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Nihongo TalesEasy Japanese

Kasa Jizo, The Straw Hats for the Stone Statues

49 sentences · 1024 characters

How this story is made

The audio is read aloud by a native Japanese speaker, line by line. Every line is checked against the script before it goes up.

The pictures are made with AI and then checked one by one — any that get the story wrong are made again.

The English follows the Japanese line by line — tense included. Japanese stories move between past and present, so the English does too.

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  1. Long, long ago, a poor old man and old woman lived in a certain place.

  2. They made straw hats and sold them to make a living.

  3. New Year was coming soon.

  4. But they had no money to buy rice cakes.

  5. So the old man made five straw hats.

  6. The old man went to town to sell the hats.

  7. It was snowing heavily outside.

  8. The old man called out loudly, selling his hats.

  9. But nobody bought a hat.

  10. Evening came.

  11. On the way home, the old man found six Jizo statues.

  12. The Jizo statues were standing in the snow.

  13. There was a lot of snow on the heads and shoulders of the Jizo statues.

  14. The old man felt sorry for the Jizo statues.

  15. The old man said,

  16. "Dear Jizo, it's cold, isn't it?

  17. I'll put hats on you now."

  18. The old man gently brushed the snow off the Jizo statues.

  19. He put the unsold hats on the Jizo statues.

  20. But there were only five hats.

  21. There were six Jizo statues.

  22. The old man thought for a moment.

  23. He put his own hand towel on the last Jizo statue.

  24. "This will make you a little warmer."

  25. The old man went home.

  26. The old woman asked the old man,

  27. "Did you sell the hats?"

  28. The old man said,

  29. "I didn't sell a single hat."

  30. The old man continued,

  31. "But on the way home, I put hats on the Jizo statues."

  32. The old woman smiled.

  33. "That was a kind thing to do."

  34. The two of them slept quietly that night.

  35. Late at night, a loud noise came from outside.

  36. They also heard voices saying, "Yoisa, yoisa."

  37. The old man and old woman were startled and woke up.

  38. But they were too scared to look outside.

  39. Morning came.

  40. The old man quietly opened the door.

  41. In front of the house, many big sacks had been left.

  42. Inside the sacks were rice, rice cakes, and money.

  43. The old man and old woman were amazed.

  44. Just then, far away, they saw the Jizo statues wearing the hats.

  45. The Jizo statues walked through the snow toward the mountains.

  46. The old man and old woman thanked the Jizo statues.

  47. That year, the two of them had a very happy New Year.

  48. The old man and old woman went on living together happily after that.

  49. The end.