Audio: Justin McCurry in Tokyo meets the Japanese husbands declaring their love - with a microphone
• or download to your computer
Never let it be said of the typical Japanese husband that he is a cold automaton who has become a stranger in his own home.
At least not of the 30 or so who turned out on a freezing evening in Tokyo's Hibiya park, cleared their throats and yelled ear-splitting pledges of undying love for their long-suffering kanai (literally, 'her indoors').
The men, fresh from work, were part of an event organised by the Japan Aisaika association, a group of self-proclaimed "adoring husbands" whose humble aim is to achieve world peace through happy marriages.
For now, the brave men who opened their hearts in front of a crowd of strangers and TV cameras had to make do with a certificate confirming their status as devoted hubbies, and flowers to take home to their wives, a habit the group hopes husbands across the country will adopt every January 31st.
But Beloved Wife Day may not be all that is seems: sceptics in the Hibiya park crowd reckoned a few of the men were using their 30 seconds behind the mic to beg forgiveness from their better halves for decades of workaholism-induced emotional neglect in the home.
It's quite possible that those near retirement age may have been acting out of enlightened self-interest, now that changes to Japanese laws entitle women to up to half of their husband's pension following divorce.
