March 3 of every year is Girl’s day in the Japanese culture and May 5th of every year is boy’s day, also known as Children’s Day. It used to be called Tango no sekku (meaning feast of the banners). On girl’s day the doll’s are displayed, but on Children’s day the carp-shaped Koinobori flags are displayed, as pictured below.
My family never had boys so we didn’t celebrate much of this. However, it was an excuse for us to eat Kashiwa mochi (which are mochi rice cakes wrapped in Kashiwa (oak) leaves.
