17th February – 如月

マスク – Mask

Because of the Corona virus around the world, masks have been a hot topic and the supply shortage has been a big problem at the moment.

In Japan, wearing masks is not a new thing and moreover, many people in Japan wear masks all season even there are no viruses or flues.

The history of wearing masks goes back to 1918 ~ 1920 when the Spanish Flu was affecting the world. At that time, half of Japanese population was infected. Then, many people started wearing masks to avoid that flu. From this incident, Japanese people have used masks every time when the flues hit this island.

Generally many Japanese wear masks in spring time to reduce the allergic reaction of hay fever as Japanese pollen splashes are serious. But still many Japanese wear masks for other purposes than avoiding hay fever, flu or sickness.

why Japanese people wear masks that often nowadays?

The reason could be related to the self-confidence issue for Japanese.

Many Japanese girls, especially younger generation wear masks in order to hide their face without makeup. Most Japanese girls are nervous of showing their face without makeup and have no confidence on the natural face. Furthermore, some people wear masks because it feels secure or wearing mask can avoid from making facial expressions. One research revealed that around 50% of Japanese ladies aged in 20s wear masks for general use.

Those mask except using as a medical reason is called 伊達マスク(Date-masuku).

Nowadays, there are many functional masks in the shops, such as making the face look smaller, colored masks and so on. Now wearing mask is not only the medical use, it has become a fashion too.

However, those Date-mask use can cause a problem – afraid of communicating with people. Because those people wearing masks feels themselves as less confident showing their face, continuously wearing masks keeps their self-confidence very low and in the worst case, it can make them social withdrawal.

Even there are people who cannot take the masks the whole 2 years in Japan.

It is a useful tool to prevent sickness, but can be also dangerous, making the life a lot harder to be ourselves.