"The secret lore of the ocean" -- Japan and the Mysterious Sea

 "We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, we are going back from whence we came." -- John F. Kennedy

My relationship with the ocean is complicated. I was born on the California coastline, and as far back as I can remember, many of my interests revolved around the water. Whenever I go to the beach, I feel tremendous peace, a return to my truest self. It's a long salty drink for my parched spirit and it's the best medicine I know. At the same time, my deepest fears lie in the ocean. Sharks are at the top of the list, that goes without saying, but it's the water itself more than anything, that vast empty space. The possibilities it holds, all that life hiding in silent, endless blue.

Just the thought of swimming in open water makes my blood run cold. I've always wanted to take SCUBA lessons but I'm certain I would suffer a fatal heart attack from sheer panic on the first dive. Even a nice whale-watching boat tour is out of the question because I know that any shadow quickly rising from beneath would send me into hysterics. And rest assured, this is not because I am ignorant--it's because I know too much. I know what's down there, and I know what could be down there, and I know that I am a member of a species that is ill-equipped to deal with any of it, so I know exactly enough to not go in.

C'mon, man! Cannonball!

Like a lot of questionable things about me, Japan gets it. Ayakashi loosely translates to "strange phenomenon of the sea," specifically entities that cross boundaries between water and land, whether that means a sea serpent being spotted breaching the waves, ghosts haunting the deck of a ship, or a full on beach-invasion of mutated crabs. The most obvious example of this reflected in pop culture is Gojira, the leviathan that rises from the sea and wreaks havoc on land. Most analysis agrees that Gojira represents Japan's fears over nuclear war and radioactivity, but for my money, it just as much represents fear of the immeasurable, unknowable secrets of the sea. Japan's relationship with the ocean goes deeper (pun intended) than the guy stomping around in a dinosaur suit would have you believe.

No one can illustrate Japan's itchiest anxieties better than Junji Ito. I discovered his brilliantly weird manga series Uzumaki only last year, and since then I have gobbled up whatever of his work I can find. Uzumaki tells the story of a small town that slowly becomes consumed with spirals, the pattern appearing everywhere from smoke to locks of hair to birthmarks. This doesn't sound like much, until people start twisting themselves into human curly fries and teenage boys slowly morph into enormous snails. Ito's combination of bizarro plot, bleak characters, and absolutely insane artwork create a dizzying experience of horror. In 2001, he unleashed arguably his most notorious work upon Japan, Gyo, first running as a serial manga before being adapted to bound collections. One day, fish bearing spindly terror-legs begin crawling up on land and chaos ensues. The overall plot consists of government conspiracy and biological warfare gone awry, mixed with family secrets and a little strained romance to spare. But the reason you may have heard of Gyo comes down to one nightmarish image: shark with legs.

Where's your god now?

Our Americanized introduction to the wonderful world of J-Horror arrived soaking wet. The American remake of The Ring has water all over the place, from Seattle's never-ending rainfall to a dreary ferry boat ride. The cursed video depicts a woman flinging herself into the ocean and dead horses in the surf. Samara herself is surrounded by water imagery, bringing the dank darkness of the well with her wherever she appears and dripping it all over your clean floors. The apartment in Dark Water is haunted with wetness, from the stains oozing through the ceiling to the grimy sludge that pours from the faucets. The story takes some inspiration from the bizarre details of the Elisa Lam case, wherein a hotel suffered plumbing issues that were later discovered to be caused by the corpse of a young woman stuffed in the building's water tower. The Grudge was less fixated on water imagery, but one of the tensest scenes depicted a detective reaching into a full bath of inky water, discovering through a psychic glimpse that a young boy and his cat were drowned in the tub.

Many of Japan's myths and legends are directly linked to water. The kappa is one of the more distinctive and well-known Japanese water spirits. They are described as wily ogres that dwell in rivers and lakes, causing trouble for unwary humans that stumble upon their turf, from drowning, to rape, to extracting your soul through your butthole (seriously). The Shinto figure Suijin (meaning "water deity" but also applied to any number of supernatural creatures that inhabit the water) accounts for a sizable portion of Shinto worship, the water god representing clean drinking water, healthy pregnancies, and providing protection for fisherman. Even the Shinto version of the creation myth includes a crucial reference to water: the god Izanagi arrived on Earth and refreshed himself with a soothing bath, like you do. As he toweled off afterward, each drop of water that fell from his body and hit the soil formed into a newborn yokai (mysterious phenomena), bizarre spirits and creatures that went on to wreak havoc on the world. 

