Jinzen-Shiki

Jinzen-Shiki

By Junko Kosaki

When I got a wedding invitation from Kayo, a very close friend from my high school days, I noticed an unfamiliar word on the card.  “Jinzen-shiki”—what’s this?” I wondered.  I was able to guess that it literally meant “wedding in front of people”, but what would it be like?  How would it be held?  As the wedding was drawing near, I was getting more and more excited.  But at the same time, something was giving me a real headache.  I had to prepare a speech for the wedding reception party.  What could I say about her?  There were too many things to talk about.  We definitely had so much fun together, so it was hard to choose the topics.  I was also a bit afraid of putting too many jokes into my speech just in case these jokes might annoy the couple.

Then the wedding day came.  I took a train and a taxi to get to the place for the wedding.  It was a typical wedding centre in a city area.  As soon as I arrived there, I saw my good old friends from my high school days!  I hadn’t seen them for a long time, so I started chatting with them until one of them said to me, “Junko, have you written your name in the wedding guestbook yet?”  Oh, my God!  That was exactly what I had to do first as soon as I arrived at the wedding centre.  I rushed to the guestbook section, greeted the ladies there, wrote my name with a Japanese writing brush, and handed a money gift to one of the ladies.  I chose a money envelop with a pretty pink flower, because I knew that Kayo would love the colour. 

When I looked around, I also saw many relatives from both families.  They were also chatting, while waiting for the ceremony to start.  Most of the female family members were wearing “kimonos”, Japanese traditional formal clothes, which are still common even at a modern Japanese wedding.  Japanese women nowadays rarely wear kimono.  Some of them only wear it on special occasions such as Coming-of-Age events, or weddings.  Others never wear it even on such occasions, because they feel tight while wearing it.  That’s why most of the invited guests, including me, were wearing Western suits or colourful dresses.

Suddenly there was an announcement saying, “Ladies and Gentlemen, would you please go downstairs to meet together at the wedding ceremony place?”  Everybody began to go downstairs, and on the ground floor we saw a small area, which looked a little bit like the inside of a chapel.  We sat down on the chairs, and soon a female Master of Ceremony solemnly opened the ceremony with an announcement.  “Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the wedding ceremony for Mr. Hirota Minoru and Miss Imajo Kayo.  I suppose that most of you find “Jinzen-shiki” unfamiliar.  The couple decided to take this fairly new style because they wanted to share their wedding with more people, not only with their close relatives but also with other people close to them…”

Her announcement reminded me of my parents’ and even my older sister’s weddings.  My parents had shown me some of their wedding photos, and I attended my older sister’s wedding.  They both had their weddings in a traditional Japanese ‘Shinto-style’.  I was twelve years old when my older sister had her wedding ceremony, and I still remember that my father told me to wait outside until the solemn Shinto wedding ceremony finished.  I also saw the other people expect our family members waiting outside of ceremony place.  It was carried out only among the family people, and it definitely meant unification of two families.

This concept of family marriage goes back the ‘Samurai’ era of the 14^th century.  Under the feudal system, marriages were often used as political and diplomatic strategies to maintain peace and unity among feudal lords.  Thus the personal will of men and women for marriage was ignored in the face of family interests, and marriages came to be arranged by and for families.  Both my grandparents’ and parents’ marriage were arranged by a person called ‘nakodo’, or gobetween.  My older sister’s marriage was not arranged, but in her wedding reception they also had ‘Nakodo’, who was her husband’s boss in his company.  Up until recently it has still been common to have someone who could play the role of ‘nakodo’ for a wedding, even though that person did not arrange the couple’s first meeting.

It is also true that Japan has been influenced by Western culture for weddings.  I remember attending a wedding ceremony of another friend of mine a few years ago.  She was really fascinated by the Western style of wedding, especially after she watched the Japanese TV drama series “Walking down the aisle”.  She was dying to have a wedding at a church, wearing a Western style of wedding dress, but the problem was she was not a Christian.  To get baptised only for the wedding, she had to go to a local church several times to follow a Christian style of wedding.  Of course, her boyfriend had to go there, too.  They spent quite a long time preparing for the wedding ceremony.  No wonder her voice wobbled with emotion when they were saying their marriage vows in front of the priest.

The music starts now, and everybody is looking at the stairs.  The bride and the bridegroom are walking downstairs slowly, arm in arm.  What a beautiful bride she is!  Her gorgeous wedding dress accentuates her beautiful and slender shoulders.  When she gets closer to us, I can see her crying just a little.  The groom, on the other hand, looks so nervous.  They are now walking towards the small stage, where they are supposed to make marriage vows in front of all the guests. 

The music stops, and it is time for them to make their vows.  ‘I, Hirota Minoru, will love her, honour her, comfort her, and keep her in sickness and in health as long as I shall live’, says the groom, first.  ‘I, Imajo Kayo, will love him, honour him, comfort him, and keep him in sickness and in health as long as I shall live’, says the bride, next.  Then, they say their final vows together, but Kayo’s voice is so small and trembling that I can hardly hear it.  Her face is covered by the wedding veil, so I can’t see her face properly.  Is she moved to the point of tears? Or is she remembering something that happened a couple of years ago?  In a sense, she has come a long way to have a wedding ceremony today. ?

