23rd July – 文月
Today is a public holiday called ‘海の日 (Umi no hi)’, meaning Ocean day. Normally this holiday falls on the third Monday of July (13th July this year) but it was moved to today due to the Tokyo Olympic game which were supposed to be held from tomorrow.
This holiday is for thanking the benefit from the ocean and wishing the further prosperity for Japan as a maritime nation.
This public holiday was established in 1996, and it was on 20th of July.
In 1876, Meiji Emperor visited Tohoku (Northern Japan) for a holiday. He used steamship for this trip and came back to Yokohama harbour on 20th July. This day was the first time to be able to ensure the safety of shipping. Moreover, from that day, traveling by ships and ship transportation have become popular. Therefore, 20th July was chosen for the 海の日 at first in 1996.
7years later, government decided to change the date of this holiday to the third Monday of July from 2003. This is because of ハッピーマンデー制度 (Happy Monday Seido), in order to activate tourism and economy, government changes Monday to a national holiday, so public can have continuous holiday (Saturday to Monday), which can accelerate people to go for inland traveling.
Not many Japanese know why this holiday is called 海の日 – Now that you know, let’s thank the marine lives and celebrate this day together:)
Little Japan Dictionary 