Blooming has been an evolving symbol of the nation of Japan for hundreds of years. The meaning of blossoms in Japan runs deep, making some of the flowers a cultural icon, the country’s national flowers. Blooming season is powerful, glorious, and sublime, but short-lived — a visual reminder that our lives, too, are fleeting. It also revered as a symbol of rebirth, renewal and optimism, and reproduction. With the blooming season coinciding with the beginning of the Japanese calendar year, they also bring hope and new dreams for the future. No one personified this metaphor more than samurai - the warriors of feudal Japan who lived by bushido (“the way of the warrior”) - a strict moral code of respect, honor and discipline, exemplifying the noble character of the “Japanese soul” — men who do not fear death. Held above all other flowers by the rulers of Japan, Ohnuki-Tierney (in the book Kamikaze, Cherry Blossoms and Nationalisms) writes the cherry blossom or sakura have been used as symbols for everything, from predicting successful harvests of rice to giving the World War II kamikaze pilots courage for their one-way missions – they were painting their warplanes with the flower imagery before embarking on suicide missions to “die like beautiful falling cherry petals for the emperor”, promoting imperial nationalism. Maybe today, it no longer embraces self-destructive purposes, but blossoming flowers indeed represent political and national alliances.