Kuchisake-onna

Kuchisake-onna

In Japanese mythology, Kuchisake-onna ("Slit-Mouthed Woman") is a woman who is mutilated by a jealous husband and returns as a malicious spirit. When rumors of alleged sightings began spreading in 1979, it spread throughout Japan and caused panic in many towns. There are even reports of schools allowing children to go home only in groups escorted by teachers for safety, and of police increasing their patrols.

The modern urban legend

According to the legend, children walking alone at night may encounter a woman wearing a surgical mask, which is not an unusual sight in Japan as people wear them to protect others from their colds or sickness. The woman will stop the child and ask, "Am I beautiful?" If the child answers no, the child is killed with a pair of scissors which the woman carries. If the child answers yes, the woman pulls away the mask, revealing that her mouth is slit from ear to ear, and asks "How about now?". If the child answers no, he/she will be cut in half. If the child answers yes, then she will slit his/her mouth like hers. It is impossible to run away from her, as she will simply reappear in front of the victim. It is said she does this because of some marital issues.

When the legend reappeared in the 1970s rumors of ways to escape also emerged. Some sources say she can also be confused by answering her question with, rather than yes or no, "You are average." Unsure of what to do, she will give a person enough time to escape while she is lost in thought. Another escape route is to tell her one has a previous engagement; she will pardon her manners and excuse herself. In some variations of the tale, she can be distracted by throwing fruit or sweets at her which she will pick up, thus giving the victim a chance to run. Another way is for the child to ask her if the child is pretty; she will get confused and leave.

Bake-danuki

Bake-danuki

Bake-danuki (化け狸) are a kind of tanuki yōkai (ghost) found in the classics and in the folklore and legends of various places in Japan.

Although the tanuki is an real, extant animal, the bake-danuki that appears in literature has always been depicted as a strange, even supernatural animal. The earliest appearance of the bake-danuki in literature, in the Nihon Shoki written by the Empress Suiko during the Nara period, consists of such passages as "in two months of spring, there are mujina in the country of Mutsu , they turn into humans and sing songs. Bake-danuki subsequently appear in such classics as the Nihon Ryōikiand the Uji Shūi Monogatari. In some regions of Japan, bake-danuki are reputed to have abilities similar to those attributed to kitsune (foxes): they can shapeshift into other things,shapeshift people, and possess human beings.

There are many legends of tanukis in the Sado Islands of Niigata Prefecture and in Shikoku, and among them, like the danzaburou-danuki of Sado, the awa-tanuki-gassen of Awa Province (Tokushima Prefecture), and the yasima-no-hage-danuki of Kagawa Prefecture, the tanuki who possessed special abilities were given names, and even became the subject of rituals. Apart from these places, there are few cases where tanuki are treated with special regard.

The character 狸, pronounced lí in modern Mandarin, was originally a collective name for medium-sized mammals resembling cats in China, with the leopard cat as its nucleus. When this character was brought to Japan, there were no animals to which it could be suitably applied. Japanese intellectuals used the character to signify tanuki, stray cats, wild boars, Eurasian badgers, weasels, and Japanese giant flying squirrels.

The tanuki of Japan from time immemorial were deified as governing all things in nature, but after the arrival of Buddhism, animals other than envoys of the gods (foxes, snakes, etc.) lost their divinity. Since all that remained was the image of possessing special powers, they were seen as evil or as yōkai, with tanuki being a representative type. Some also take the viewpoint that the image of the tanuki has overlapped with that of the mysterious and fearful 狸 of China (leopard cat).However, since the tanuki of Japan do not have the fearsome image that the leopard-cats of China do, unlike in China their image took the form of a more humorous kind of monster,[8] and even in folktales like Kachi-kachi Yama, and Bunbuku Chagama, they often played the part of foolish animals.

Compared with kitsune (foxes), which are the epitome of shape-changing animals, there is the saying that "the fox has seven disguises, the tanuki has eight (狐七化け、狸八化け)". The tanuki is thus superior to the fox in its disguises, but unlike the fox, which changes its form for the sake of tempting people, tanuki do so to fool people and make them seem stupid. There is also the theory that they simply like to change their form.

Ushi-oni

Ushi-oni

The Ushi-Oni (牛鬼, Ox Oni (demon)), or gyūki, is a creature which appears in the folklore of Japan. There are various kinds of ushi-oni, all of them some sort of monster with a horned, bovine head.

Perhaps the most famous ushi-oni appears as a protective symbol in the Uwajima Ushi-oni Festival, which is held in late July in Uwajima of Ehime Prefecture. Something like the dragon dancers at a Chinese New Year celebration, this ushi-oni is represented with a huge, multiple-person costume with a cloth body and a carved, painted head held upon a pole. It has a sword for a tail, and is thought to drive away evil spirits.

Another well-known ushi-oni is a massive, brutal sea-monster which lives off the coast of Shimane Prefecture and other places in Western Japan and attacks fishermen. It is often depicted with a spider- or crab-like body. This ushi-oni seems to be connected to another monster called the nure-onna, who sometimes appears before an ushi-oni attack and tricks the victim into holding her child, which then becomes stuck to the person's hands and grows heavier in order to hinder escape.

Yet another ushi-oni is depicted as a statue on the grounds of the Negoroji temple in Takamatsu, Kagawa Prefecture. It is a bipedal monster with huge tusks, spurred wrists, and membranes like a flying squirrel. A sign nearby explains that this creature terrorized the area about four-hundred years ago, and was slain by a skilled archer by the name of Yamada Kurando Takakiyo (山田蔵人高清). He dedicated its horns to the temple, and they can still be seen to this day. 

Ushi-oni are also mentioned in Sei Shōnagon's tenth-century diary The Pillow Book, and in the Taiheiki of the fourteenth century.

The Shinto Kanamara Matsuri

The Shinto Kanamara Matsuri (かなまら祭り) is held each spring at the Kanayama shrine (金山神社) in Kawasaki, Japan. The exact dates vary: the main festivities fall on the first Sunday in April. The penis, as the central theme of the event – is reflected in illustrations, candy, carved vegetables, decorations, and a mikoshi parade.

The Kanamara Matsuri is centered around a local penis-venerating shrine once popular among prostitutes who wished to pray for protection from sexually transmitted diseases. It is said that there are also divine protections for business prosperity and for the clan's prosperity; and for easy delivery, marriage, and married-couple harmony. There is also a legend of a sharp-toothed demon (vagina dentata) that hid inside the vagina of a young woman and castrated two young men on their wedding nights. As a result, the young woman sought help from a blacksmith, who fashioned an iron phallus to break the demon's teeth, which lead to the enshrinement of the item.

Today, the festival has become something of a tourist attraction and is used to raise money for HIV research.