Voice of Tradition
Hokkaido, Japan
The Beginning of the Journey
In Hokkaido, the land stands apart, cold and enduring. Mossy trees stand mute, having watched the turning of all seasons—witnesses to time itself.
Long before me, humans crossed this earth and made their home here. Beneath the sky and through the forests, the Ainu named this land Mosir. These woods still remember their legends.
The Ainu language has always been passed down by word of mouth, as epics called Yukar or as oral histories from elder to child. Tales of the past. Who the Ainu were and are is not mine to claim; I can only listen.
Lake Shikotsu
The red frame of the Yamasen Bridge stands against the blue surface of Lake Shikotsu. Behind the peak, the Chitose River begins and flows into the caldera as it has since before myth.
My guide and I paddle from the shore toward the Yamasen. The kayaks are clear-bottomed; below us, rocks and trees appear close enough to touch.
We pass from shadow into sun. A hawk circles above, its call cutting through the wind. The lake, born of fire tens of thousands of years ago, known for pure waters and year-round accessibility.
To the Ainu it was shikot, “big depression.” Its depths hold life, whether for kayaking its surface or diving below.
Legend tells of a rain trout that hid here from the gods, growing to titanic size, able to swallow bears whole. I hope not to see it today.
Nibutani Kotan
The Saru River winds through the foothills of the Hidaka Mountains. To many with Ainu roots, this is home. Of the Ainu villages around Hokkaido, this one is proud, rich with speakers and advocates.
At the Nibutani Ainu Culture Museum, lives are preserved in cloth and craft. What was once a life, now fragments—patterns, tools, garments—echoing a world left behind.
Nearby, at the Biratori Ainu Crafts and Heritage Center Ureshipa, the strata of Ainu life is set before me. I hold a pendant pressed with the past.
Ainu patterns, once stitched onto bark-fiber ceremonial wear, are now etched on hardwood. My guide tells me I’ve chosen one like a Blakiston’s Fish Owl, a kamuy, protector of the village.
Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park
In the shadow of Mt. Tarumae, Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park sits between Lake Poroto and the Pacific.
With museums and recreated homes, it offers a full experience of Ainu culture.
As I enter through the concrete corridor to the plaza, the walls are decorated with shapes of the forest and silhouettes of animals, gods of nature beckoning me.
Traditional Ainu Performing Arts
Lakeside, a group of performers, moves across the grassy field toward the stage. Ms. Akemi Oshino, born in Mukawa and now a researcher at Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park, stands at the center and speaks about the Ainu language and how it preserves the shape of the land. Words for places flow from this reservoir of speech. Hokkaido’s capital, Sapporo, comes from sat-poro-pet, “large dry river.” Across the island, the pattern, masked in Japanese kanji, endures.
She steps back, making way for another performer, mukkuri, a small mouth harp, in hand. After a brief moment of quiet, she greets us in Ainu. The mukkuri is unique instrument, its sound unforgettable, shrill notes bouncing as the string is plucked.
Following the performance, the group gathers in a circle to perform the iyomante rimse. Ms. Oshino, who learned the Ainu language and culture from her grandmother and through courses, is part of a new generation working to promote Ainu culture and overcome prejudice.
She explains the dance is linked with the ritual, which involves the sacrifice of a bear, sending the kamuy back to the realm of heaven in hopes of fortune.
In unison, they spin, clap, and stomp across the platform. Rhythmic notes of the Ainu language echo. The meaning is largely lost, but the spirit remains—something human, something real. A tradition once thought gone lives again, fierce and fragile, carried by those who remember.
Wearing Ainu Clothing
I move from the lakeside to a recreated Ainu home. Teenagers play a stick-and-hoop game on the lawn. The evening sun filters through the trees in thin gold streams. A glimpse of life in a kotan long gone, alive again in youth and shadow.
I enter the house and sit by the central hearth with Mana Akibe, daughter of Debo Akibe, an Ainu elder. She speaks of the blue-and-white auttus. The patterns, like the pendant around my neck, mark place and blood.
She grew up at Lake Akan in the east, where she learned what it is to be Ainu. She tells me there is no single Ainu. East and West tell different stories, speak different words, carry their own ways and beliefs.
The Ainu Clothing I wear carries this truth. Each stitch marks a place, a family, a memory. Like language, it is passed down. Those who carry it add their own hands, their own lives, to its story.
Archery
Archery, known as aksinot, is one of the hands-on experiences at Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park. In a small hall, the bows sit slightly, like children’s toys, but the string is tight and the arrow strikes hard.
One side of the hall reflects training Ainu children once followed in the kotan before joining the hunt with their parents. Shells are strung on a stick and left to dangle.
I take my chances at the model deer. Handed a bow, I’m told the Ainu carved symbols into arrows to mark the killing blow and applied poison to weaken the animal—but none is given to me today.
Ainu Word Interactive Exhibit
As I walk to my last stop, my guide says iyayraykere—thank you in Ainu. At Upopoy National Ainu Museum and Park, the language is honored. Staff begin and end conversations with it, a quiet insistence it live on.
The Ainu language moves differently from the Japanese. Words are long and flexible, rising, twisting, combining contrasting sounds, rhythmic, almost dancing. I think of Ms. Oshino, my previous guide, who spent her youth and college years learning from classrooms and her grandmother. Not merely learning—reviving stitch by stitch new life into the tapestry of Ainu culture.
This thought carries me to a digital screen. Animals, plants, spirits dance among words. A microphone waits. I lean forward and speak iyayraykere. The word bursts across the screen. A fox leaps through it, chasing the space it held. More words follow—names, places, gods, myths.
The sound lingers, folding into the space between walls and footsteps. A thread linking the past to the present. In the quiet, I feel the weight of a language reborn, carried in voices that will not let it vanish.
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