‘I don’t think I will marry anyone.’  This is what she said when she parted from her last boyfriend, Masashi, three years ago.  She had been going out with him since she graduated from senior high school.  I knew him very well, so I used to tease her a lot about going out with him.  It was when they began to talk about their future that their long-term relationship began to suffer.  She wanted to keep her job as a nurse.  She loved her job, no matter how hard it was.  Her mother was also a nurse, and she was brought up by her mother, who worked so hard to earn their living after her father’s death.  It was so natural for her to continue her job even after the marriage.  However, Masashi could not understand her point of view, and he wanted her to quit her job straight after their marriage.  She tried and tried to persuade him to let her continue her job, but in vain.  Poor, Kayo, she was absolutely devastated.  It was too hard for her to choose between her boyfriend and her job.  She lost weight and self-confidence. They broke up soon after.  She kept telling me that she would never get married to anybody.  Well, what happened after that?  She found someone else, a much more thoughtful and understanding man!  She met her future partner, Minoru, at a university in Kyoto, where they were taking a correspondence course together.  She was challenging herself to take another qualification she could use at her hospital, and Minoru was also taking additional qualification to cope with teaching another subject at his high school.  He is a social studies teacher, just like Masashi, who also teaches social studies at a middle school.  What a coincidence!

While I am thinking of all these sorts of things, the ceremony is continuing smoothly.  Now both the bride and the groom exchange their rings with each other, and the groom then pecks the bride on her cheek.  This part is very similar to the western style wedding.  Then, one friend from each of the bride and the groom’s side comes up to the stage and announces that the couple are  now married.  Now I understand what  ‘Jingen-shiki’ is all about.  It is a wedding ceremony where the bride and the groom make marriage vows in front of their close friends and family in a rather informal way.  There is no religious priest, nor do they have their wedding ceremony at a sacred place.  It seems quite simple, but I like this simple but rather informal style of wedding.

When the ceremony was over, and we all moved to a much bigger room for their wedding reception.  We waited for a while before the newlyweds came into the reception place.  Suddenly, the front door opened, and the live music started.  Although all the lights were off, the couple were seen in the middle of a shiny spotlight.  They really looked like movie stars.  They slowly began walking towards another stage.  While they were walking, Kayo’s beautiful tiara began to fall off by accident.  At first, all the guests looked a little surprised, but soon they burst out laughing when Minoru helped her to put her tiara back on her head.  It was such a heart-warming scene, which showed his deep affection towards her.  Finally, they managed to reach the stage.

Finally it was time for me to give a speech for Kayo.  I was getting a little nervous, while the ceremony was in progress.  Although she told me in advance that my speech would be in the first half of all the speeches, I felt like I was waiting for ages.  Even when I had all sorts of cuisine beautifully arranged in front of me, I couldn’t even enjoy eating.  I just wanted to finish my speech as soon as possible and I was trying to remember what I had prepared to say.  I wanted to make her laugh, but at the same time I really wanted to tell her that she is one of my best friends.  We shared a lot of good memories, and we shared a lot of tears, too.

I wasn’t even listening to what other people were talking about until my turn came around.  I stood up and commenced my speech.  The first time we met, the fun time in the cooking class, and the strict Japanese classics teacher who used to pick on her, because she was always smiling even in front of that strict teacher.  These are the things we always talk about when we remember our high school days, and Kayo was always better at describing each scene than I.  While I was speaking, I could see her laughing, and I was also relieved to see her husband smiling.  I then said that she was a bit worried about taking a university correspondence course at first, but that she used to talk how much she had been learning new things.  Her positive attitude did inspire and encourage me to study abroad again.

Yes, she is a positive and challenging person.  At the reception, she sang as many as three ‘karaoke’ songs with her guests.  Although in many modern Japanese weddings it is now very common to hear even a bride and a groom singing ‘karaoke’ together, I have never seen a bride enjoy singing with her friends so happily.  It is a big difference from my parents’ generation in which a bride was supposed to be silent throughout the wedding reception.  Oh, I was so glad to see her happy face anyway.

The reception was coming to an end.  The bride and the groom slowly stood up and faced their parents.  They were going to read their letters to their parents.  I was wondering what Kayo would say to her mother at that moment, because I knew that she had been taking a long time to write a letter to her, who had raised two daughters all by herself after her husband’s death.  “Mom, thank you so much for raising me until today.  I can’t think of any good words to describe how much I appreciate it.  I know that it must have been hard for you to raise two daughters by yourself.  I was sometimes not a very reasonable child and caused a bit of trouble to you, even though I knew that you were tired from working.  But I have always admired you as a great mom and a woman.  Thank you.  I will start a new life with Minoru, and I promise you to become happy and build a nice family’.  Kayo’s voice was surprisingly determined and strong at this time.  Her mom was looking down slightly, constantly nodding subtly.  Although she seemed to be smiling, there was also a little sad expression on her face.  Kayo finished her letter without crying, while some of their female relatives were sobbing.  This is always the most touching moment in a Japanese wedding reception.

After the reception was over, I went to a nearby coffee shop with my high school friends.  We again talked about Kayo’s wedding dress and other dresses at the reception, her husband, etc.  Then, one of my friends, Chie, said, “I would like to have my wedding in a fine restaurant.  I would like everybody to enjoy delicious wine and food.  I would only invite close friends.”  “Um, that’s not a bad idea.  Well, when will it be, Chie?” I said.  “Within five years!  I have to find my future partner first.”  The moment she said so, we all burst into laugh.  Thank you, Kayo, for reuniting us at your wedding, and HAPPY MARRIAGE FOREVER!