Japanese Dolls- OKIKU NINGYO

Ningyo is the name for a traditional doll in Japan. Word-for-word ningyo means "human shape" and there is a story long ago in Japan about a doll that its hair is growing, it is called the Okiku Ningyo.

The kimono-dressed doll was purchased during 1918 by a young boy named Eikichi Suzuki for hir 2-year old sister named Okiku. Okiku played with the doll everyday but she died in a severe cold the following year. The family placed the doll in their household altar and prayed to it everyday in the memory of Okiku. 

Okiku Ningyo in the altar

Later, the family noticed that dolls' hair is starting to grow. They've seen it as sign of Okiku's restless spirit has taken refuge in the doll. They took the hair in the lab and result is its a real human hair. 

 In 1938, the Suzuki family moved to Sakhalin and they put the doll in care at the Mannenji temple where it has remained ever since.

The hair continues to grow every year and the people in Japan started to have a ceremony in memory of Okiku. They trim the hair each year. 

Nobody has every explained why is the doll's hair continues to grow but one scientific examination was held and it is concluded that the hair is indeed a hair of a young child.