the denizens of hell. Jizo cares for these little souls by giving them refuge amidst his flowing robes. In appreciation for his efforts, passer-by leave stones before Jizo statues in a symbolic effort to ease the children’s burden.)

  The guiding jizo of Kesennuma Oshima was different. According to local legend, the soul of someone who is about to die, unbeknownst to them, appears before this particular jizo the day before their fated date. (This resembles “doppelgänger” legends of Europe, in which phantom doubles of victims of misfortune are seen in far-flung locations just before or after the victim’s death.)

  One evening, just before twilight, the wife and young son of a fisherman were returning home from a long day of hard labor spent helping a neighbor plant a rice field in exchange for food. As their path brought them near the Guiding Jizo, the mother sensed a presence nearby. Cautiously peering around a tree, she spotted the statue — and a whole host of spirits materializing before it. One would be shock enough. But this was a veritable parade of ethereal men, women, and children. And even stranger, the vast majority seemed to be in the prime of their lives.

  After hearing the story later that evening, the father laughed it off as a figment of their imaginations. But the very next day, when the family was gathering seaweed along the coastline at low tide, something strange happened. The tide pulled out and didn’t return. Before long an ominous shadow appeared on the horizon. Spooked, the mother, father, and son rushed to higher ground.

  Minutes later, a tsunami plowed into the coast, wiping out the entire fishing village as the three watched helplessly from a hilltop. They were the only survivors.

  That’s when it dawned on them. The phantoms the mother and boy had seen were none other than those of their fellow villagers, paying their final respects to the jizo as their bodies went about their lives, blissfully unaware of the fate they would suffer just twenty-four hours hence. If only the mother had realized, if only the people had known...! But it was far too late for that.

  Jizo statues are a common sight throughout Japan. Hats and bibs are common accouterments, left as offerings to clothe the little souls in the afterlife.

  Tohoku and Tsunami

  Given the fact that Kesennuma made headlines for the very same reason in 2011, there is no doubt that this “fairy tale” is based at least in part on a true story.

  Foreign media outlets rushed to describe the scale of the 2011 tsunami disaster as “unprecedented,” which is true as far as the nuclear meltdowns are concerned. But the term is sadly far from accurate when it comes to earthquakes and tsunami. Similar catastrophes occurred in 1933, 1896, 1611, 869, and undoubtedly many times unrecorded by history as well.

  In fact, stone markers dot the Japanese coastline warning of tsunami from times of old, a literal message to future generations from ancestors long since shuffled off this mortal coil. Some date back centuries. One of the more recent, in nearby Aneyoshi City, was erected in 1933. It reads: “High dwellings mean peace for your descendants. Remember the disaster of the great tsunami. Do not build houses below here.”

  In every case, the 2011 tsunami waters broke before reaching these markers. Aneyoshi was one of the few locales where residents actually followed the markers’ warnings. In many other places, the stones were treated as ancient history or all but forgotten.

  In modern times, tsunami zones are often marked with mascot characters such as this one, spotted along the seaside in Iwate prefecture.

  Surviving an Encounter

  Although many locals understandably relocated to higher ground after earlier tsunami, new residents who lacked a visceral memory of the dangers slowly repopulated low-lying areas once again, leading to tragic repetitions of history.

  The true horror of tsunami is the fickleness of human memory. Occurring just once or twice a century, very large tsunami arrive just beyond the limits at which personal experience can guide us rather than history. Both stone markers and folktales are ways in which the victims of previous tragedies attempt to reach out to future generations.

  The bottom line: in this era of science and technology it is tempting to brush off myth and legend as superstition. Sometimes, however, they’re more than just stories. Listen to them.

  Yokai Connection

  In spite of their name, Funa-yurei (see Yokai Attack!) are treated as yokai rather than yurei because they represent the concept of drowning at sea rather than any single individual. They have a nasty habit of preying upon unwary fishermen, particularly in the twilight hours.

  Unfortunately, a belief in these creatures may have caused the deaths of many victims pulled out to sea by the 1896 tsunami, which hit roughly the same area as the 2011 tsunami. The following is from a report made many years later.

  “In one village (in Iwate prefecture)... 40 fishermen in five or six boats went out the evening of the tsunami.” Returning unaware of what had happened while they were at sea, the “fishermen heard voices calling out for help in the dark as they returned. Local lore regarded voices in the water as those of ghosts. Moreover, answering the calls of such ghosts would result in their pulling the responder into the water. This situation resulted in delays in the fishing boats mounting rescue operations.”

  Other Guiding Jizo:

  There are other Guiding Jizo, although with different legends surrounding them. One is located near Gokuraku-ji Temple in Kamakura, just an hour from Tokyo by train. Parents pray to this particular Guiding Jizo to ensure the healthy growth and development of their children.

