Chin-Chin Kobokama

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
The floor of a Japanese room is covered with beautiful, thick,
soft mats of woven reeds. They fit very closely together
so that you can just slip a knife blade between them.
They are changed once every year and are kept very clean.
The Japanese never wear shoes in the house and do
not use chairs or furniture such as English people use.

(00:22):
They sit, sleep, eat, and sometimes even write upon the floor,
so the mats must be kept very clean. Indeed, and
Japanese children are taught just as soon as they can speak,
never to spoil or dirty the mats. Now, Japanese children
are really very good. All travelers who have written pleasant
books about Japan declare that Japanese children are much more

(00:45):
obedient than English children and much less mischievous. They do
not spoil and dirty things, and they do not even
break their own toys. A little Japanese girl does not
break her doll. No, she takes great care of it
and keeps it even after she becomes woman and is married.
When she becomes a mother and has a daughter, she
gives the doll to that little daughter, and the child

(01:06):
takes the same care of the doll that her mother
did and preserves it until she grows up and gives
it at last to her own children, who play with
it just as nicely as their grandmother did. So, I
who am writing this little story for you, have seen
in Japan dolls more than one hundred years old, looking
just as pretty as when they were new. This will

(01:28):
show you how very good Japanese children are, and you
will be able to understand why the floor of a
Japanese room is nearly always kept clean, not scratched and
spoiled by mischievous play. You ask me whether all all
Japanese children are as good as that, Well, no, there
are a few, a very few naughty ones. And what

(01:50):
happens to the mats in the houses of these naughty
children nothing very bad, because there are fairies who take
care of the mats. These fairies tease and frightened children
who dirty or spoil the mats. At least they used
to tease and frighten such mischievous children. I am not
quite sure whether those little fairies still live in Japan,

(02:11):
because the new railways in the telegraph polls have frightened
a great many fairies away. But here is a little
story about them. Once there was a little girl who
was very pretty, but also very lazy. Her parents were
rich and had a great many servants, and these servants
were very fond of the little girl and did everything
for her which she ought to have been able to

(02:33):
do for herself. Perhaps this is what made her so lazy.
When she grew up into a beautiful woman. She still
remains lazy, but as the servants always dressed and undressed
her and arranged her hair, she looked very charming and
nobody thought about her faults. At last, she was married
to a brave warrior and went away with him to
live in another house where there were but few servants.

(02:56):
She was sorry not to have as many servants as
she had had at home, because she was obliged to
do several things for herself which other folks had always
done for her. It was such trouble to her to
dress herself and take care of her own clothes, and
keep herself looking neat and pretty to please her husband.
But as he was a warrior and often had to
be far away from home with the army, she could

(03:18):
sometimes be just as lazy as she wished. Her husband's
parents were very old and good natured and never scolded her.
Well One night, while her husband was away with the army,
she was awakened by queer little noises in her room.
By the light of a big paper lantern, she could
see very well, and she saw strange things. What hundreds

(03:40):
of little men dressed just like Japanese warriors, but only
about one inch high, were dancing all around her pillow.
They wore the same kind of dress her husband wore
on holidays, kamashimo, a long robe with square shoulders, and
their hair was tied up in knots, and each wore
two tiny swords. They all looked at her, They danced

(04:01):
and laughed, and they all sang the same song over
and over again, chinchin Kobakama Yomo fuke sro oshizumare hime
gimh yatan tong, which meant we are the chinchin kobakama.
The hour is late, sleep, honorable noble darling. The words
seemed very polite, but she soon saw that the little

(04:23):
men were only making cruel fun of her. They also
made ugly faces at her. She tried to catch some
of them, but they jumped about so quickly that she
could not. Then she tried to drive them away, but
they would not go, and they never stopped singing Chin
chin kobakama and laughing at her. Then she knew they
were little fairies, and became so frightened that she could

(04:44):
not even cry out. They danced around her until morning,
then they all vanished. Suddenly, she was ashamed to tell
anybody what had happened, because as she was the wife
of a warrior, she did not wish anybody to know
how frightened she had been. Next night again the little
men came and danced, and they came also the night

(05:05):
after that, and every night, always at the same hour,
which the old Japanese used to call the hour of
the Ox, that is, about two o'clock in the morning
by our time. At last, she became very sick through
want of sleep and through fright but the little men
would not leave her alone. When her husband came back home,
he was very sorry to find her sick in bed.

(05:28):
At first, she was afraid to tell him what had
made her ill, for fear that he would laugh at her.
But he was so kind and coaxed her so gently
that after a while she told him what happened. Every night,
he did not laugh at her at all, but looked
very serious for a time. Then he asked at what
time do they come? She answered always at the same hour,
the hour of the ox. Very well, said her husband, Tonight,

(05:51):
I shall hide and watch for them. Do not be frightened.
So that night the warrior hid himself in a closet
in the sleeping room and kept watch through a chink
between the sliding doors. He waited and watched until the
hour of the ox. Then all at once the little
men came up through the mats and began their dance
in their song Chin Chin kobakama yomo fuke sro. They

(06:14):
looked so queer and danced in such a funny way
that the warrior could scarcely keep from laughing. But he
saw his young wife's frightened face, and then, remembering that
nearly all Japanese ghosts and goblins are afraid of a sword,
he drew his blade and rushed out of the closet
and struck at the little dancers. Immediately they all turned
into what do you think toothpicks? There were no more

(06:38):
little warriors, only a lot of old toothpicks scattered over
the mats. The young wife had been too lazy to
put her toothpicks away properly, and every day, after having
used a new toothpick, she would stick it down between
the mats on the floor to get rid of it.
So the little fairies who take care of the floor
mats became angry with her and tormented her. Her husband

(06:59):
scolded her, and she was so ashamed that she did
not know what to do. A servant was called and
the toothpicks were taken away and burned. After that, the
little men never came back again. There is also a
story told about a lazy little girl who used to
eat plums and afterward hide the plumstones between the floor mats.
For a long time, she was able to do this

(07:19):
without being found out, but at last the fairies got
angry and punished her. For every night, tiny tiny women,
all wearing bright red robes with very long sleeves, rose
up from the floor at the same hour and danced
and made faces at her and prevented her from sleeping.
Her mother one night set up to watch and saw
them and struck at them, and they all turned into plumstones.

(07:42):
So the naughtiness of that little girl was found out.
After that she became a very good girl, indeed and
of Chin Chin Kobakama by lefcadio Hern