Some of these apparitions seem terrifying in appearance and actions, but are often embarrassingly easy to outwit. Legends of drowned sailors known as funa yurei rising from the sea and dragging ships below the surface is a classic image of maritime horror. The ghosts will demand a bamboo spoon from the terrified crew, only to use the spoon to fill the boat with water; therefore, it was deemed wise for a captain to pack a spoon with holes drilled in it, so as to fool the spirits. Even the murderous kappa have a two glaring weaknesses: they have a bowl-like dent on top of their head that must remain filled with water, and they are polite to a fault. If one can trick a kappa into returning a customary bow of greeting, its bowl-head will spill over and the beast will be forced to remain half-bowed until he can refill himself, allowing the human to escape.

Perhaps the most mortally horrifying of these spirits, for me anyway, is Umibozu, or "sea monk." Storms are obviously bad news for sailors, but when the skies are clear and the water is still, that is the time to be truly afraid. Umibozu are artistically portrayed as dark giants with luminous eyes that rise suddenly from the depths of calm seas and loom over passing ships, if not sucking them into the swell of their arrival. Sometimes they ask questions, more often they cause destruction, but they always leave witnesses in pants-shitting hysterics.

Hey buddy.

They were said to warn of coming storms, but there are disturbingly few concrete reasons for encountering umibozu. In fact, I couldn't find any information on how to attract it (should you want to) or how to avoid it (should it find you), almost as if it is a true force of nature, as random and unfeeling in its punishments as the sea itself. Of course, this phenomena of enormous shapes rising from the depths has been promptly dismissed by science. Clearly, ancient mariners mistook the reflection of thunderheads or a large turtle for a towering harbinger of doom. I don't buy it. Even with only a handful of information on these entities, I know exactly enough to never get on a fishing boat again.

The most fascinating of the culture's roots in water lies in the existence of whale cults in the coastal regions. I'm sure some of you out there can't think of marine mammals and Japan without instantly jumping to The Cove, but I would like to do my part to remind you that film does not depict Japan's environmentalist attitude as a whole, only an ostensibly ugly aspect of its fishing industry (at least to us Westerners, and we're not in any position to judge). But Japan's niche religion of whale worship has a long history rooted in folklore, none as striking and haunting as the legend of Bakekujira, the Ghost Whale.

The most metal god in all creation.

One night long ago, off the coast of Okino Island, something huge and white came rolling in with the tide. When boats went out to investigate, they were astonished to see the living skeleton of a baleen whale, surrounded by a massive school of squirming fish. The men attempted to harpoon the beast only for their spears to fly right through it. The apparition lingered for a while only to eventually vanish without a trace beneath the waves.

It's fairly common for whales to follow their prey into dangerously shallow territory, accidentally beaching themselves in the process. But nature does not act without reason, at least not to those who are paying attention. Stories referring to Hyochakushin (the "Drifting Ashore" god) nearly mirror the legend of Bakekujira, but take a more literal form. Before the revolution of the sea-faring vessel, coastal Japanese villages were limited in how much bounty they could take from the ocean, their rowboats unable to travel too far away from shore. These villages would struggle to survive on their small fishing hauls and meager harvests on land. But every once in a while, fortune would smile upon them.

The arrival of a whale on the beach was an enormous blessing, bringing with it scores of deep sea fish. A village could eat for weeks on fish and whale meat and they didn't let a scrap of it go to waste. The villagers believed the whale was not only a gift from the gods but also a god itself, a massive noble creature that arrived in their hour of need, and they would not allow the sacrifice go unnoticed. Shrines made of whale bones were erected to honor the creatures, and to this day there are over 100 whale graveyards scattered over Japan. The whale god eventually blended into the lore of the Shinto god of abundance, Ebisu, as a bringer of good fortune and mortal comforts, establishing whales forever as benevolent rulers of the sea.

So what does all this mean? It's probably not for a white American to properly explain or even hope to truly understand, so I won't try. But I do find it inherently fascinating how a culture shapes itself, what geographical and psychological factors combine to produce such vivid mythologies, which in turn influence the modern culture. And given my own quasi-phobia of the deep, it's difficult for me not to be intrigued by the pattern.

I don't know for sure if the nation of Japan is subconsciously terrified of the ocean, if a citizen of modern day Sapporo looks out at that endless green sea and can't help but feel admiration mixed with some unknowable dread, some deep-seated fear that they've known their whole life but never really understood, sure that at any moment something monstrous could rise from the depths. But it's plain to see that many of their stories and legends have a common theme, and it's hard to dismiss that it is merely an influence of geography. There is true fear there, the truly alien, still the greatest mystery our planet holds. In any case, these stories have pumped up my anxieties of the ocean better than Jaws ever could.

Have you heard the good news about our lord and savior NO ONE?

(The information on Japanese legends sourced from https://hyakumonogatari.com/tag/water-monsters/ which is highly recommended reading if you're even half as interested in folklore as I am.)