  Haunted Places: 30

  MATSUE OHASHI BRIDGE

  Haunted Places: 30

  MATSUE OHASHI BRIDGE

  Name in Japanese: 松江大橋

  Location: Matsue, Japan (Western Honshu)

  Type of Bridge: Stone (in original form) Concrete and steel (in current form)

  First Built: Around 1608

  Length: Roughly 426 feet (130 meters)

  Date of Haunting: Around 1608

  Cause of Haunting: Human sacrifice

  Name of Sacrifice: Gensuke

  Type of Spot: “Yurei Spot”

  Type of Phenomena: Visible manifestations

  Threat Level: Low

  Claim to Fame

  Matsue Ohashi Bridge has been feared as a spooky spot for more than four hundred years. The story concerns an infamous phenomenon from times of old called a hitobashira — literally a “human pillar” but more colloquially a “foundation sacrifice.”

  Hitobashira are one or more human beings deliberately entombed in the base of a structure in a superstitious effort to ensure its safety and durability. Rumors of foundation sacrifices swirl around all sorts of medieval construction projects, including levees, canals, and tunnels (see p.112). But they are particularly associated with castles and bridges. The Matsue Ohashi Bridge is the most famous of the latter.

  The Story

  Matsue is one of Japan’s most storied cities — literally. Folklorist Lafcadio Hearn, who penned a series of collections of Japanese ghost tales at the turn of the 20th century, heard most of them in and around Matsue.

&nbs
p; Matsue is a remote sort of place, a “castle town” divided into southern and northern halves by the Ohashi-gawa River. In the early 17th century, the daimyo who ruled Matsue commissioned the construction of a series of new bridges across the waters in order to hasten the completion of his home and fortress.

  Time and time again, foundation stones were laid in the Ohashigawa. But the area happens to be an estuary, a channel for waters flowing between Lake Shinji and the sea. Currents swirled wickedly with every ebb and flow of the tides. Bridge foundations — and on more than one occasion, half-completed bridges — were swept away one after the other, as though the rivergods were taunting the audacity of man for attempting such a thing.

  This wouldn’t do. And so the powers that be conceived a plan. They would quiet the rumblings of the river gods with an offering. A sacrifice: A human sacrifice.

  But who to pick? They decided to select the victim — we mean, honored offering — randomly. Really randomly: they decided to nab the next man who happened to walk by the construction site without pleats in his hakama (the traditional article of clothing worn by men at the time). That unfortunate man just happened to be Gensuke.

  The workers grabbed him, bound him to a foundation stone, and sunk the (presumably screaming) man precisely at the spot where the waters were at their most turbulent. That was the last anyone saw of poor Gensuke alive.

  The hitobashira apparently did the trick. No longer did the tides sweep away the foundation-stones and the bridge quickly went up without a single hitch. The people of Matsue hailed “Gensuke’s Pillar” for its stabilizing influence on the project. Although it has been rebuilt many times in the intervening centuries, an incarnation of Matsue Ohashi Bridge stands on the spot to this very day, more than four hundred years later.

  The Attack

  Allow us to quote Hearn, from his 1894 classic Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan:

  Upon moonless nights... a ghostly fire flits about [Gensuke’s] pillar — always in the dead watch hour between two and three; and the colour of the light was red, though I am assured in Japan, as in other lands, the fires of the dead are most often blue.

  In addition to the visible manifestation, there is at least one fatality associated with the bridge (other than Gensuke’s, of course). When Matsue Ohashi was overhauled and rebuilt into its current form in 1936, a worker by the name of Kiyoshi Fukada died when a heavy metal bucket slipped off the bridge and fell on his head. Contemporary news reports placed the cause of his death squarely at the foot of Gensuke’s Pillar, upon which the man had been working when the incident occurred. Gensuke’s curse? Unfortunate coincidence? You make the call.

  Surviving an Encounter

  So long as you don’t plan to monkey around on the pillar itself, there’s no need to worry about physical harm — Gensuke’s pillar is mainly known for its ghostly late-night glow. You can also take solace in the fact that regardless of how barbaric we may find the custom today, hitobashira were introduced specifically to make dangerous places safer for the living. For that reason, if anything you should offer thanks for his (literal) sacrifice rather than turning heel and running.

  In fact, the city of Matsue does precisely that every year. The Gensuke Matsuri Festival, held in late October, begins in Gensuke Park at the foot of the bridge. After a thirty-minute Buddhist kuyo (purification) ritual to appease the souls of those who gave their lives to build the bridge, the festivities segue into more upbeat workshops, lectures, and performances.

  Yokai Connection

  Gensuke isn’t the only spook to haunt a bridge in Japan. The Hashi- Hime (see Yokai Attack!) is a yokai that actively preys upon travelers. It takes the form of a beautiful man or woman who enchants a passer-by, then reveals her hideous true form to scare them to death. While Gensuke’s yurei haunts the bridge under which he is buried, Hashi-Hime seems free to roam across bridges throughout Japan.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Dangerous Game

  HYAKU MONOGATARI

  JAPANESE CURSES

  KOKKURI SAN

  HANGONKO

  SPIRIT PHOTOGRAPHS

  HOUSES WITH HISTORIES

  Read on for an overview of everything from parlor tricks to methods for contacting the “spirit plane” - Japanese style.

