KOTA KINABALU, MALAYSIA — The only thing hotter than the suffocating air hanging over this city’s bustling night market are the flames I see spewing from the mouth of a man standing just a few metres from me.

TOKYO - Each year, on the Saturday closest to November 15, children aged 3, 5 and 7 all across Japan dress up in traditional garments — kimonos for the girls and hakamas for the boys — and are taken by their parents and grandparents to shrines to participate in an ancient ceremony called Shichigosan.