It’s a summer evening. You sit on the beach with your loved ones, chocolate-covered banana in hand, and watch as a series of fireworks paint the sky right before your eyes.
A swarm of people surround you and applaud after each explosion rings out. Many are dressed up Yukatathe summer kimono whose prints often mimic the colorful display above.
This exact scene (give or take the banana) is what summer has meant to generations of Japanese for hundreds of years. As night falls and the warm weather subsides, revelers head to the nearest beach or riverbank to marvel at the spectacle of what is known here as Hanabi (literally: “fire flowers”).
