`✵•.¸,✵°✵.｡.✰ Tanabata! ✰.｡.✵°✵,¸.•✵´

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By now, many of you may have heard of the Japanese star festival commonly known as Tanabata. Based on the Chinese Qixi Festival, it celebrates the meeting of the celestial lovers Orihime and Hikoboshi (represented by the stars Vega and Altair). To quickly summarize the legend, the two lovers are separated by the Milky Way, and they are allowed to meet only once a year on the seventh day of the seventh month of the Gregorian calendar.

The festival was introduced to Japan in 755, and gained widespread popularity by the early Edo period (1603–1867). The customs relating to the festival varied by region, but generally, girls and boys wrote their wishes on strips of paper called tanzaku and hung them up on bamboo branches.

Tanabata was inspired by the famous Chinese folklore legend of the cowherd and the weaver girl.

As the story goes, Tentei (the Sky King) had a daughter named Orihime (the Weaving Princess). She spent her days weaving beautiful cloth by the banks of the Amanogawa (Heavenly River). Since Tentei loved the cloth so much, the princess worked hard at her weaving every day to please him. However, she eventually grew sad because she devoted so much time to her work that she could not meet anyone and fall in love. Tentei sympathized with his daughter and arranged for her to meet a cowherd named Hikoboshi, who lived and worked on the other side of the Amanogawa.

The young couple fell in love instantly and were married shortly thereafter. Once married, Orihime stopped weaving cloth and her husband no longer tended to his heard. This angered Tentei and he separated the two lovers across the river and forbade them to ever see each other again. The princess grew despondent and begged her father to let her meet her husband. The king was moved by his daughter’s tears and allowed the couple to meet on the seventh day of the seventh month with the stipulation that she work hard and finish her weaving.

The first time the couple tried to meet, they found that they could not cross the river because there was no bridge. Orihime cried so much that a flock of magpies came and promised to make a bridge with their wings so that she could cross the river. It is said that if it rains on Tanabata, the magpies cannot come and the two lovers must wait until the following year to meet. The rain on Tanabata is called "The tears of Orihime and Hikoboshi."

In modern-day Japan, large-scale Tanabata festivals are held in many places, mainly along shopping malls and streets, which are decorated with large, colorful streamers. The most famous Tanabata festival is held in Sendai from August 6-8. Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disney Sea often celebrate the Tanabata Festival with a parade featuring Minnie as Orihime and Mickey as Hikoboshi.