  Dangerous Games: 31

  HYAKU MONOGATARI

  Dangerous Games: 31

  HYAKU MONOGATARI

  Name in Japanese: 百物語

  a.k.a. One Hundred Stories (literal translation); One Hundred Candles

  Type of Game: Parlor game

  Origin: Unknown

  Peak of Interest: Late Edo Era (early 19th century)

  Things You’ll Need: 100 candle-lit paper lanterns or candles (slow burning type); 100 scary stories; A space with two or three distinct rooms; Blue robes for participants; A low table; A mirror; A long summer evening with nothing else on the schedule

  Type of Phenomena: Horrifying manifestations of various sorts (both yurei and yokai)

  Threat Level: Depends on who you scare up!

  Claim to Fame

  Traditionally played during the summer months, when ghosts and other spooks are believed to be at their most active in Japan, Hyaku Monogatari is a parlor game from a bygone era. It involves telling one hundred scary stories over the course of a very long evening, extinguishing a candle after each. The ostensible reason for this is that once the hundredth tale has been told, a vaguely-defined mysterious happening will, uh, happen.

  How many participants actually believed a ghost would appear once the final tale was told, we’ll never know. But undoubtedly more than a few people joined in the fun for a decidedly down-to-earth reason: long before the advent of air conditioning, listening to scary stories was a quick and easy way of getting a shiver and cooling down in the doldrums of summer!

  Nobody is quite sure where the game originated. Judging by the name, it may have been inspired by tales of the Hyakki Yagyo (“The Hundred Demons’ Night Parade”), a supposedly true story of an 11th century invasion of Kyoto by supernatural forces. (For more about this terrifying tale, see Yokai Attack!)

  Although records of Hyaku Monogatari sessions date back to at least the mid-1600s, it was undoubtedly played far before that. It seems to have originally been a way for aristocrats to pass a summer evening, but soon spread like wildfire through society at large. Its popularity coincided with an emerging mass popular culture and dovetailed perfectly with the worldwide phenomenon of Spiritualism in the mid-to-late 1800s. A popular summer pastime for two and a half centuries, the concept of Hyaku Monogatari inspired a great deal of literature and art, including spooky series by some of Japan’s masters (such as Katsushika Hokusai, pictured below). The long hours and preparation required has made sessions few and far between in our faster-paced modern era, but even today, the phrase remains synonymous with tales of terror.

  How to Play

  While the game itself existed long before, the 17th Century story collection Otogiboko details the traditional method of playing.

  1) Gather a group of at least 3 and preferably more (you’re going to be telling a lot of stories here).

  2) Wait for a night of the full moon.

  3) Assemble at the home of one of the participants.

  4) Prepare a space consisting of at least two rooms, though three are preferable, and an L-shape more preferable still.

  5) Darken the rooms. In the one furthest from the room in which the group is assembled, arrange 100 lanterns†† lit by candles. Lanterns should preferably use blue tissue-paper rather than the standard white. In the center place the table, and atop the table the mirror.

  6) Participants should wear blue clothing‡‡ and leave their swords at the door (remember, this was written in the 17th century; this was standard tea-house etiquette of the day. Modern-day participants should follow suit by leaving stunguns, pepper sprays, Tasers, Glocks, etc. at the door.) Remove all potentially dangerous items from the room.

  7) Pick your tales ahead
of time. Traditionally, the stories told at Hyaku Monogatari sessions involved not ghost stories but tales of strange or odd happenings. But really, any form of spooky tale intended to set the listener’s hair on end will do.

  Choose stories of a reasonable length. Each participant will only have an average of just five minutes to tell a tale. Think about it: five minutes times one hundred equals more than eight hours. This sort of entertainment hails from a slower era and demands serious concentration and endurance.

  8) After each tale is told, the teller rises and goes into the room with the lanterns. After extinguishing a lantern, they must gaze at themselves in the mirror and return to the storytelling room. (The group may talk amongst themselves during this time.)

  The Attack

  The room gets progressively darker and gloomier as the candles are blown out. Once the hundredth is extinguished and the rooms are plunged into total darkness, something is supposed to happen.

  Here’s the catch: the “something” isn’t clearly defined. Nearly any strange phenomenon is possible. Perhaps someone will be seized by a spirit, or a yokai or yurei will appear in the room. Details vary from account to account, but a late 18th century portrayal of a session illustrated by legendary woodblock artist Katsushika Hokusai shows participants sprinting in terror from a home that is literally overflowing with strange creatures. This is undoubtedly an exaggeration, but caution is advised. Some sources claim that once invoked by a successful Hyaku Monogatari, strange phenomena will continue unabated for thirty days.

  Hyaku Monogatari don’t have to be spoken aloud; reading one hundred scary stories under the right conditions can have the same effect. Wait a second - how many stories are between these covers, again?