The receent trip to Japan had its morbid side with, coincidentally, visits to two places which are famous as spots where Japanese warriors committed suicide. Normally I find Japanese people to be not particularly different to anyone else and certainly not the incrutable oriental of urban legend but their attitude towards such behaviour is one area where the cultural differences are really brought home.
The first site, the Sengakuji temple in Tokyo (picture above - as always click on the image to see a larger version), is the place where the 47 Ronin Samurai committed suicide after they had avenged the execution of their former lord - bwho is also buried there. This story is, of course, well known so it was somewhat of a surprise to find that the Sengakuji doesn't have 50 gazillion varieties of (tacky) omiage hon sale, or indeed much indicating that it has such a significant graveyard, indeed you have to get inside the temple before you see signs to the relevant bits. I found the place to be dignified and I was entirely happy to help contribute funds so my wife could buy some incense to burn in respect and as a memory to their actions. While I have some problems with the whole concept of seppuku; in this case, where the choice was between seppuku or execution and where the very publicity of their act helped make their revenge more complete, I do indeed see why these samurai are held to be such heroes. We admire them for their willingness to sacrifice themseleves for the cause of justice and for the way they struck back at the eternal enemy of honourable warriors namely slimy bureaucrats.
On the other hand, the second site - Iiiyamamori in Aizu Wakamatsu - is rather less dignified about the whole thing. Iimoriyama is about the Byakkotai. The Byakkotai were some young boy soldiers (aged ~16) who were fighting for the Shogun against the Meiji forces in the 1868 civil war that resulted in the Meiji restoration. The Byakkotai were supposed to relieve the besieged their lord and the shogunate forces at Aizu's Tsuruga castle but when they got to Iimoriyama and saw the castle apparently already destroyed by fire they committed suicide in despair. Ironically the castle did not in fact burn down - the flames and smoke were from the town surrounding it.
To be honest I have a fundamental misunderstanding about the whole thing. Unlike the 47 ronin, the Byakkotai killed themselves because they thought they had failed. This to my mind is a tragic waste of life not heroism and I find it hard to see these poor boys as anything other than victims of poor leadership and idiotic adherence to antiquated and inhumane concepts of behaviour. To the inhabitants of Aizu Wakamatsu though, while the tale is indeed tragic, it is one that they celebrate as a heroic one, and one which they do their best to exploit with all the tackiness they can possibly muster such as a young woman acting out the suicide as a kind of dance to musical accompaniment.
Perhaps more bizarre than all the tacky gift shops and the specially installed Y200 escalator, which gets the tour bus parties up the hill without much climbing, is the column from Pompeii that was donated by the Mussolini government in year 6 of the Fascist era (aka AD 1928). This is peculiar on two grounds, firstly the Byakkotai were fighting against the militarists who dominated the Meiji restoration and who morphed into the unpleasant eastern allies of Hitler and Mussolini, and secondly what is being celebrated is the wasteful suicide of a group of apparently incompetent soldiers. It was a tragedy, but I don't really see why it was a heroic one, except as a sort of "heroic failure". Anyway despite that lots of tourists come and take photos and light incense at the graves (the wife did too but I didn't contribute). Perhaps it is my non-compassionate rightwingism but I found the whole thing to be intensely disturbing rather than heroic or worth celebrating. I can understand that it is worth remembering - as an object lesson in what not to do for example - and possibly as an example of standing against the horrid militarists - although I think that is more of a post 1945 justification and the memorial was there well before then - but I not with it being a place to celebrate loyalty, honour etc. I guess sometimes east dones't meet west.