Yurei

Yūrei (幽霊) are “ghosts” in Japanese folklore. The kanji directly translates to “faint spirit”. It is a traditional Japanese belief that for a dead person’s spirit to rest in peace and join its ancestors (sometimes even becoming the protector of their living loved ones), it has to be given a proper funeral and burial rites.

It is said that if a dead person has not been given a proper burial, or has been a victim of a violent death, its spirit lingers in the land of the living as a yūrei (or sometimes as an onryō or “vengeful spirit”). Sometimes, extreme feelings (such as love and anger), or an unfinished business may also cause a yūrei to stay.

One old tale about a yūrei is about the prodigal samurai and his wife:

むかしむかし, there lived a poor but skillful samurai. He met the woman of his dreams and married her, and together they lived a happy but simple life in a small village.

Everything was looking good for both of them, until one day, the samurai was given great honors for his skills, and was offered a high position in the emperor’s palace, which was in a faraway city.

The samurai, blinded by power and money, immediately decided to leave home. He promised his wife that he would return soon, then he excitedly set off to the faraway place.

Once he got there, he was amazed by all the luxury that lay before him: delicious food, all kinds of extravagant things, and he even met a lovely lady that he forgot all about his wife. He spent his days merrymaking when he was not working.

Five years had passed, and soon he got weary of his life in the city. He missed his simple life with his loving wife, and everyday he grew more homesick.

One day, he finally decided to come home to the small village. He found their house looking the same way when he left it, but it was very clean and tidy. He found his wife sitting on their porch, and she smiled warmly upon seeing him, her eyes shining with tears. He hugged her, feeling very guilty. That night, they slept with his wife in his arms.

He whispered to her, “I’m sorry I left you, and I’m sorry for a lot of things too. I missed you so much.”

She answered, “Don’t worry, I’m happy now that you’ve come home. I love you, and I missed you too.”

He fell asleep, and the next morning, he was shocked at what he saw the moment he woke up.

Next to him was a corpse, and when he looked around the room, everything was old and dusty! He ran outside to his neighbor’s house and demanded that they tell him what happened to his home. They replied:

"When you left, she waited for you to come back. When she did not receive any letter from you, she became very distant and depressed as time went by. She stopped talking to us and she stopped coming out of your house, until one day, we thought we smelled something rotten coming from your house, and we figured that she had died. Nobody ever came to check on your house because everyone thought she cursed it."

The samurai, feeling very shocked and sorry, went back to his house and started to cry. That afternoon, he took his wife’s corpse and buried it.

He cleaned the house, and continued with his life. Sometimes, when he felt really sad and alone, he could have sworn that he could still see his wife sitting in their porch, smiling at him warmly and sweetly.

The end~

;_____;