A music festival may seem like the last place you would bring your toddler, given the usual festival theatrics: unpredictable weather, blaring speakers, and thousands of strangers rocking out to their favourite music. But interestingly enough, Fuji Rock Festival in Japan seemed like the perfect getaway for our little family vacation of music and exploration with little Zee in tow.
I knew it was the right decision the moment I saw him exploring the grassy play area around the little teepee tent that we set up for him on the first day at the festival. Seeing him soak in the new surroundings was beautiful. We always knew that he loved the outdoors but seeing him this excited about his foreign environment made us realise that we did the right thing.
When Ben and I were deciding on a festival to visit for a vacation with some friends, we couldn’t imagine being away from the little guy for more than a day. So after much deliberation, we decided on the most child-friendly music festival we could possibly think of. Since we’d been to Fuji Rock Festival some years back, we thought it was a “challenging but workable” decision.
But before you start imagining head banging and drunken louts going all crazy at the festival, the atmosphere at Fuji Rock is usually chilled and relaxed with plenty of outdoor-themed play areas for kids, wide open spaces for picnics and of course, good music to top it all off. Fuji Rock Festival is one of the few festivals in the region that is open to people of all ages including kids.
Preparing for the trip seemed fairly easy. We had a travel checklist of items to bring along, plus some necessities and others for the “just-incase-he-can’t-stop-crying” plan we’d put together for the 7-hour flight to Tokyo. But just like most parents, we ended up over-packing for the sake of Zee, doubling up on all our fresh supplies just in case we needed them. Since we decided to cook for Zee on the trip we booked an apartment close to the venue that allowed us to get groceries and fix Zee’s food each morning, making our lives a whole lot easier at the festival.
We know that the key to getting Zee in the mood for new experiences was first to get him settled down in the new environment. On day 1 of the festival, our mission was to find the best spot to pitch our portable teepee tent for the play area and to make it as comfortable as possible for the little guy. As we predicted, it didn’t take long till Zee started to slowly explore his surroundings.
Zee loved the wide open areas of the festival grounds and the interesting mix of music coming from all the stages. At every turn was a new sight or sound for him to take in. This made the whole experience of taking care of him a lot easier because we could just have fun watching him run around the play area while mingling with other toddlers and not have to constantly mollycoddle him during the day. We realised that we need to learn to trust Zee to explore his surroundings and express his emotion the way he wanted to.
The most challenging part of having Zee there was trying to enjoy the festival while at the same time attending to Zee’s feeding, sleep routines and mood. We were prepared to throw his sleep routines out of the window for now so the strategy was “eat and sleep as and when he wants to”. Thinking ahead, we brought a baby carrier for whenever and wherever he needs to sleep, and loads of healthy snacks just in case we were stuck in queue at the festival ground. This works perfectly.
In terms of the practicalities of bringing a toddler to a music festival, there are many things to consider. Having said that, the fact that we chose a toddler-friendly festival helped because that covered some of the essentials like the kiddy play areas at all the stages, food vendors, clean water, and most importantly a well-stocked store packed with a steady supply of diapers.
On our end the most important things we brought along were the obvious items like wet weather gear, a comfortable child carrier, child-sized earmuffs, sun block, mosquito repellent, some snacks, extra meals and milk for Zee.
My advice for mums who live for music and would love to experience the same is to do lots of research and to be prepared for any eventuality. Try to enjoy the moment with your child because it should be a journey of experience for both you and your child.
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Irene See is a brutally practical, adventurous and full-time working mom who’s living life to the fullest.
Special thanks to Russell Especkerman.
